Two

Bill had gone back to the weight room slightly exasperated with Quinn but mostly amused, so when his principal, Robert Gloam, perspiring elegantly in royal blue sweats, caught the look on his face, he stopped mopping his face on a Ralph Lauren towel and said, “What’s so funny, Big Guy?”

Of all the crosses Bill had to bear in life—parents and boosters, teenage athletes with hormones pinballing through their bodies, the struggle to make ideas like the Great Depression real and significant to a generation of mall credit junkies—the most irritating was his biggest fan, Bobby Gloam, the Boy Principal. Bill tried hard not to think of Robert as Bobby or the BP because it wasn’t respectful, and Robert was a hard-working little man, if a bit obsessive about sports; but he was so young and so clueless that the nicknames were almost irresistible.

“Funny? Oh, Quinn found another dog,” Bill said, and Bobby rolled his eyes in male sympathy.

“You got a lot of patience there, Big Guy,” Bobby said.

“She’s practical,” Bill said. “She’ll do the right thing.” He began to do the last check on the weight room, which was pretty much unnecessary since he’d trained the boys well, and the BP had been in there while he was gone, nagging at every dropped towel or misplaced weight. The BP felt proprietary about the room since it had been renovated only the past month and was now almost embarrassingly plush, a symphony in scarlet and gray. “The teachers’ lounge should look this good,” Quinn had said, and Bobby had answered, “Hey, the athletes earned this. What have the teachers done for anybody?”

“I wish Greta would do the right thing,” Bobby went on now. “Of course, she’s due to retire after next year, but that’s still a year and a half to go, and that’s a long time to put up with a lousy secretary.”

Bill heard him only peripherally, moving toward the light switch, ready to shut down and go home and make dinner for Quinn, just like every Wednesday. Quinn. He felt good just thinking about her.

“I mean, sometimes I think she’s defying me,” Bobby was saying.

“She’s just a little tactless sometimes,” Bill said. “She’s a darn good art teacher, and that’s all that matters.”

“Not Quinn, Greta,” the BP said. “Although I have doubts about Quinn, too.”

“What’s Greta doing exactly?” Bill asked, feeling a little guilty for tuning him out.

“Well, take my coffee,” Bobby said. “I ask her to get me some, and she pours it and puts it on the corner of her desk. And then I have to ask her to bring it in to me.”

“Why don’t you get your own coffee?” Bill asked. “The pot’s right there on the counter outside your door. You’re probably closer to it than she is.”

“Chain of command,” Bobby said. “What kind of authority do I have if I get my own coffee?”

None, which is what you have now anyway.

“What would you do?” Bobby asked, and Bill repressed the urge to say, “I’d get my own coffee,” and said, “Just make my expectations known, I guess, like I do with the boys.”

Bobby looked confused, so Bill went on. “I make it clear what I want from them. I don’t get upset, I just expect them to deliver. Expect Greta to give you what you want, and eventually she will.”

“That seems pretty optimistic,” Bobby said.

“No.” Bill flipped off the lights and started for the door. “Take this thing with Quinn and the dog. She knows we can’t have a dog, so I just kept reminding her of that until she agreed to give it to Edie.”

“Edie’s another one I’m not too sure about,” Bobby said. “These older women do not understand authority.”

“Look,” Bill said, pretty sure he was fighting a losing battle. “People want to be thought well of, they want to live up to other people’s good opinions of them. You let people know what they have to do to earn your approval, and they’ll do that, as long as it’s within their capabilities, of course. Never expect something from people that they can’t deliver.”

“Greta can bring me coffee,” Bobby said.

“And Quinn can give the dog away to a good home.” Bill opened the door as the last of the afternoon sunlight filtered into his weight room. “All it takes is patience.”

“You’re really something, Big Guy,” the BP said. “A real master of people.”

