My Kind of Town
>> Honolulu Iron Works He touched me
They were waiting outside the health club for Lily Ah Sun's ride, she being too drunk to drive.
"You must get asked this all the time, but I can't help myself," Lt. Col. Chuck Ryan said. "You two are identical twins, but you're so ..."
"Night and day?" Fawn and Shauny said in sibling harmony.
"It's really simple," said Lily, best friend of both twins. "The night after Shauny's hormones kicked in, when we were sophomores at Punahou, she got caught skinny dipping in the pool with a senior boy and got kicked out and had to transfer to Roosevelt, and ever since she's just had a lot of fun."
"Can you say to the beach and back?" Shauny said with a hearty laugh.
"And Fawn has devoted her life to God."
"Hey, I'm a devoted Lutheran!" Shauny said.
Fawn rolled her eyes. She'd heard this one before.
"It was Martin Luther who said, 'Jesus died for your sins, therefore go out and sin, lest Jesus die in vain.' In my case, happily, he did not."
Ryan had felt Shauny's raw female energy from across a room. But no matter. From the moment he saw her twin Fawn, well, he hadn't felt like an Alpha Male in a long time.
A white Dodge truck pulled up. A big local guy waved from the cab.
"It's Quinn!" Lily couldn't hide her smile. "These are my best friends Shauny and Fawn, and our new friend Chuck. This is my long-lost cousin Quinn."
"Hi," he said, stepping down from the cab, "everybody." The hunk weightlifter cop as shy local boy.
Lily staggered as she stepped down off the curb. "Whoa, Lily, you weren't kidding," he said, catching her in his arms. "How much you had to drink?"
"I forget," she said, heart suddenly racing.
He opened the passenger door for her. The seat she was supposed to get into was at her chest level. "How'm I s'posed to get up there?"
"There's a step. Put your foot right there ..." He placed his hands on her waist, one on each side, and his big, strong hands nearly encircled her waist. "OK, and 1-2-3 ..." Lily felt herself floating off the ground, gently lifted up and into the cab. And his touch went straight to a place that hadn't been touched in too long.
"Take me for a ride anytime," Shauny whispered as Quinn and Lily drove off.
"I am taking you for a ride -- home," Fawn said. "Chuck, would you mind driving my sister's car home, and then I'll drop you back here?"
The officer and gentleman who doubled as a spook had to force himself not to smile.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin.
He can be emailed at dchapman@midweek.com