by Sarah Atwell
“I think it’s wonderful. Are the bedrooms back that way?” Allison gestured toward the opposite end of the space.
“Yup, two—and a bathroom, of course. I’m really proud of that. Want the quick tour?”
“I’d love it.” She stood up eagerly, and I led the way; we were trailed by the dogs, ever polite to guests. Allison made all the right ooh and ah noises as I showed her my bedroom, the smaller guest room, and the oversize bathroom between. Then I led her back to the main area. After all, I had to watch my boiling water carefully.
“And I love the way you left this all open, with the kitchen and all.” Allison fell back into her chair, more relaxed than I had seen her before.
“Some of that was just practical. I didn’t want to have to pay to build any more walls, and it was just easier to run the plumbing along the outside wall here. Besides, on those rare occasions I actually cook for someone else, it’s nice not to be shut in some other room, away from all the action.” I checked my water: It was boiling nicely. I turned it down to simmer.
The dogs were the first to hear a noise at the door. I checked my watch—if it was Cam, he had made good time from San Diego. And it had to be, since Fred and Gloria were all but bouncing up and down in front of the door: friend, not foe. I went to join them, although I refrained from jumping up and down.
Cam had his own key and let himself in—looking down first, since he knew where the welcoming committee would be. Once inside the door he indulged them in happy ear scratching, until both dogs were reduced to goofy, tongue-lolling grins. Then he straightened up to his full six feet and grinned at me, holding out his arms for a hug. I didn’t hesitate—it had been a while since I had seen my only living relative, or at least the only one I cared about.
“Cam, it’s wonderful to see you!”
“You too, Sis—and is that cheese sauce I smell?”
I whacked him on the shoulder. “Not yet, dummy—it would be a crime to overcook such a delicate concoction.” Although I wasn’t sure it was even possible.
And then he went still, his eyes riveted to a point beyond me. “Who on earth is that?”
I turned to see Allison bathed in the golden light of late afternoon, her hair a riotous halo, her eyes dark against her almost translucent skin. She stood frozen like a dryad, startled yet not frightened by Cam’s intense gaze. I turned back to answer my brother and caught the expression on his face. Uh-oh. Smitten.
It was going to be a very interesting evening.
Chapter 9
devitrify: the process of glass chemically changing . . . from an amorphous solid into a crystalline structure (Edward T. Schmid, Advanced Glassworking Techniques: An Enlightened Manuscript)
What had seemed like a casual and innocent idea—introduce lonely Allison to lonely Cam—had morphed quickly into something more complicated. And as my mind struggled to keep up, I realized that Allison and I had never discussed what to say about the murder. Well, of course we hadn’t, because she hadn’t known that I was going to throw her together with my brother. Who I didn’t want to tell about the dead man and the FBI and all the other mess. At least, not right away.
Luckily Allison’s eyes flickered toward me, and we engaged in a peculiar wordless communication, using mostly eyebrows. I was sure she didn’t want to talk about her late husband. Besides, the FBI had ordered us not to say anything, right? So I had the perfect excuse not to involve Cam. Not that I entertained any illusions that I could keep the news away from him for long, but I wanted a little time to soften him up, let him relax after his long drive.
I hadn’t counted on his response to Allison. Oh, dear.
I took Cam’s hand gently to lead him into the room. He followed me like an obedient child, his eyes never leaving Allison.
“Cam, this is Allison McBride. She’s new in town, and she’s just started working in the shop. I figured Nessa could use a little help. Allison, this is my brother, Cameron—Cam. He lives in San Diego, and he’s visiting for the weekend.” That should cover the bases for now. I could see Allison recognized what I was doing, and she looked relieved.
“Hello, Cam. Sorry to intrude on your weekend. I can come back another time. . . .” she faltered.
“Oh, no, please stay,” Cam leapt in before I could respond.
Allison looked at me for guidance. I smiled and nodded. Then I nudged Cam. “Hey, pal—can I get you something to drink? And I have to concentrate on my cooking—tricky stuff, that boiling water and all.”