Bill drove home a contented man. Giving the dog to Edie had been a good idea, and so like Quinn, solving Edie’s loneliness problem and finding the dog a home, too—two good deeds at once. Bill had lived alone a couple of times in between relationships, and he’d hated it, so he knew Edie must hate it, too. When he’d met Quinn, he’d known instantly that she was the one, the way she was so practical, the way she always made everything all right. There were no waves when Quinn was around; she calmed the waters. It had taken him a year to convince her to let him move in, and another six months to get her to move to the great apartment he’d found for them, but she’d understood in the end, and now his life was perfect.

So in June they’d get engaged, and they’d get married at Christmas. He had it all planned out so it wouldn’t conflict with school or the athletic season, and he imagined the future with her while he parked the car at the apartment. They’d have children, of course. She’d sit in the stands while he coached their sons, she’d tuck them in at night, she’d do all those mother things. Whenever he saw mothers in stores yelling at their kids, he’d think of Quinn’s round, serene, Madonna-like face and know she’d never do that to his kids. And she’d always be there for him, too, warm and understanding. She was everything he needed, the solid, sure center of his life.

So when Quinn came in the apartment door at six-fifteen with the dog smirking at him from her arms, he kept his voice calm, his tone warning her that this was not negotiable as he said, “Quinn, the dog goes to Edie.”

Quinn’s chin came up, and her jaw clenched, and suddenly her face didn’t look as round as it usually did. Her hair slid back, and two bright spots stood out on her cheekbones. She looked awful, and the dog looked worse, feral, as if it had bitten and infected her.

“No,” she said.

 

“Hey,” Darla said to Max as she came into the grimy, cluttered station office that was decorated in what Quinn called Early Clipboard. “Whose Toyota is that out there?”

“Barbara Niedemeyer’s,” Max said without lifting his head from the bill he was making out. “And we are not adopting another dog, so just forget about it.”

Darla grinned at the back of his head and thought how sexy the curve of his neck was, rounding down into the back of his T-shirt. Max had put on a little weight in the seventeen years since they’d graduated, and his dark hair was a little thinner, but she could still see the best-looking boy in the senior class who’d invited her to be the first girl he took to the drive-in in the car he’d finally gotten running. They’d seen The Empire Strikes Back, or most of it. Looking at him now, she wanted to jump him all over again. Not bad for seventeen years, after all.

She peered out into the service bay. “Where’s Nick?”

“Upstairs.” Max pushed his chair back. “I mean it, no dog.”

Darla sat on the edge of the desk and nudged his thigh with hers. “Not even if I asked real nice?”

“Not even then,” Max said, but he’d caught the undertone in her voice; she could tell by the way his eyes crinkled. “You could try to persuade me, though.”

Darla slid until her legs were on the outside of Max’s and leaned over to put her hands on the arms of his desk chair. “Well, I want this dog pretty bad. What exactly would I have to do?”

“Come home and give me a back rub,” Max said. “And a few other things. You’re still not getting that dog, though. I got to be fair here.”

He tried to look stern, and Darla laughed, leaning closer. “Forget about home,” she whispered. “It’s full of kids. You and me, right here, honey.” He started to frown and she kissed him, and Max kissed her back, their good, solid, damn-I’m-glad-you’re-here kiss, but tonight her blood rose faster because they weren’t at home, they were in the office, windows all around, lights on, acting like dumb kids all over again. Sex with Max was never bad, but it wasn’t always pulse-pounding, and lately it hadn’t even been often.

Now her pulse was pounding.

“Wait a minute,” Max said, coming up for air, and she slid down into his lap as best she could with the chair arms in her way, straddling his thighs but not tight against him the way she wanted to be.

“Come here,” she said, and he said, “Jesus, the whole world can see us.”

“So they’ll learn something,” Darla said, but Max was standing up, sliding tight against her for a lovely second before the straightening of his body nudged her back onto the desk.

“Let’s go home,” he said. “The kids’ll be in bed by eleven. Then it’s you and me, girl.”

Darla felt the heat die out of her. “That’s five hours.”

