As she chose one, opened it, it occurred to her she hadn’t had much taste for wine pre-Roarke. Could be, she thought, due to the fact that the wine she could afford in those days had been one dubious step up from horse piss.

She poured two glasses—Roarke’s Italian label because she had a yen for spaghetti and meatballs—and wandered into his office. She’d intended to simply set his glass on his desk and leave him to finish up the ’link meeting, but he signaled her to wait.

She noted the two people—one male, one female—on-screen. Everybody talked about those numbers, and margins and whatever the fuck. So she sipped her wine—definitely not horse piss—and walked over to his windows.

A fresh gust had the trees, right now still as bony as Summerset, bowing and swaying. She could see the lights of the city beyond the gates. Right then, from that vantage, it seemed more fanciful than the house she lived in.

Only minutes before she’d been in the thick of it, pushing and shoving her way through traffic, watching the sea of pedestrians surge through intersections. Every one of them, she thought, in a desperate rush to get somewhere.

Now she was out of it, and somewhere—exactly where—she wanted to be. Added to it, an evening without murder clawing at her brain.

Maybe she should pull out a cold case at random, see if fresh eyes and new angles could heat it up.

“All right then,” Roarke concluded. “I’ll have a look at the revised proposal tomorrow. Enjoy your evening.” He ended transmission. “Though you’ll be working through the evening if you want this to fly.” He waited for Eve to turn, then lifted his wine. “Thanks. You read my mind.”

“I wanted wine because my brain’s fried from spending two big hunks of my day with numbers and reports. You’re drinking it because you’re half celebrating dealing with them.”

“Isn’t it lovely that wine covers both? Since you had two hunks of your day free to deal with numbers and reports, I assume you’ve no new case.”

“Caught one, closed it.”

“There’s my clever cop.” He swiveled his chair, patted his knee in invitation. “Let’s hear about it.”

She gave him a stony look, then opted to ease a hip onto the side of his workstation as he often did on hers. “Drunk tripped going down the stairs in his apartment building while peeling an apple with his pocketknife. Broke his neck and stabbed himself in the gut. Pretty much simultaneously according to the ME. Tox came back with a .20 BAC. Rotgut brew on top of it. He took the spill before nine this morning.”

“There’s a sorry end. My own morning held what I believe will be a happy beginning. I met with Rochelle Pickering, offered her the position and a tour of An Didean. She accepted.”

“That’s really quick. Are you sure—”

“I am, yes,” he said. “But I have her file right here. Why don’t you look it over before dinner? If we’re agreed, I’ll send her copy of the signed contract.”

Really damn quick, she thought. “You signed it?”

“Signed by her, and witnessed, late this afternoon after she had it looked over. Signed by me, and witnessed, before I left for home. But not yet sent, so not yet official.”

He studied her, his cynical cop, over another sip of wine. Behind her hung a portrait she’d given him of the two of them on their wedding day.

“This is your place as much as it’s mine, so I waited until you could weigh in.”

“I’m not going to…” She searched for a word, fell back on one of his. “Bollocks this up. You’ve vetted her.”

“Read the file.” He patted his lap again.

“That’s a sneaky way of getting me to sit on your lap.”

“If I didn’t have sneaky ways, neither of us would be in this very pleasant office space.”

He had her there. Hell, he had her everywhere anyway. She sat on his lap. And when he brought up his reports on Rochelle, she began to read.

It took less than fifteen minutes for her to admit she was being a hard-ass. “Okay, okay.” She waved at the report on-screen. “She bangs the drum. You need a top shrink, and the kids deserve one not only with the chops, but who cares.”

“They do. I’ll add I liked her quite a lot. As did Caro.”

Two people, Eve admitted, who read people well and didn’t fall for bullshit easily.

“I’d still like to know where some seriously educated kid shrink met the bust-your-balls owner of a sex club.”

“I asked her about that today. Interestingly, at a memorial service, as you and I met as well.”

Tags: J.D. Robb In Death Mystery
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