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forasecondtherewedwon · 3 years ago

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Love Me Like You Drew - chapter four

Fandom: Nancy Drew Pairing: Nancy x Ace Rating: E Chapter: 4 / 6 Word Count: 4481

Chapter summary: Nancy hadn’t expected the police station to be the most exciting part of Bess’s Horseshoe Bay tour. She really hadn’t.

Read: chapter one | chapter two | chapter three

Nancy wondered if Aristotle had sensed that she knew Bess, and if some of his hostility came from fearing Bess was out for his job.

She wasn’t, she assured Nancy, she was just a history enthusiast, and a Horseshoe Bay enthusiast, and a walking tour enthusiast, and a new-friendships enthusiast, beaming and chattering as she showed Nancy around town like she’d personally selected every grain of sand on the beach and blended every flavour of ice cream at the ice cream shop. Bess was an honest-to-god delight and Nancy was thrilled to find that she wasn’t tiring of her new friend’s unending supply of gusto. She was zestier than the massive grapefruit Nancy had eaten for breakfast at the Breaker.

Following her conversation with Odette, she’d experienced what she’d long ago recognized to be a natural and necessary period of rebellion; her agent told her to do one thing, she had to do another. This time, Odette’s bid for Nancy to go out and flirt had been all the impetus Nancy had needed to shut herself in her hotel room for a day and a half, forsaking all socialization.

She’d hooked the Do Not Disturb sign around the doorknob so housekeeping’s knock wouldn’t intrude on her solitude. She’d paced the bedroom, darting looks at the blank document she’d opened on her laptop. She’d committed herself to the world’s slowest, most indulgent leg-shaving—and of course an idea had come to her partway through, forcing her to launch herself out of the bathtub and scamper, dripping, to her notebook. The pages had dried bumpy.

Yeah, it was probably a good thing that Bess had called today to renew her offer of showing Nancy around Horseshoe Bay. If nothing else, it had motivated Nancy to finish shaving her legs and put on a sundress she hadn’t actually been able to picture herself wearing on this trip when she’d shoved it into her bag in New York. The medium Bess had introduced her to an hour ago had promised her that the sundress would be associated with positive developments. Sounded good to Nancy, even if the method of attaining that promising forecast had required her to smile politely while holding in her opinion that the medium’s methods and predictions were all bullshit. But it was better not to rock the boat in a seafaring community.

She’d preferred the portion of the tour that had come with hard facts. Another of Bess’s passions was her volunteer work at the Historical Society. (Another intrusion into Aristotle’s territory, but Nancy kept her lips zipped.) The woman who ran it, Hannah Gruen, had apparently seen something promising in all of Bess’s interest in Marvin family history and taken her under her wing. Nancy admired the building—surprised by the peach siding—and Hannah’s calm, orderly presence. There were rows of neat lockboxes, tidy drawers of files, and a large book of records with the entries recorded in Hannah’s clean hand. Just being there had made Nancy feel more organized. Not everything in Horseshoe Bay had to inspire the content of her writing—some of it could inspire the mental state that made the writing possible.

“Not too boring?” Bess checked after Hannah had shown them out and waved from the doorway. Bess took quick, deer-like steps down from the porch to the front path in her espadrilles, hands raised like she was waiting to catch Nancy’s disappointment.

She was still anxious to please, Nancy could tell. They’d gotten along quickly, but Bess certainly hadn’t forgotten that Nancy was also the author of her favourite book series. There’d been an artifact (looked like a paperweight to Nancy, but she hadn’t wanted to downplay anything in Hannah’s domain) featuring a pattern of roses that Bess had drawn Nancy’s attention to, saying the shade of pink was exactly what she’d imagined Lucy Sable’s dress to look like in His Sea Queen, when Ryan Hudson proposed to her on the windswept bluffs.

“No,” Nancy said sincerely. “That was great. She made me want to restructure my notebook collection.”

“Oh good,” Bess said, transparently relieved.

Nancy halted her with a gentle hand on her arm.

“You don’t have to sell me on anything. I’m sold. Your town is like a postcard and you’ve been amazing to me since I got here. You can relax, Bess.”

“You just… you created such a beautiful world in your books that I suppose I want us to… live up to that.”

“This place is just as beautiful…” Nancy began, remembering the wooden pier they’d walked out on to look at the water, the main-street porch railings wound with honeysuckle, and the cute blue house they’d passed on their way to the Historical Society.

Bess shook her head.