It took Cam a moment to drag his focus to me. “Oh, sure. Beer, if you’ve got it.”
“Of course. Why don’t the two of you sit down and entertain yourselves while I cook?” I almost had to push him toward the seating area. What was it with the two of them? They seemed mesmerized. “Sit. I’ll get you that beer.”
Cam drifted forward, Allison drifted sideways. They reminded me of a pinball game in slow motion. Finally they bumped into pieces of furniture and sat. Allison chose an armchair, and Cam positioned himself on the closest couch. The dogs watched the two of them in fascination, waiting to see what happened next. When they were settled, Fred resumed his post at Allison’s feet, and Gloria joined Cam, who absently dropped a hand to her head and scratched her ears.
I retrieved a cold beer from the refrigerator, opened it, and stuck it in Cam’s hand. Then I retreated back to the kitchen area. I don’t think either of them noticed. I sighed and dumped pasta into the boiling water. While I waited for it to cook, I collected bowls and plates—I try to support other local artisans, and I admire a number of Tucson’s potters, so the pottery made a colorful array on the round table I used for eating and about everything else. I added the salad—in a bowl, not the bag it came in—and the bottles of dressings, and put the wine bottle in the center of the table. Then I went back to my counter and started slicing hot dogs. Laborious work, this haute cuisine stuff. When the timer went off, I drained the pasta, opened the pouch of sauce and drizzled it over the steaming pasta, tossed in the hotdog morceaux, and presto—dinner.
“Food’s on, kids!”
Cam pulled out Allison’s chair and waited behind it until she had settled herself. Part of me wanted to gag— was he going to unfold her napkin for her? But she deserved a little kind treatment, after what that cad of a husband must have put her through, and it tickled me to see that Cam could be a true gentleman. Most of the time he was so lost in his own head that he barely recognized a plate in front of him.
“So, tell me what it is you do, Cam,” Allison prompted.
“I’m a software designer for a California company that specializes in ecological systems modeling. . . .” And he was off. Cam loved his work, and he didn’t regard talking about it as self-promotion. He seriously believed that everyone would be as interested as he was. I’d heard it before, of course, but he was always adding bells and whistles to his programs, and of course the computer software industry kept moving forward at what to me was an alarming rate. Cam thrived on it. I checked out Allison to see how she was coping with the flood of arcane information, but she looked fascinated—whether it was with the glories of global imaging analysis or with Cam was not clear.
How did I feel about that? I chewed on my pasta— nicely al dente, thank you—and watched the sparks flying between them. I adored Cam. He was seven years younger than me, but sometimes I felt like his mother. Our own mother had been at best an offhand parent, and we had learned early that “out of sight, out of mind” was her mantra. So I had taken over a lot of the mothering function in our early years—and Cam had always needed mothering. He was very smart but socially inept, and had suffered the consequences. I had always regretted that I had to leave him to our parents’ mercies to go to college. Would he have turned out happier if I had been around to see him through his rocky teen years? Sometimes it troubled me that he hadn’t managed to form any serious lasting relationships as an adult—hence my stab at matchmaking.
Which had been very successful so far this even
ing— but was it a good idea? I hadn’t given too much thought to the outcome—being distracted by such matters as a dead man in my place of business, a confrontation with the FBI, a new employee to train, and my first encounter with Matt Lundgren in several years. My thinking had gone as far as “two lonely people.” But did that make for a good match? Cam was overeducated, and Allison most likely had never been to college at all. Cam was a professional, Allison an underemployed drifter. I knew pitifully little about Allison’s history, and what I did know was not exactly encouraging.
But Cam was male, Allison was female, and for the moment, that seemed to be enough. Who was I to judge? My track record with the opposite sex wasn’t a whole lot better than his, and my last go-round—with Matt—had been a disaster. Not that I had made a conscious decision to become a nun after that, but I certainly hadn’t been looking since.
