Until You

"You have ketchup on your mouth."

"Where?"

Conor leaned over and kissed her.

"There," he said softly. "And there. And..."

His cell phone shrilled.

"Dammit," he said, and yanked it from his pocket. "Hello?"

"Conor, it's Harry."

"Yes?"

"Can you get to a land line?"

Conor shot a glance towards the rear of the diner. There were two public telephones on the wall, both of them in use.

"I can call you back in five or ten minutes," he said.

"No. This is important." Harry took a breath. "The information you requested? About the couple we've been dealing with?"

Conor sat up straighter.

"Yes?"

"It's come in."

"Something on him?"

"No. Not on him."

"On the woman, then?"

"Yes." Thurston paused. "The point of origin we'd learned, Conor, do you remember it?"

"Point of—"

"Conor?"

Conor looked across the table at Miranda. She wasn't smiling anymore.

"Conor, what's the matter?"

"Hold it a second," he said into the phone, and put his hand over the mouthpiece. "Nothing, sweetheart. This is just, ah, it's just the same guy I called yesterday, remember? He promised to get back to me with some information."

"About Moratelli?" she whispered.

"Miranda, just let me finish this call, okay?"

She nodded and pushed aside her plate, her eyes gone as bleak and dark as they had yesterday.

Conor turned away from her, the phone still pressed to his ear.

"All right," he said very softly, "let's have the rest of it."

"The woman's point of origin is not Argentina. It's Colombia."