“Not the scenery, Nancy. Your books have heart. They have pain. I know I’ve been nattering on about Lucy’s gowns and my envy of the Hudson yacht, but the depth you gave the story is the reason I go back to it over and over, when something’s gone wrong in my life.” She tipped her head, reflecting. “When something’s gone right. The romance can only be the sweet confection that it is because it exists in an imperfect world that throws a love like Ryan and Lucy’s into stark relief.”

Nancy, who hadn’t been expecting any of that, didn’t even try to respond. She threw her arms around Bess in a tight hug. Bess chuckled and patted her on the back.

“What’s this for?”

“I had no idea how much I needed a Bess Marvin in my life,” Nancy confessed, making Bess laugh again. She pulled back. “You know, you’d be a great literary agent.”

“Why? Do I remind you of yours?”

“God no. My agent is moody, sarcastic, and patronizing. Oh, and she called my editor a cunt.”

Bess gasped.

“Not to her face,” Nancy clarified. “Although, that would’ve been priceless.”

“The publishing industry is so much different than I would have imagined.”

“Better continue the tour before I shatter any other illusions.”

The earlier stop at the ice cream shop had qualified as brunch, as far as Nancy was concerned, and Bess next led her towards the police station. The plan was to meet up with Bess’s girlfriend, Lisbeth, on her lunch hour for a quick bite. Bess came armed with donut holes. Apparently, Lisbeth could roll her eyes all she liked at the cop/donut stereotype but Bess hadn’t yet known her to reject the bakery’s chocolate glaze.

They found Lisbeth in the bullpen. Rather, they spotted Lisbeth in the bullpen (Bess pointed her out to Nancy like a kid picking their stuffed animal prize from a rare rigged carnival game win), but she was on the phone. Bess had to grab Nancy’s arm to stop her from pushing through the low wooden gate.

“You can’t just walk in!” Bess said, shocked. “This is a police station.”

“Sorry, but they shouldn’t have made the little swinging door so inviting. It’s like a saloon for toddlers.”

“We’ll just wait here a moment. She’ll see we’ve come in.”

Bess clasped her purse in front of herself with both hands, eyes fixed on Lisbeth. Nancy studied her.

“Is Lisbeth still working late nights?” she guessed.

The obvious effort to relax her posture only made Bess seem more anxious for her girlfriend’s notice.

“She’s on a big case right now,” Bess explained. “She’s been made acting chief and she’s hoping this case convinces the powers that be to give her the position permanently.” She put her back to the cop at the desk and pitched her voice for Nancy’s ears only to convey more personal details. “Recently, Lisbeth proposed we move in together and I agreed, but I’m afraid she only offered as a way to placate me because we’ve missed so many dinners and had to cancel weekend plans.”

Bess looked pained. And this was the problem with being observant—Nancy voiced what she noticed and it led to someone looking for support or sympathy or advice. Not that Bess didn’t deserve those things, but Nancy was an author, not a relationship counsellor. If this were a book, her first-draft crack at solving the strain between Bess and Lisbeth would be to write them into a private office or interview room and not let them out until they were limp with satisfaction and covered in hickeys that made them feel like teenagers again.

Nancy didn’t feel that she knew Bess quite well enough to suggest that.

“That must be difficult,” she said instead.

“It is.”

Bess appeared grateful just to have this much understood.

“I’m sure it won’t last,” Nancy offered. “I bet it means a lot to her that you’re making the effort to come to her in the meantime.”

“I try.” Bess gave her a small smile. “I guess, in the grand scheme of things, this busy period isn’t going to seem very long at all.”

“Definitely not as significant as Lisbeth moving to Horseshoe Bay to be near you.”

“That was a fairly romantic gesture.”

“Don’t downplay it.” Nancy elbowed her playfully. “Lisbeth’s gotta be head over heels.”

“We’ve lasted this long. Patience will keep us together.”

“And donut holes,” Nancy said, pointing at the bag Bess was scrunching with the handle of her purse.

“Yes, of course.”

She loosened her grip. Nancy darted her gaze back to the bullpen.

“Aaand Lisbeth’s off the phone,” she announced. “Time to introduce me.”

Bess only had eyes for the woman with short hair and a dark, tailored jacket. Lisbeth’s smile was more reserved than her girlfriend’s, but she seemed pleased to meet Nancy as they shook hands.

“Can I just borrow Bess for a minute though?” Lisbeth requested, hand on her girlfriend’s back.

“Yes, totally,” Nancy said. “I’ll just…” She glanced around at the benches lining the walls, but they were suddenly occupied, unless she wanted to squeeze into an end space next to an elderly lady who was being slightly aggressive with her knitting.

“Why don’t you wait in my office.”