Cam seemed finally to have exhausted the topic of his job, and politely he turned to me. “So, Em, what’s new in the shop?”
I tried not to choke. What would he say if I told him the truth? That I’d found a dead man in my furnace? Not a good idea, certainly not over dinner. So instead I said brightly, “I’m trying out a new technique—I saw some great Victorian pieces a while ago and I wanted to see if I could replicate the effect.” Nice, safe, tame subject. It carried us through the main course and the rest of the bottle of wine. Dessert was predictably a success— Cam’s culinary taste was, if anything, worse than mine. It made him very easy to feed. Actually, he was very low-maintenance all around—I was far more ambitious for him than he was for himself.
Cam sat back and stretched. “Hey, let me do the dishes.”
I stood up. “Don’t be silly. You’ve been sitting for hours—why don’t you take the pooches for a walk? That should give them a thrill.”
Cam loved the dogs, and they loved him back, but I swear he looked pained at the idea of leaving Allison. I walked into his line of vision and handed him the leashes and a plastic bag. “Here. Go! We’ll have this cleaned up in no time.” With a last backward glance, he went.
Allison neatly collected dishes from the table, like the skilled waitress I’m sure she was, and carried them over to the sink. “Your brother’s quite nice,” she said tentatively.
“That he is,” I shot back, squirting dish soap liberally into the pasta pot. “Look, Allison, I didn’t mean to put you in a difficult position. I mean, springing Cam on you like that. I kind of lost sight of the fact he was coming this weekend, what with all the distractions. . . .”
Was she smiling? “It’s no bother, Em. And you’ve been very kind, helping me and all.”
“Allison, that does not mean you are under any obligation to me. You needed help, and I was happy to help. Of course, I have a kind of personal interest in this whole murder thing. I wish I had any idea why he ended up in my studio. I have to assume he had tracked you down, somehow.” When she started to protest, I held up a hand to stop her. “No, that’s not your fault. You managed to keep off his radar for, what, two years? I’m guessing he had a few more resources than you did, to track you down.”
Allison stopped drying the bowl in her hand and looked at me. “Why do you say that?”
I turned off the water and faced her. “Allison, I did a little digging online today.” When she looked blank, I pushed on. “I looked up your husband on the Internet.” Still blank: Where had this woman been for the past decade or two? I had thought I was electronically inept, but she was totally unaware. “Never mind. I did some research on Jack Flannery, and I get the feeling that he was connected to the Mob, or something close. Did you know he had a criminal record?”
Allison looked down at the bowl in her hands. “I . . . wasn’t sure. And there was nothing like that after I met him. I’d have noticed if he was missing for a year or two, wouldn’t I?” She gave a bitter laugh. “You must think I’m a fool—I was married to the man for so long, and I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to know, I think. After we married . . . after I came to know him, I had my suspicions. But he cut me off when I said anything, and then I just stopped asking. He paid the bills, and he could be charming when he chose. And I thought that was enough, or the best I’d find.”
I turned back to the dishes, but kept talking. “Allison, it’s over and done. The thing is, we still don’t know what he was doing in Tucson. You’re the only obvious connection. Tell me, do you think he was looking for you, here?”
She shrugged. “I always wondered, here or wherever I was. I hurt his pride, running off like that. But I don’t think it was me that mattered that much to him, so much as how it looked to his pals.”
“Well, that doesn’t help much now, does it? All right—knowing what you know now, do you think he was working for the Mob?”
Allison took her time in answering. “Maybe. Jack took care to keep his work out of our home, but there were times . . . you know, he’d let slip a name, and then shut up. I answered the phone a few times, and he’d grab it away fast. That kind of thing. He didn’t want me to know. He said as long as he was working steady, kept a roof over our heads and food on the table, I had no need to know.”
Big help. Allison had not wanted to know, and now that willful ignorance had caught up with her. And somehow dragged me into whatever mess this was. But it was going to be hard to do anything about it without more information, and Agent Price wasn’t going to hand it over to me. And no way was I going to call Matt and ask.
