“Huh.” Ramsey screwed her mouth to one side. “Does that make her an even better friend than I thought or a betrayer of the girl bond?”
“I’m going to go with the first one.”
After a moment of contemplation, she said, “Yeah. Me too.” She sat back to let the waitress set down their antipasto and then spread her napkin across her lap. “You know, Sullivan, you could have called me. Texted. You have my number.”
He picked the pepperoncini out of his salad and laid it on his appetizer plate. “Unless you want it,” he said, pointing to the pepper. When she shook her head, he said, “I didn’t think a text or a phone call was our thing.”
“We have a thing?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” He forked lettuce and prosciutto and carried it to his mouth. “Running into each other seemed like a better option. More casual.”
“Even though you deliberately plotted the encounter,” she said dryly.
“Hey, I didn’t ask Maggie to tell Buddy you were with Briony, and I didn’t ask Buddy for an update on your whereabouts. It happened more or less organically.”
“Mostly less.”
“Do you mind?”
“No. Actually, I thought I’d see you at the Ridge. I had six calls into the department. You never responded to any of them.”
“I know. I heard. There’s a little competition at the station to be the one who answers your calls.”
“Really? Should I be flattered or creeped out?”
“Up to you.”
“Do the guys know we had a few dates?”
“Some of them know you went to Linda’s wedding with me.”
“But not about Shoot and Shots or the concert?”
“Nope. It felt like something I should keep to myself for the time being.”
“Then they don’t know that…” Ramsey’s voice trailed off.
“That you saw my closet?”
“Yeah. That.” She smiled a trifle crookedly and speared a cherry tomato.
Sullivan returned her smile. “No, they are all encouraging me—ribbing me—to ask you out again. I don’t know when or how they got the idea that they have a stake in my love life.”
“Obviously there is some talk behind our backs in addition to what our friends say to our faces.” Ramsey waved her fork, dismissing the middle school drama. “Tell me about your week.”
Sullivan finished the last of his salad and then pressed his napkin to his mouth. “Five overdoses, four drunk and disorderly calls, three domestic violence complaints, two car accidents, and one—”
“Partridge in a pear tree?”
“I wish. One schizophrenic off his meds scaring pedestrians on Main Street.”
“Oh, that’s sad. Did he have a weapon?”
“No. Just doing a lot of yelling and gesticulating. He’s on a psych hold. The docs will get him stabilized, he’ll do well for a while, then he’ll go off his meds and we’ll get another call.”
The waitress returned, took their salad bowls, and replaced Ramsey’s with a hot plate of manicotti and Sullivan’s with gnocchi. Ramsey let Sullivan get a couple of bites in before she asked him about the overdoses.
“Five in one week? Is that a lot? Average?”
