He took the linen napkin from his lap and set it next to his glass. "So, why don't you tell me who you are. Tell me something I don't already know."
She supposed he wanted her to divulge incriminating evidence, but she didn't know anything. Anything at all, so she told him something she was positive he would never guess about her. "Well, I've been reading what Freud had to say about compulsions and fetishes. According to him, I have an oral fixation."
A smile tugged one corner of his mouth, and he lowered his gaze to her lips. "Really?"
"Don't get too excited," she laughed. "Freud was the brilliant mind behind penis envy, which is absurd. Only a man would think up something so stupid. I've never met a woman who wanted a penis."
As he stared at her from across the table, the other corner of his mouth slid upward into a grin. "I've known a few who wanted mine."
Despite her liberal views on sex, Gabrielle felt her cheeks warm. "I didn't mean it that way."
Joe laughed and tilted his chair back on two legs. "Why don't you tell me how you met Kevin."
Gabrielle figured Kevin had already told Joe everything, and she wondered if he was asking to catch her in a lie. She didn't have anything to lie about. "Like Kevin probably told you, we first met at an estate auction a few years before we opened Anomaly. He'd just moved here from Portland and was working for an antique dealer downtown, and I was working for a dealer with stores in Pocatello, Twin Falls, and Boise. After that first time, I ran into him quite a bit." She paused and brushed a bread crumb from the table. "Then I got fired from my job, and he called me up and asked me if I wanted to go into business with him."
"Just out of the blue?"
"He'd heard I'd gotten fired over the purchase of more hair art. The owner of the store didn't have an open mind about it. Even after I reimbursed him for the cost, he fired me anyway."
"So Kevin calls you up, and you two decided to open a business." He folded his arms across his chest and rocked the chair a little. "Just like that?"
"No. He wanted to strictly sell antiques, but I was a little burned out on antiques, so we compromised and settled on a curio shop. I came up with sixty percent of the starting costs."
"How?"
Gabrielle hated to talk about money. "I'm sure you know I have a modest trust fund." And she'd invested more than half of it into Anomaly. Usually, when people learned her last name, they assumed she had a bottomless bank account, but that wasn't the case. If her store failed, she would be almost broke. But the thought of losing her financial investment didn't bother her nearly as much as the thought of losing the time and energy and the emotional attachment she had to her store. Most people measured success by monetary gains. Not Gabrielle. Sure she wanted to pay the bills, but to her success was measured by happiness. She considered herself very successful.
"What about Kevin?"
While success meant happiness to Gabrielle, she knew it didn't to Kevin. To him, success was tangible. Something he could hold or drive or wear. Which made him unenlightened, but didn't make him a criminal. It also made him a good partner. "He got a bank loan for the other forty percent."
"Did you bother to do any investigating at all before you started this business?"
"Of course. I'm not a fool. Location is the most important factor to the success of a small business. Hyde Park has a steady stream of-"
"Wait." He held up one hand and stopped her. "That isn't what I meant. I was asking if you'd ever thought to investigate Kevin's background before you invested so much of your own money?"
"I didn't do a criminal check or anything, but I spoke with his previous employers. They all said great things about him." This next part she knew he would never understand, but she told him anyway-quickly. "And I meditated about it for a while before I gave him my answer."
His hands fell to his sides, and a scowl wrinkled his forehead. "You meditated? Didn't you think going into business with a man you hardly knew required more than meditation?"
"No."
"Why the hell not?"
"It was karma."
With a loud thud, the chair legs hit the floor. "Come again?"
"My karma was rewarding me. I was un-happy and out of a job, and Kevin presented me with the opportunity to be my own boss."
He didn't speak for several prolonged moments. "Are you telling me," he began, again, "that Kevin's business offer was a reward for some good deed you'd performed in a past life?"
"No, I don't believe in reincarnation." Her belief in karma confused some people, and she didn't really expect Detective Shanahan to understand. "Going into business with Kevin was my reward for something I'd done in this life. I believe the good or bad you do affects you now, not after you've died. When you die, you move to a whole different plane of consciousness. The enlightenment, or knowledge, you attain while in this life determines to which plane your soul ascends."
"Are you talking about heaven or Hell Bop?"
She'd expected a derogatory question from him and wasn't surprised. "I'm sure you call it heaven."
"What do you call it?"
"I don't call it anything, usually. It could be neaven. Hell. Nirvana. Whatever. I only know it's the place my soul will go when I die."
"Do you believe in God?"
She was used to that question. "Yes, but probably not in the way you do. I believe God would rather I sat in a field of daisies and fill my senses with the awesome beauty He's created while I contemplate inner peace. He'd rather I actually live the Ten Commandments than sit in a stuffy church and listen to some guy tell me how to live them. I think there is a big difference between being religious and being spiritual. Maybe you can be both, I don't know. I only know that a lot of people wear religion like a name tag, and they reduce it to bumper stickers. But spirituality is different. It comes from the heart and soul." She expected him to laugh or look at her as if she'd sprouted horns and hooves. He finally surprised her.
"You might be right about that," he said as he rose to his feet. He placed his salad bowl on his plate, gathered his silverware, and walked into the kitchen.
Gabrielle followed and watched him rinse his plate in the sink. She never would have guessed him for the kind of guy who cleaned up after himself. Maybe because he just seemed so macho, like one of those guys who crushed beer cans on his forehead.
"Tell me something," he said as he turned off the faucet. "Was my arresting you in Julia Davis Park karma?"
She folded her arms beneath her breasts and leaned a hip into the counter beside him. "Nope, I've never done anything bad enough to deserve you."
"Maybe," he said, his voice low and seductive as he looked at her across his shoulder, "I'm your reward for good behavior."
She ignored the shivers running up her spine as if she were attracted to emotionally barren cops with bad attitudes. Which she wasn't. "Get real. You're about as enlightened as a toadstool," she said and pointed to the pots on the stove. "Aren't you going to do all the dishes?"
"Not a chance. I did all the cooking."
She'd sliced the bread and dressed the salad. He hadn't done all the cooking. This was a new century-men like Joe had to step out of the cave and do their share, but she chose not to enlighten him on the subject. "I suppose I'll see you bright and early in the morning then."
"Yep." He shoved a hand into the front pocket of his Levi's and pulled out a set of keys. "But Friday I have to testify in court, so I probably won't be in until after noon sometime."