“It’s eight o’clock. You need to call it a night.”
“Yeah,” she answered absently, just to acknowledge the remark, no particular inclination to follow his advice. She was just glad he spoke so he stopped whistling.
“What’re you doing now?”
Over the course of the day she’d been reviewing the contents of the various boxes collected from the Florist home. She read letters, flipped through notebooks, scanned a diary of Susan’s, looked at saved Christmas cards, found restaurant coupons and school flyers-the normal clutter a family collected over time and eventually discarded. At the moment she was deep in their financial, insurance, and medical paperwork, tracing where they sent checks, looking for signs of secrets, an affair, child-support payments, bailing out a family member who kept getting into debt, something. Even the boy had an account for his allowance and interesting purchases to his name. She condensed the last hours into a single word: “Finances.”
“Evie. Pause long enough to look at me.”
She glanced up. Gabriel was wearing a bright pink Hawaiian shirt and holding two glasses of crushed ice and something red with straws stuck in them. He handed one of them to her. “Sip it slowly.”
She complied, and smiled. Tart and fruity.
“Don’t ask what’s in it. It’s safe for cops to drink on duty, contains no alcohol, although it’s probably got a dozen other things-including a touch of lime juice and part of a can of cherry pie filling-from what I saw land in the blender.”
“You were at a party?”
“Good one too. A coming-home party for vacationing friends, three weeks in Hawaii. We didn’t want them to feel so much culture shock coming back to Illinois. Come on, take a break. You can drop in on the last half of the party with me.”
“Where is it?”
“Two blocks east, above the pizza place.”
Okay, meeting the town’s residents would be a decent use of her time, and she could use a break… and more of this punch. She pushed back her chair, tucked the phone he gave her into her pocket with her keys, picked up her drink.
“How many people were interviewed today?” she asked as they walked toward the door. “You told me earlier about yours, but were there others?”
“Between Dad, myself, and deputies who had the time, we interviewed thirty-eight. We added another six to the list based on feedback-people we all agree we should have thought of ourselves. How’d you do?”
She glanced back at the tables. “I’ve got some ideas.” She really wanted to pursue a couple of them for another hour or so…
He reached over and pulled her through the doorway. “It’ll still be here tomorrow. You’ll think better if you clear it out of your mind for a bit.”
She waited while he locked the place up, nodded to the retired deputy coming their way. Gabriel must have been confident he would get her to take a break.
“You need a warmer jacket,” he pointed out. “We can ride-”
“No, I’m fine for a few blocks. Come winter, I live bundled in layers that make me look like the Michelin Man. I’m stubborn about giving in to winter.”
He smiled. “A cute image. Tell me something else I wouldn’t know about you.”
She gave him a considering glance. “Okay, but I answer one, you answer one. Sure you want to go any further? I already gave you the easy answers.”
“Yes.”
She sipped at the drink and decided to make it interesting just to see how he would respond. “Let’s see, I build a snowman every February just to force away my increasing annoyance with winter. I vacation comfortably-land somewhere, rent a house, eat out, take a stack of books and movies, pretend I live there, and decide if I would like the area as someplace to retire one day. I’m trying to get up the nerve to take flying lessons so I can travel around as easily as Ann does. I like to run with my dogs, play Frisbee with them, enjoy tug-of-war with their ropes. I used to go to the gym to stay in shape, but now the dogs help me accomplish that and with a lot more fun. I’m single, never married, though I’ve been close enough a few times it would take a sharp knife to shave the difference. I take my birthday off. I sleep in, then put a hundred dollars in my pocket and go shopping for whatever catches my eye, write down a list of what I want most, and hand it to God as my birthday wish, have a special meal-steak, baked potato, asparagus, a richly iced cupcake-curl up on the couch to watch a good movie or reread a favorite book to top off the day.” She looked over and found him watching her. “Birthdays aren’t celebrated enough as they should be,” she finished, feeling a bit defensive.
“Define ‘almost married.’”
Trust him to catch that one. She blew out a breath. “Let’s see… not in any particular order. One got called off by the groom a few days before the wedding. Another, I returned the engagement ring. The third”-she grinned, cocked her head-“we’ll call it career-goal differences, but in reality his mom didn’t like me, and we mutually concluded she never would. That gets me to age twenty-six. I’ve since become wiser and stopped letting guys ask me the question.”
He was silent for a long moment. “I’m not sure what to say. That’s an… unusual history. Allow me a tactless question-how old are you now?”
“I’ll admit to thirty-five with a year of fudge. When I’m forty it’ll be three years of wiggle room, and I’ll work my way up from there.”
“Dad had told me, but I wanted it from you. Word is you’re seeing a guy by the name of Rob Turney.”
“That’s the word, is it? Accurate enough, I guess.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Evie, but that almost-married list is sad.”
She liked that he was willing to say such a thing. She agreed with him. With a shrug, she replied, “I was looking for something I thought a guy could give me, with the added edge of being a bit commitment shy. They were good guys with solid jobs, I wasn’t going to be marrying lazy bums, and any one of them would have made a fine husband. But I didn’t fight very hard to keep a wedding in view once things in the relationship began to go south. I’ve grown out of it, that need for a guy to fill the voids, make me complete. I grew up.” She shook off the memories and offered a smile. “And that constitutes my list of personal crashes.” She could tell he wasn’t sure what to say, and she was of a mind to let him off the hook. “Are we at the party? I see Hawaiian shirts in the windows above us.”
Diverted, he glanced up. “Yes.” He opened the door in front of them. “Stairs to the second floor, then take the door on the right. Hosting us are Glenda and James Fitzgerald. You’ll want to ask about their son, Mark, and their cat Sophia.”
“Got it.”
“The Florists’ extended family is mostly here. I counted six of them,” he mentioned as they topped the stairs.
She shot him a look. “You should have told me earlier. I need a Hawaiian shirt too.”
“In this crowd, someone is going to spill that punch on you-you’ll be nicely colorful. Hang around with me for a bit. I’ll introduce you to folks or you can peel off and see if you can corner a lady who likes to gossip. Either is going to make for a fun evening, maybe even productive.”
He opened the door, and the volume promptly spiked. Between music and conversations, it sounded as though the entire town had gathered in what could be at most a three-bedroom apartment. Gabriel stepped in first, drew her into the room behind him.
“Gabriel! You brought a date. How nice! Come in, come in. I see you’ve already gotten her a drink. What’s your name, dear? I’m Linda the librarian, but most people just call me the town crier. Come on, let’s get you a plate and some food, and you can tell me where Gabriel has been hiding you.”