While technically a question, Lisbeth hadn’t spoken it that way. It was probably hard to turn off the tone of authority in Lisbeth’s job, but Nancy didn’t mind. Behind the words was considerate intent, so she nodded and grinned at Bess as she was permitted to push through the swinging door after all, gestured between the desks to the office at the end.

Nancy wasn’t sure whether to leave the door open or shut; it had been shut when Lisbeth had sent her over, but would someone think she was up to something in here if she didn’t keep the door wide behind her? She decided on half-closed, which didn’t block out the sounds of talking, ringing phones, and an angry-sounding printer, but felt solitary enough since the blind was drawn down on the glass door. She sighed and pulled out her phone to pass the time.

Her dad had texted her, which was mildly interesting. She was pretty confident that he didn’t really expect her to reply to the emails he sent. They’d always felt like they were more for his peace of mind, allowing him to check in and vent his veiled worries about her at greater length than what was permitted by the callously brief space of time on her voicemail. Texts demanded less—less attention, fewer words in response—and were therefore a more attractive form of communication. Though Nancy still ignored plenty of texts. (Odette wrote long, flowing emails like she was laying down the exposition for a Thomas Hardy novel, every line spikily sarcastic with the knowledge that she had a very slim chance of getting an email back. In contrast, her texts skipped the preamble and got right to the agent-on-author abuse, which Nancy readily admitted to be a timesaver.)

The fact that her dad had texted her meant he was missing her more than usual, lonely enough to actually need an answer. Maybe Jean was swamped at the office. Any day now, Nancy was going to start being kinder about their relationship and actually stop feeling the irrational betrayal of her dad being disloyal to her mom that she’d told him she’d gotten over years ago.

She scanned through his two short texts. He hadn’t asked about the situation with Columbia, but only because she hadn’t told him about that. She’d planned on surprising him when she got good news, so.

How are you, honey? he wanted to know. I made Mom’s pancakes this morning and I was thinking about you.

Dad, I’m struggling, she longed to send back. Either that or, Dad, I’m in Maine and I kind of love it here. Both were true, both would be strange for her to admit to him. She wasn’t the most emotionally available person.

Surviving, she decided to reply. Maybe we can talk soon.

She’d made that particular promise before and always backed out. She might again. It took so little effort to make “soon” never arrive—family dinners she’d flaked on last-minute, flimsy excuses for why she’d had to end one of their infrequent calls, redirects to asking transparently insincere questions about Jean. Nancy had an insane number of avoidance tactics in her arsenal.

Distantly uneasy about the short reprieve she’d bought herself, she tucked her phone away. She was just beginning to look around Lisbeth’s office—look, not snoop—when the side door clicked open. Nancy stiffened, a babbled explanation for what she, a stranger, was doing in the office of the acting chief of police rising up her throat like bad chowder, when the intruder slipped quickly into the room and elbowed the door shut behind himself.

Sonofabitch.

“Ace Hardy,” she said in a tone that announced she should’ve known.

Because who else would find her here? What other man on this planet would be capable of intercepting her during Bess’s chaotic tour that zigzagged the town? What man would just walk in wearing… handcuffs?

Her vision seemed to recalibrate as the chunk of her brain preoccupied by romance came online. Fuck, she wanted to plant a hand on his chest and push his back against the door he’d just come through. Ace. Handcuffs. Looking startled and perplexed to find the room wasn’t empty.

Why did he look surprised? Nancy’s brain squeegeed the built-in lust filter off her vision. Quickly, she crossed to the door that opened onto the bullpen and swung it closed, then rounded on him.

“I don’t know what the hell you did to go from a guy who volunteers with children to one who gets arrested, but I am not letting you out of here. Stay right there.”

Ace appeared doubly thrown by her presence and her instruction.

“Nancy…? Wait, do you think I’m trying to escape?”

She watched him warily, still standing between him and the exit, although she was realizing it would be a pretty stupid exit for Ace to take if he was attempting to give the cops the slip.

“You’re not?” she checked, because, during the short time they’d been acquainted, she hadn’t known him to lie.

“I’m hiding from my father.”

“Yeah, I’m gonna need more explanation than that.”

“Used to be on the force,” Ace recapped for her, “now retired, but Mom and me can’t stop him from coming down to the station once a week to pitch in.”

“But you tried to stop him and his parenting methods are questionable?” she guessed, glancing at the cuffs that held Ace’s wrists together in front of him.

He cracked a small smile.

“Yes and no. I came with him, but he didn’t do this. I did.”

Nancy smothered the part of her that wanted to offer to do it for him next time. She should really leave. Go find Bess and Lisbeth…

“I’m trying to teach myself how to get outta them,” Ace explained before she could ask.

“Why?”

