The Role Players
Page 24
“I can’t promise I’ll not tell Jonathan when we return home,” I said, and Gene nodded.
He extended his hand and I took it. And, as I had done at the end of another case a long time ago, I walked down the hallway toward the elevator.
*
So that’s it. The rest is anticlimactic—my calling Tait, going to the police with the gun and my story, and my promise to be available to them should they need me, our last short but quiet evening with Chris and Max, our good-byes with the certainty of seeing each other soon, our trip to the airport in Tait’s limousine, and our boarding the plane for our flight home.
*
Jonathan sat looking out the window at the clouds, his camera in his lap. After a while, he turned to me and took my hand—the aisle seat next to me was empty but it wouldn’t have mattered if it weren’t—and said, “I had a good time.”
I squeezed his hand and smiled. “I’m sorry it wasn’t a lot better. I…”
“That’s okay,” he said. “We were together most of the time. That’s what matters.”
“Have I ever mentioned that I love you?” I asked.
“As a matter of fact, you have,” he said, smiling. “But there’s just one thing…”
“Yes?”
“The very first thing we do when we get home is you telling me everything, right?”
I squeezed his hand. “Is it okay if it’s the second thing we do when we get home?”
His smile immediately switched to a naughty-little-boy grin, and he said, “Oh, yes, Master.”