“Not at all,” Mendoza said cheerfully.
Greg nodded, but not as if he believed it. I didn’t, either.
“I just thought we should talk,” Mendoza added, with a look at me.
Yes, of course we should. I wanted to talk to him. I just hadn’t thought he’d make it so easy. I figured I would have to painstakingly track him down while he did his best to avoid me, and that I’d have to force him to tell me whatever was going on.
But Greg didn’t know any of that. He hadn’t seen Mendoza at Sambuca—or if he had, he hadn’t mentioned it.
Now he cleared his throat. “I should get going. If you’re all right on your own, Gina?”
I nodded. “Of course. Thank you for a lovely evening.”
“The pleasure was all mine,” Greg said politely and turned towards the front door.
“Let me see you out.” It was the least I could do. Not only did Greg deserve that, after a nice evening, but Mendoza—after three weeks of silence—didn’t need to gain the impression that I would drop everything, including Greg, just because he showed up.
I fell into step beside Greg on our way down the hall to the front door. “You’re spending time with your mother, and with Cressida and Tara, this weekend, you said?”
He nodded. “I’ll call you on Sunday. Maybe we can do something together then, if you’re not busy surveilling body shops.”
And not busy doing whatever it is you’re doing with homicide detectives, hung in the air, unsaid.
“I’m sure I won’t be,” I said. “They’re not open on Sundays.” Although I might be sitting outside Nick’s apartment, or down the street from Megan’s little house in Charlotte Park, or be angling for another invitation to Sambuca.
Or not. Mendoza would ask me to stay away from there, no doubt.
Then again, what better reason to go back?
Greg stepped across the threshold onto the front porch and turned to face me. I pulled the door shut behind me so Mendoza couldn’t hear what was said out here.
Not that much was. Greg examined my face for a second before he asked, “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” I said. “I don’t know what he’s doing here—like I said, I haven’t seen him since you left for Italy—but I’m not worried. Probably just a question about something.”
Greg nodded. He squeezed my hand. “Let me know when you want to stake out Sambuca again. I wouldn’t mind another go.”
I promised him I would, and then I held my breath as he leaned in. I thought he was aiming for my mouth—he had kissed me on the lips last time we’d had dinner together, and a very pleasant kiss it had been, too—but whether it was the fact that we hadn’t seen each other in a few weeks, so he wanted to build up to it again, or whether it was because Mendoza was waiting inside, maybe even watching, in this case he veered off and kissed my cheek instead.
“Goodnight, Gina.”
“Goodnight, Greg,” I echoed, and stood there and watched him walk to his Jaguar and fit himself behind the wheel. And then I waited while he fired up the engine and took off down the driveway. Once his taillights were out of sight on the road below, I shut and locked the door and headed back down the hallway.
Mendoza had moved to one of the stools by the kitchen island, and Edwina was sniffing his shoes and the bottoms of his pants with every appearance of interest.
“Stop that,” I told her as I stepped into the kitchen from the hallway. “Get away from those, Edwina. You don’t know where they’ve been.”
Mendoza grinned, and that damn dimple popped up in his cheek. “She might not, but you know exactly where they’ve been.”
“All the more reason for her not to be licking them.” I nudged her with the tip of my boot. “Shoo, Edwina!”
The terrier danced away, even as she gave me a wounded look over her shoulder. I relented. “You can have a biscuit instead. Will that make up for it?”
It would, at least judging from the response I got. Edwina has a limited vocabulary, but ‘biscuit’ is in there, and so is ‘car ride’ and a few others. I dug a bone-shaped treat out of a box in the pantry and offered it to her. Edwina took it between her teeth and scampered off to her pillow, where she bit through it with savage delight and a shower of crumbs.
“So,” Mendoza said, and I turned to him. “You’re still seeing Newsome.”
It wasn’t a question, but I answered it anyway. “Yes. Or seeing Newsome again. He’s been in Italy for the past few weeks.”