I heard Cam and his procession of pups climbing up the outer stairs and whispered quickly to Allison, “We don’t need to tell him about all this right now, okay? I can explain it to him later.”
She nodded, then turned to watch Cam struggle through the door with the frisking dogs twining around his legs.
“Good walk?” I said. Inane comment, but the best I could do.
“Fine. The shop looks really good from the street— lots of color.”
“That’s what I was aiming for—glad you like it.” Actually, I was amazed he had even noticed. It must be good.
Allison was standing like a tree—probably a birch, slender and delicate. I hated interrupting her rapt contemplation of my brother, but I knew I had a busy day ahead of me tomorrow. “Allison? Let’s see about getting you home, okay?”
She dragged her eyes to me. “Oh, Em—don’t worry. I have my bike downstairs.”
Cam jumped quickly into the discussion. “Allison, you can’t seriously ride home after dark—it’s dangerous. I’ll be happy to take you home.”
My brother, the knight in shining armor. I looked at Allison, and she looked panic-stricken. I had to step in, fast. “Let’s all go, Cam. I can show you the way, and I’m sure the dogs would love a ride.”
His face fell, but he rallied gamely. “Great. Are you ready? Did you have a coat or something, Allison?” His voice lingered over the syllables of her name.
I stepped in. “Before we go, Allison, we need to go over your schedule at the shop. Are you still working that other job?”
“I am, just the one now, after . . .” She shook herself and rallied. “But I can juggle my time—what would be best?”
“Can you handle half-time, say twenty hours a week?”
“That would be grand. Can I check back with you tomorrow? Will you be needing me tomorrow?”
I thought briefly. “Yes, if you can come in. I’m teaching a class in the afternoon, and we should be busy, so I’m sure Nessa can use the help.” I ignored the light gleaming in Cam’s eyes at this news.
“I’ll be there, then.” She turned to Cam, pretty concern on her face. “Cam, will there be room for the bike? Because I’ll need it in the morning.”
“No problem. Shall we?”
I waited for him to hold out an arm for Allison, but he somehow restrained himself. However, I was left with shepherding the pups out the door and down the stairs while he and Allison went on ahead. It figured. By the time I made it around the corner to where he had parked the car, Cam was wrestling Allison
’s bike into the back. I accepted the obvious and settled myself and my canine companions in the backseat, leaving the front to our guest. I stifled a snicker as he handed her into the front seat as though she was made of glass. No, I shouldn’t use that analogy, because I knew how tough and resilient glass could be—I’d even bounced a few pieces off my concrete floor. But maybe Allison was as resilient as glass.
The ride to Allison’s apartment complex was short, and she provided directions efficiently with a lily-white hand. Stop that, Em—you’re being catty. He likes her. I like her. What will be, will be. But I felt an odd sense of relief when Cam pulled the car into a handy space, then raced to the other side to hand Allison out again. I wasn’t sure relief was an appropriate response, since I still had to face explaining a few things to Cam, once we got back to my place, but at least I could focus on one problem at a time.
“Where is your apartment?” Cam bent solicitously toward Allison.
She pointed. “The one on the end there . . .” Then her voice trailed off, and I looked to see why. Even from this distance it was clear: Her door was hanging open, and the splintered frame was evident even from the curb.
The three of us jostled each other, trying to reach the door. Cam was still in white-knight mode, Allison was worried about her place, and I was trying to decide if this was related to what had gone before, even as I tried to hold back the other two. At least I had remembered to hang on to the dogs’ leashes, but they were weaving in and out of our little crowd and threatening to topple all of us.
Apparently I was the most determined of the bunch, and when we reached the door I turned to face them, effectively blocking them.
“Hold it, everybody. Let’s not just rush in here. Allison, can I assume you did not leave your door unlocked this morning?”
She nodded. “I don’t have anything worth stealing, but I’m careful regardless.”
