He hung up without saying goodbye. I looked at the toaster, where Rosaria had materialized with the air of someone who’d been eavesdropping and wasn’t ashamed of it.
“A diner,” she said. “How romantic.”
“It’s not romantic. It’s an investigation.”
“You should wear lipstick.”
I did not wear lipstick. I found Tony already in a corner booth at Sal’s Place with a cup of black coffee and a look on his face that said he was wrestling with something and losing.
The diner hadn’t updated since 1987—vinyl booths, Formica tables, a laminated menu with a lobster in a chef’s hat.
“Thanks for coming.”
“Thanks for calling.” I ordered coffee from the waitress, who looked at Tony and then at me with undisguised curiosity. Small town. New woman having coffee with the detective.
Tony turned his mug between his hands. Big hands.
“I need your take,” he said. “On the family. You know them. I don’t.”
“Could’ve asked that on the phone.”
His jaw worked. “Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate. “Look—you know things. I don’t know how, and honestly I’m not sure I want to know. But you’ve been right so far, and Rosaria really was poisoned, so...”
He trailed off, staring into his coffee like it might finish the sentence for him.
“So you want to compare notes,” I said.
“I want to compare notes.”
Rosaria appeared in the window beside the booth, her reflection superimposed over the parking lot. She took one look at Tony and tilted her head, studying him with the clinical focus of a woman appraising livestock at a county fair.
“Good bone structure,” she said. “Strong jaw. He is still quite handsome.”
I picked up the menu and stared at it very hard.
Rosaria circled the table—or circled Tony’s reflection, drifting from the window to the chrome napkin dispenser to the glass sugar jar, examining him from every angle like an art critic at a gallery.
“Excellent posture. A man who sits up straight has discipline. Salvatore slouches.” She paused at the napkin dispenser, peering at Tony’s hands wrapped around his mug. “Working hands. Not soft like a dentist’s. I approve.”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
“You okay?” Tony asked.
“Fine. Just—deciding between the turkey club and the BLT.”
“Turkey club’s dry.”
“BLT it is.”
“He orders his coffee black,” Rosaria observed from the sugar jar. “No nonsense. I approve of that also.” A beat. “He keeps glancing at you when you are looking at the menu. You really should have worn lipstick.”
I closed the menu with more force than necessary and focused on Tony. “Tell me what you got.”
He pulled a small notebook from his jacket. Dog-eared, coffee-stained, covered in handwriting that looked like a seismograph during an earthquake.
“George Ferraro. Nervous. Couldn’t keep his hands still—kept picking at his cuffs, turning his phone over, drumming on the table. And every time I asked a question, he’d look at Claudia before answering. Like he needed permission.”
“That’s George. He’s always done that with the women in his life. First Rosaria, now Claudia.”
