63

Tamara was gone by the time he woke up. Soon she would be gone for good. Another woman out of his life forever. He didn’t want to think about that.

It had all been a desperate evening, sad, but with some laughs, too. They hadn’t known each other all that long, yet they’d been through a lot together. In spite of their protestations about friendship and no commitments, they’d fallen a little bit in love with each other. How could they not? They were both such loners by nature and temperament, so willing to accept the limitations they each imposed on the relationship, there was an inevitability to love. Yet neither one of them would make the first move toward the bedroom. The time for that, if there had ever been one, had passed. Their love was built on friendship. It was an easy kind of love, short on expectations and long on comfort.

In the shower, Jesse’s thoughts turned away from Tamara’s pending departure to the events of the previous day. He couldn’t get the sonnet out of his head. In death’s black-lined womb I seek her grace. The mirror has revealed my hangman’s face. And with the sonnet in play, it probably wouldn’t be long before word of the missing tape would become public. Once that happened, there would be no controlling what followed. There was no way to get ahead of, around, or over what was headed his way. Maybe, he thought, the best thing to do was to run straight for it.

Jesse had lathered up half his face when the doorbell rang. His cell was on the vanity to his right. He checked it to make sure he hadn’t missed calls from the station while he was in the shower. The last thing he needed was for Molly and Alisha to show up at his door again. No calls. He wiped the shaving cream off his face, threw on his old Dodgers shorts, and headed down the stairs. Probably Tamara, he thought, reaching for the doorknob. Although he was confident she was going to take the job in Austin, she hadn’t said as much. She probably wanted to come over and get that on the record or give him another chance to talk her out of it. He hadn’t done a very good job of discouraging her last night.

There was a woman standing on the other side of the door, but it wasn’t Tamara Elkin. Bella Lawton smiled her electric smile at Jesse, and while she had on more clothing than she’d worn the other day by the pool, she was no less attractive. She was dressed in a sheer midriff-baring blouse that left almost nothing for Jesse’s imagination to work with. She wore tight white shorts that were similarly stingy and open-toed shoes with chunky heels. Chunky or not, the heels somehow managed to exaggerate the perfect shape and flawless tan of her legs. And even from where he stood, Jesse could smell the raw scent of Bella’s perfume, all crushed herbs with undertones of patchouli and citrus.

“Aren’t you going to invite me in, Chief — Jesse?”

“Come in,” he said, and stood back to let her pass.

She purposefully brushed lightly against him as she came into the house.

“I was about to shave,” he said, not reacting to her touch. “What can I do for you, Bella?”

She smiled at him in a way that made her answer pretty clear. Then added, “Too bad you already showered.”

Jesse wasn’t in the mood for innuendo. “Why are you here?”

“I got tired of waiting for you to call me, so I took the initiative. That’s how I’ve gotten to where I’m at, Jesse... initiative.”

“Watch out for that. Initiative cuts both ways. It may get you far, but initiative almost got one of my cops killed a few years back.”

“Don’t you like me?”

“Well enough, but I don’t really know you.”

She laughed a coy little laugh. “I think that’s the point of my visit, Jesse,” she said, stepping very close to him and brushing her hand across his chest. “Letting you get to know me.”

He stepped back and away from her and headed into the kitchen.

He called to her. “I’m putting up some coffee. You want some?”

She trailed after him, abandoning innuendo and nuance. “I want some, but not coffee.”

“Sorry, not interested,” he said, though it wasn’t completely true. Any straight man with a pulse would have been interested in Bella, but he was more interested in something else: what she was doing there. Why had she come knocking today and not yesterday or tomorrow? Jesse understood Tamara. He even understood Nita Thompson’s loneliness and why she had reached out to him. She was a loner, too. But Bella was different. Her being here felt like part of a calculation.

“Coffee’s all I’ve got to offer.”

“Too bad for you.”

“I don’t doubt it, but I’m probably about twice your age and you don’t strike me as someone starved for male attention.”

“Young men are fools.” She waved her red-tipped fingers dismissively. “And they’re too hungry.”

“Watch that, Bella. I was young once and you won’t be forever.”

“Exactly.” There was that smile again.

“How do you like your coffee?”

“Come on, Jesse, I’m going to be in and out of town for at least the next month. We could have some fun.”

“Not going to happen.”

She came around the counter, leaned against him, and put her lips to his ear. “Going once... going twice...”

He stepped back again. “Great perfume. The cream’s in the fridge. Sugar’s over there.”

She shook her head. “You had your chance. Maybe if you’re nice, you can have another.”

“Very generous.”

“You’d be amazed at how generous I can be.”

“Probably. And Bella,” he said, “I’ll be in the mayor’s office in about an hour. Why don’t you meet me there? Bring Stan and Bascom with you.”

That got her attention. “Now I’m curious. What’s going on?”

“See you in an hour.”

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