“Yours and mine. Also, I recalled it as relaxed.”
“It is.”
Silence. My face warmed- Scotch and awkwardness. Even in the dim light I could see that she’d colored.
“Anyway,” she said. “I don’t know if I ever thanked you, but you made talking about my experience as easy as it could’ve been. So thanks.”
“Thanks for helping. It made a difference.”
She scanned the menu some more, gnawed her lower lip, looked up, said, “I’m thinking T-bone.”
“Sounds good.”
“You?”
“Rib eye.”
“Major-league beefathon,” she said. She looked at the empty booth again, brought her eyes back to the tablecloth, seemed to be studying my fingertips. I was glad I’d filed my nails.
“You’re taking time off from crime cases,” she said, “but you’ll go back to it.”
“If I’m asked.”
“Will you be?”
I nodded.
She said, “I never got to ask you. What draws you to that kind of thing?”
“I could recite some noble speech about righting wrongs and making the world just a little bit safer, but I’ve stopped fooling myself. The truth is, I have a thing for unpredictability and novelty. From time to time, I need a shot of adrenaline.”
“Like a race car driver.”
I smiled. “That glamorizes it.”
She drank wine, kept the glass in front of her lips, lowered it, and revealed her own smile. “So you’re just another adrenaline junkie.” She ran a finger around the base of her glass. “If it’s all about thrills and chills, why not just run cars around the track or jump out of planes?”
The work I did had been a factor in the breakup with Robin. Would we still be together if I’d settled for skydiving?
As I framed my answer, Allison said, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to put you on the spot. I’m just guessing that you crave more than novelty. I think you really do like making things right.”
I didn’t answer.
“Then again,” she said, “who am I to utter pronouncements without a solid database? Being a behavioral scientist and all that.”
She shifted her bottom, tugged her hair, drank wine. I tried to smile away her discomfiture but couldn’t catch her eye. When she put her glass down, her hand landed closer to mine. Just a few millimeters between our fingers.
Then, the gap closed- both of us moving in concert. Touching.
Pretending it was accidental and retracting our hands.
The heat of skin against skin.
The blue shirt with which I’d replaced the sweat-ruined yellow one was growing sodden.
Allison began fooling with her hair. I stared into what remained of my Scotch. Breathing in the alcohol. I hadn’t eaten much all day, and booze on an empty stomach should’ve set off at least a small buzz.
Nothing.
Too damned alert.
How was this going?
For the rest of the evening, we let loose a few more cautious bits of autobiography, ate well, drank too much, walked off the meal with a slow stroll up Wilshire. Side by side, but no contact. Her big heels clacked, and her hair flapped. Her hips rolled- not a vamp, just the way she moved, and that made it sexy. Men looked at her. Halfway through the first block, her hand slipped around my biceps. Breeze from the ocean misted the streets. My eyes ached with uncertainty.
Conversation fizzled and we covered the next few blocks in silence, pretending to window-shop. Back at our cars, Allison gave me a tentative kiss on the lips. Before I knew it, she’d gotten into her ten-year-old Jaguar and was roaring off.
Two days later, I called her and asked her out again.
She said, “I’ve got the afternoon off, was planning to relax at home. Why don’t you come over and we can eat here? That is, if you’re willing to take the risk.”
“Big risk?”
“Who cares? You’re the adrenaline-guy.”
“Good point,” I said. “Can I bring something?”
“Flowers are always appropriate. Not that I’m suggesting- I’m kidding, just bring yourself. And let’s keep it casual, okay?”
She lived in a single-story Spanish house on Fourteenth Street, just south of Montana, within walking distance of her office. The alarm sign on the lawn was conspicuous, and the black Jag convertible was parked behind an iron gate that cut the porte cochere from the street. As I approached the front door, a motion-sensing light went on. Woman-living-alone precautions. Woman-who-had-been-molested-twenty-years-ago precautions.
As I parked, I thought about Robin moving back to Venice, all by herself. Correction: not alone anymore… stop, fool.
I rang the bell and waited, bouquet in hand. Figuring roses would be too forward, I’d chosen a dozen white peonies. Casual had come down to an olive polo shirt and jeans and running shoes.
Allison came to the door in a lime polo shirt and jeans and running shoes.
She took one look at me, said, “Do you believe this?” Then she cracked up.
As I sat in her compact white kitchen, she cooked mushroom and chicken liver omelettes and took a chilled salad out of the fridge. Sourdough, white wine, an ice bucket and a six-pack of Diet Coke filled out the menu.
The kitchen opened to a vest-pocket backyard and we ate outside on a trellis-topped patio. The garden was used-brick pathways and a patch of grass surrounded by high privet hedges.
I tasted the omelette. “Not much risk, here.”
“It’s one of the few things I can get through without disaster. Grandma’s recipe.”
“Let’s hear it for Grandma.”
“Grandma was ornery, but she knew her way around a stove.” She talked about her family, and eventually I found myself parceling out bits of self-revelation. As the evening progressed, my shoulders loosened. Allison had relaxed, too, curling up on a couch, her feet tucked under her. Laughing a lot, blue eyes animated.
Pupils enlarged; those who study that kind of thing say it’s a good sign. But shortly before eleven, her posture stiffened and she looked at her watch, and said, “I’ve got an early patient.”
She stood and glanced at the door, and I wondered what had gone wrong.
When she walked me out, she said, “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For being so abrupt.”
“Patients have their needs,” I said, sounding like a stiff.
She shrugged, as if that wasn’t it at all. But she said nothing more as she extended her hand for a shake. Her house had been warm, but her skin was cold and moist. In bare feet she was tiny and I wanted to take her in my arms.
I said, “Good to see you, again.”
“Good to see you.” I stepped out to her front porch. Her smile was painful as she began to close the door, then she came out and bussed my cheek.
I touched her hair. She turned her head and delivered another kiss, full on the lips but closed-mouthed. Hard, almost assaultive. I tried for another kiss, but she withdrew, and said, “Drive carefully,” and this time she did close the door.
She phoned me the next day, at noon. “Wouldn’t you know it, my early patient was a no-show.”
“Too bad,” I said.
“Yes… I… could we… would you like to… I’m free tonight at seven, if you’re willing.”
“Seven’s fine. Want me to cook?”
“Alex, would you mind something other than just sitting around and eating? Maybe a drive? I’ve been so cooped up. Driving helps me unwind.”
“Me, too.” How many hundreds of miles, since Robin had left, had I put on the Seville? “We could take a spin up the coast to Malibu.”
My favorite drive. All those night cruises along the Pacific with Robin-shut up.
“Perfect,” she said. “If we get hungry, there are plenty of places to stop. See you at seven.”