“In case I ever need to.” The glint in his eye when he looked at her suggested a real arrest wasn’t the situation he was taking measures to prepare for. “I’ve practiced with one hand free, but I guess I got cocky and thought I could still pick the lock with both hands restrained.”

“Can’t you just ask your dad to uncuff you?”

“No. He was… I got bored waiting for him to come out for lunch and swiped these. I thought I could put ’em back before he noticed, but…” He shrugged. “They got the best of me.”

“So,” Nancy said with cautious curiosity, “normally, when you’re practicing, it’s with cuffs that belong to…?”

“Oh, I’ve got a few pairs of my own,” Ace readily divulged.

“That is… interesting information.”

He came towards her, speed-reading her face like he was cramming for an exam. (Not that Nancy’d know what those were like—fucking Columbia.) Slowly, he held his cuffed hands out to her.

“Do you have time to help me? I’ll owe you one.”

She swallowed, looking from his large, slack, unthreatening hands to his face. She heard the printer outside the door thunder to life and jumped, but Ace only stepped closer.

“I’ve never picked a lock before,” she said.

“I’ll guide you. You can do it.”

“Hmm. That’s what you said about me and archery.”

“Which you were great at!”

“Liar.” She rolled her eyes, smiling.

“No way.”

Nancy could tell that Ace believed what he was saying, and that he only believed it because his unconcealed attraction to her was blinding him to her shortcomings. He liked her too much. She was such a sucker for guys who liked her too much.

Sighing in resignation, she said, “I don’t even know what I need to get these handcuffs off.”

“I got the tools in my pocket.”

“Convenient.”

Oh, not convenient enough to help him get out of this predicament on his own, but convenient for him that she had to slip her fingers into his front pocket while they stood face to face, Ace’s hands lifted out of the way between them. His face strived for an innocence she didn’t trust for a second. Even if she knew he couldn’t have orchestrated this and was, in that way, as innocent as his pretty blue eyes implored her to accept.

“Couldn’t have been the back pocket?” Nancy remarked wryly, feeling for the thin strips of metal and dying to just grip Ace’s warm thigh through the worn-soft cotton pocket.

“Couldn’t reach that with the handcuffs on,” he said.

“Of course not.”

She continued to fumble for the lockpicking tools. Alright, she was shitty at archery, and she’d never tried to break out of a pair of handcuffs, but her hand-eye coordination was not that bad. At least, it was better than this—her fingers scrabbling in vain as the tools repeatedly evaded her. She’d probably be able to concentrate better without looking Ace directly in the eye while she groped in his pocket, but she didn’t seem to be able to break off the stare. If only he wasn’t so warm. If only he wasn’t so close. If only she hadn’t shut the office door.

“Fuck it,” Nancy breathed.

She yanked her hand from his pocket and fisted the front of his shirt as she surged in to kiss him. Her hand twisted his shirt, her mouth pressed passionately to his, and if this was the bad idea she’d convinced herself it would be, then why did it feel so good? Nancy’s eyes clamped shut even tighter when Ace made a noise against her mouth—a groan that melted her like a popsicle. Unless it wasn’t a groan; maybe he was trying to speak.

Nancy pulled back, releasing his shirt.

“I…” she began, wide-eyed and searching her blank mind for the words that would help her explain herself.

But Ace, mouth pink from the pressure of her lips, shook his head dazedly. He raised his arms to loop his cuffed wrists over her head. The inside of his forearms skimmed down her back until he pulled her towards him and found her mouth again with heavy insistence. Nancy gave up, gave in, leaned in, pressing her chest to his. Her hands slid over his shoulders to hold the back of his neck as they kissed feverishly.

“I really like your dress,” he said, the words panted in the breath he took moving from her lips to her neck.

“Thanks,” she sighed.

She let her head fall to the side to give Ace space to do his excellent work. His eagerness reminded her of Gil’s, though the budding adoration just underneath smacked more of Owen. There was some of Abe’s haste without the faint tone of annoyance that had flavoured their brief fling, and a touch of what Park had been like when he’d finally quit trying to resist their chemistry, minus the clinginess that had come even before he had.

Ace wasn’t exactly like anybody she’d felt this level of attraction to before, and Nancy found it hard to categorize him as easily as she had the others. Her four almost-relationships swirled in her mind—the flirtations, the temporary relief from thinking about her mom, or her dad’s refusal to use her first book advance to pay down the medical debt, or the first time Columbia had made her feel worthless. Kissing Ace actually made her feel more connected to herself, and more aware of the choices she was making, rather than acting as a distraction from things she couldn’t bring herself to confront. That should have scared her. It probably would later.

