Killer Cocktail Read Free Page B

overpacking my overnight bag and wondering when—possibly even, if—I should call Kyle and tell him I was going away He was trying to wrap up a case so I had no expectation of spending the weekend with him. When we’d last spoken, he’d said he didn’t know when we’d be able to get together. So if I called him now and told
him I was going away for the weekend, would it seem like I was forcing him to revisit the subject of our going away? I didn’t want to seem punitive. Or worse, clingy.
    Fortunately, I was spared the agony of examining this ethical dilemma by the fact that Kyle chose that moment to call me.
    “Hey.” He said it warmly, but gave me no indication of whether he was standing in the middle of his office or in the middle of a pool of blood. “This a bad time?”
    I opted for the breezy, no-big-deal approach. “No, actually good timing. I’m on my way out. What should I bring you back from Southampton?”
    There was a pause. Brief, but still discernible. The Pause is risky, more for the recipient than for the pauser. Resist all you want, you’re still going to read something into the Pause, a problem that can feed on itself when the pauser realizes he’s paused and starts wondering about what you’re reading into his pause. You’re on one end of the phone, thinking he’s bracing himself to tell you bad news, to get his lie in proper order, to struggle against his desire to declare undying love. And he’s on his end, perhaps doing any one of those things, but maybe just stifling a sneeze or being momentarily distracted by some slut in an exceptionally tight T-shirt and gaudy belly ring.
    Communication is the foundation of any good relationship, God help us.
    “The weekend?”
    I made sure I didn’t pause. “Uh-huh.”
    “Going alone?”
    “Does that affect your request?”
    “Among other things.”
    I liked that answer, and did my best to detect jealousy lurking around the edges. “Tricia’s family’s having a thing and she wants Cassady and me to come along and protect her.”

    “Hazardous duty.”
    “Only for my liver.”
    “One of those weekends.”
    “With any luck.”
    “So you’re hoping to get lucky this weekend?”
    “Ah. You can take the boy out of the interrogation room, but you can’t take the interrogation room out of the boy.”
    “Or evasion out of the girl.”
    “I’m going down to keep Tricia from telling her aunt what she really thinks of her. My sole mission.”
    “Aunt’s a piece of work?”
    “Putting it nicely. You may have heard of her. Cynthia Malinkov.”
    “Any relation to Lev Malinkov, the developer?”
    “Ex, with an emphasis on big alimony.”
    “You’re a good friend.”
    “It’s my only shot at heaven.”
    He laughed. It was a great sound, especially because he didn’t do it very often. I stayed quiet, which I don’t do very often. It didn’t really constitute a Pause, because I was giving him the opportunity to say something in addition to the laugh. I was also realizing that he hadn’t said why he called.
    “You underestimate yourself,” he said, and I could tell he was still smiling.
    “Chronically”
    “Have a great time.”
    “You haven’t answered my question. Or told me why you called.”
    “You sure you didn’t call me?”
    Now I laughed. “Not really.”
    “I don’t want anything. Just call me when you get back.”
    “But why’d you call?”
    “Tell you then. Stay out of trouble.”

    “I’ll do my best.”
    He sighed and I knew he was remembering the circumstances of our first meeting. “Try harder.”
    In retrospect, he gets to look all brilliant and psychic, which isn’t entirely fair. Of course, if any of us had realized how the weekend would end, we would have all stayed in Manhattan, even if we did nothing more exciting than sit in my apartment eating cold Chinese takeout and playing cribbage. But life is never that simple. Thankfully.

2
    Maybe there’s something in the air, something in the water,