“Yeah…” Birdie rocked back his chair for a bone-cracking stretch. “‘Course, Margie being Jewish, our really big celebration was a while ago.”
Jake grunted a reply. He was wondering how he could have been partners-and friends-with a man for almost five years and not know his wife was Jewish. He wondered how many other things he didn’t know about Birdie-or Don Coffee, or Agent Franco, or any of the other people he worked with, for that matter. That made him think again about what Eve had said to him that day in the hospital in Augusta, about this case being like a cancer in his life. He’d thought about that a lot during the last couple of weeks. That, and a whole lot more.
He drained the last of the coffee and gave his head a brief shake. “Partner, I’ve got to tell you, I am impressed.”
Birdie looked at him in surprise. “What for?”
“You and Margie. I mean, you’ve got a great marriage. That’s hard enough to manage in this line of work, you’ve got to know that. Okay, so on top of that, you’ve got the problem of two different religions to deal with?”
Birdie twisted uncomfortably in his chair. “Well,” he mumbled, “I guess we don’t really see it as a problem. It’s just…you know, part of who we are. No big deal.”
Jake didn’t say anything for a minute; personal conversations didn’t come easy for him, and he already knew this one was probably going to give away more about himself than he wanted it to. Then he decided there were questions he wanted the answers to badly enough to risk it, so he laced his fingers together behind his head and hauled in a breath. “It really isn’t difficult for you, is it? Marriage, I mean. You and Margie-you make it look so easy.”
“Oh, Lord, I wouldn’t say that.” Birdie’s bark of laughter brought his chair upright with a thump. “It’s never easy, partner. Don’t kid yourself. You’ve always got to work at it.”
“Okay, so how do you make it work?”
“Aw, hell.” Birdie was squirming again. “I don’t know. Why’re you asking me? I’m no expert.”
“When it comes to marriage you are. Especially in this business. Cops have a lousy record when it comes to marnage-it’s a known fact. You guys are known far and wide as the exception that proves the rule.”
Birdie looked pained. “What the hell does that mean? ‘The exception that proves the rule…’ There is no rule.”
“Then,” Jake persisted, “tell me how you do it.”
His partner leveled a long, thoughtful look at him. “You’re really serious about this, aren’t you?”
“Yeah,” said Jake, returning the look, “I really am.”
“Yeah… okay, well.” Birdie cleared his throat; obviously, personal conversations weren’t all that easy for him, either. He leaned back and folded his arms above his expanding middle. “It helps if you marry the right person. For the right reasons.”
“The right reasons… love, you mean.”
Again Birdie grimaced as. if he’d felt a sharp pain. “Well…see, now, the trouble with love is, everybody’s got a different idea what that means. Who even knóws what it means? And some people are always gonna mistake it for something else.”
“Sex, you mean.”
Birdie gave a grunt of laughter. “Trust me, one thing you do not want to do is marry somebody because the sex is great.”
Well, hell, even Jake knew that. He nodded wisely. “Yeah, I guess that never lasts.”
Birdie smiled and looked away, kind of a smug and secretive look. “Well…let’s just say…it changes.”
After a vibrant pause, Jake cleared his throat and said impatiently, “Okay, so if not love, what do you consider the right reason to marry somebody?”
Birdie shifted around to face him and leaned forward, like someone about to impart a great truth. “Turn it around. Say you marry somebody who’s married you because she wants-or needs-something she thinks you can give her. Money, say. Security. Kids. Whatever. At the same time, she’s got no idea in the world about what you need, or giving anything back to you. Think you’d be happy?”
Jake gave a distracted snort. He was thinking that the scenario had all too familiar a ring.
“Not that you shouldn’t do for your partner-try to make her happy. I don’t mean that. I just mean, there’s got to be a give and take. You’ve got to take care of each other.” Birdie chuckled. “Margie, now-she’s always worrying about me…harping at me to take my vitamins, wear my vest, keep my feet warm, eat breakfast…yada yada yada. Drives me crazy. But I’ll tell you this-not a day goes by I don’t know she loves me. Not a day goes by I don’t think about how glad I am to be married to her. She’s my mate, my partner, my best friend, and I can’t even imagine not having her around, having her there when I wake up in the morning, crawling into bed beside her at night.” He stopped, gave his nose a quick back-and-forth swipe with his hand and finished gruffly, “As far as I’m concerned, that’s the only reason for marrying somebody. The only good reason, anyway.”
Jake didn’t say anything; he was experiencing some emotions he knew were going to embarrass him and Birdie both if they got out. In need of distraction, he turned back to the monitors.
A moment later he was reaching for the volume control and muttering, “What’s she doing? What the hell’s she got?”
“What is that?” Mirabella asked. “What did you find?”
Summer, on her knees beside the bed, didn’t answer. She stared at the objects in her hands-three smallish shrink-wrapped boxes in a nest of brightly colored wrapping paper.
“You put ‘em away and forgot, I’ll bet,” said Mirabella, coming to her own conclusions. “I’ve done that. Who’s it for?”
Summer rose slowly and sat on the edge of the bed, ignoring paper and scissors and tape dispensers. Discarding the gift wrappings, she held up one of the shrink-wrapped boxes, turned it over so she could read the back. “I did forget,” she said in a shaking voice. “I must have put them under here last summer-this was my room then. Hal brought it just before he…died. It was a present for the children. Computer games, see? I put them away because I didn’t think they were appropriate for kids their age. Damn Hal-he never did have any sense. Way too violent…I don’t know what he was thinking!”
“Let me see that.” Mirabella snatched the box out of her hands, quickly examined it, then reached for another. “Don’t you know what this is?” she whispered excitedly. “It’s what they’ve been looking for. Whatever Hal had, he probably hid it in one of these!”
Summer wiped her eyes with her hands. “I know that’s what Jake thought, at first. But I don’t see how they could be. They obviously haven’t been opened. They’re all shrink-wrapped…”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Mirabella impatiently, “anybody can shrink-wrap. You can do it in your kitchen. Here, take one…” She tossed one of the boxes into Summer’s lap and attacked the other with her teeth.
“Shouldn’t we take them to Jake?” Summer was reaching for the scissors.
“What if we’re wrong? Let’s see if there’s anything in here, first.” Mirabella tore away the transparent wrappings.
They both froze as the door suddenly opened.
“Hi, guys, am I missing anything?” Eve chirped, grinning like the Cheshire cat.
Her sisters both slumped with relief. “Shh…get in here,” Mirabella hissed, grabbing her arm and pulling her into the room. She checked abruptly to gape at Eve’s wrist. “Nice watch.”
Eve shook herself free and said with a grimace, “It’s my Christmas present from Sonny.”
Summer and Mirabella exchanged droll looks. Summer murmured, “A diamond Rolex-must be tough…”