He brought his mouth back to hers and Nancy tugged his lip lightly between her teeth, letting her hands drift up to play with the ends of his hair. She felt the unyielding metal encircling his wrists as his hands slid lower—trying unsuccessfully to grab her ass, as far as she could tell, until he had to concede this round to the cuffs. She smiled against his lips between kisses and felt his mouth quirk up in return.

“…in my office.”

At the sound of the raised voice, Nancy attempted to step back from Ace, forgetting she was trapped by his locked embrace. He winced as she shoved into his cuffed wrists. Enacting the only other plan she could come up with, she dropped to a crouch. Ace took a swift step back. When the door to Lisbeth’s office opened, Nancy was pretending to retie her shoelace.

She flicked her hair to the side to see Horseshoe Bay’s acting chief and beamed at her.

“Hi!”

“…Hi,” Lisbeth replied, frowning as she looked from Nancy to Ace.

Nancy stood, smile fixed in place as she stole a glance at Ace. Though his expression was slightly stunned, she hadn’t messed up his hair too much, and he looked largely presentable. If he had a boner right now, that would probably give them away, but she couldn’t risk looking in the direction of his crotch. He hadn’t pushed his hips into hers as they’d made out, which either meant he hadn’t been quite as swept up in the moment as she had, or he was a gentleman and didn’t nudge his erection against a girl to signal that he’d like to take her back to his place and fuck now. (Gil had never been subtle.)

Casually, Nancy made sure to position herself in front of Ace.

“Again, Ace?” Lisbeth asked.

She appeared more amused now and it was like a slap to Nancy as she considered the question. Again? Had Lisbeth caught him making out with someone in her office before? Oh god, was Nancy jealous?

Confused and horrified at herself, it was difficult not to sigh in relief as Lisbeth retrieved a small set of keys and gestured for Ace to present his wrists. The damn handcuffs. Lisbeth had caught him doing his amateur Houdini shit before. That was all. And of course they had a routine, an easy rapport around the implication that she wouldn’t be ratting him out to his father; she was Bess’s girlfriend, and Bess was Ace’s best friend.

Ok, Nancy knew this wasn’t a Hallmark movie she’d happened upon, but everybody did seem to know each other.

Chik went the metal as Lisbeth freed Ace, seconds before Bess waltzed into the room.

“Are we ready to go?” she asked. Her gaze landed on Lisbeth, then Nancy, then Ace. “Oh hey,” she greeted, giving him a warm smile. “What are you doing here?”

“Just waiting for the Captain,” he said. “We’re going for lunch.”

“Well, what a coincidence because—good news, Nancy—Lisbeth’s relented to all my pleading and agreed to be dragged out of the station for an hour as well.”

“Half an hour,” Lisbeth corrected in a fond tone, dropping the cuffs and keys into a desk drawer.

“Alright, alright, forty-five minutes. So. Are we going? See you later, Ace.”

Expression chipper, Bess glanced between the three of them and Lisbeth went to her, linking their fingers and striding for the door. Nancy had to follow, but her feet wouldn’t move. Bess and her girlfriend were already walking through the bullpen and Nancy was dawdling, staring at Ace and not knowing what to say. He looked like he was gathering his own thoughts, but she cut across him.

“I better catch up,” she blurted.

“Um, yeah, enjoy your lunch.”

Even after what she’d said, Nancy turned back towards Ace with the urge to kiss him again. She took half a step and squashed it, but she saw in his face that it didn’t matter; he’d read her impulse. She would only have stammered through anything else she tried to say to him at that point, so she fled the room.

She caught up to Bess and Lisbeth on the sidewalk outside and they walked in the direction of a nearby sandwich shop. Nancy did her best to seem normal and not like she was replaying the weight of Ace’s joined hands against the small of her back or the heat of their kiss. She almost thought she should go back to see that medium Bess had taken her to, but she couldn’t decide whether it’d be to tip or strangle her.

Nancy honestly believed she was doing a pretty good job of concealing her amorous encounter until Lisbeth dropped a few steps behind them to take a work call and Bess sidled up to her conspiratorially.

“I love the shade of your lip gloss,” she said. “That smear you left on Ace’s mouth really complemented the colour of his eyes.”

“Fuck,” Nancy muttered.

“It does seem as though things are headed that way, yeah.”

Bess was rubbing it in a little too much, Nancy felt, by sounding so gleeful. And her grin had no right to be that infectious.

Nancy smiled and slid her mom’s locket along its chain.

#my writing #Love Me Like You Drew #Nancy Drew #Nace #Ace [redacted]#Bess Marvin #Bess x Lisbeth #Nancy Drew fanfiction #Nancy Drew fic #Nace fanfiction

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