Max grinned. “We can make it. Come on. Let’s get out of here before somebody sees us necking.”

“Yeah, that would be bad,” Darla said flatly and followed him out the door. The white Toyota gleamed at her in the garage lights. “Whose car did you say this is?”

“Barbara Niedemeyer,” Max said.

“She just dumped Matthew,” Darla said, and stopped in her tracks. “Oh, my God, she’s after Nick.”

“Maybe she just thought there was something wrong with her car,” Max said. “You don’t really want another dog, do you?”

“No, and anyway, Quinn wants it.” Darla’s mind turned over the possibilities, sliding away from her own disappointment. “I’m telling you, if that Toyota comes back in here again within the week, she’s gunning for Nick.” She turned to look at Max. “Should we try to save him?”

“Nick doesn’t need saved from anybody,” Max said, and he looked so uncomfortable, Darla let the subject drop. Max and Nick were close, but they didn’t interfere with each other, a relationship plan that had worked for the thirty-five years they’d been brothers. No need for her to go suggesting they change it now.

“All right,” she said, and Max said, “What do you mean, Quinn’s keeping it? That’s not like her.”

Darla followed him out into the dreary March dusk, trudging through the slush and thinking that Quinn would laugh when she found out Barbara was after Nick, and trying hard not to think about how much she’d wanted to make love back in the office, something different, just once after seventeen years.

“Maybe she wants something different,” Darla said, and Max said, “Quinn? Not likely.” He yanked open the truck door on the driver’s side and climbed in. “She’s got a good life, and if she plays her cards right, she can keep it forever. Why mess it up?”

Darla stood in the parking lot, the snow drifting around her, suddenly cold to the bone. “Because sometimes you need something new to feel alive again, Max. Sometimes what used to be good isn’t enough.”

“What are you talking about?” Max leaned over and opened the passenger door. “That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard. Get in here before you freeze.”

Darla walked around the truck, and climbed into her seat. She wasn’t sure what she was talking about, but she was fairly sure she knew how she felt.

And if Max thought he was getting laid tonight after the kids were in bed, he didn’t know her at all.

He patted her knee. “After the news, girl,” he said. “You and me.”

 

Saying no, flat-out no, went to Quinn’s head like cheap wine—she felt dizzy and lightheaded and a little sick as Bill smiled at her, hi, lips together.

“Don’t be silly,” he said. His face was set in the benevolent Captain of the Universe look that had earned him the respect of all of Tibbett. A real man’s man, her father had said when she’d brought him home the first time. Which would explain why she didn’t want him now. Let the men have him.

Quinn bent to put Katie on the floor. As she stood, she looked past Bill to where pots simmered on the stove, and flushed with annoyance. “You cooked again. I’ve told you over and over, on Wednesdays I eat with Darla—”

“You eat early,” Bill said. “And pizza is not good food. You need good food.” He opened a cupboard and took out a plate.

Quinn considered running down the food groups that pizza satisfied and gave up. It was easier to eat than to argue. She walked across the kitchen to rummage in the cupboard under the sink, Katie tiptoeing anxiously behind her, toenails clicking on the tile floor. “Where’s the puppy chow from the last time?”

“Clear in the back.” Bill’s voice sounded flat, and Quinn pulled her head out in time to see him glaring at Katie.

Quinn stuck her head back into the cupboard and fished out the puppy chow. When she stood, Bill had his back to her, dishing up noodles and sauce.

“Our lease says no pets.” Bill put the plate on the table and stood beside it, his arms folded, a nonjolly, nongreen giant.

Quinn poured chow into a bowl and put it on the floor. “Come on, baby. Dinner.”

The dog sniffed the food and began to eat cautiously. Quinn filled a second bowl with water and put it beside the first. Katie bent to eat, and she looked so sweet that Quinn stroked her head.

Katie squatted and peed.

“Quinn!” Bill yelled, and the dog cringed away from his voice.

“I’ve got it.” Quinn grabbed a paper towel from the roll beside the sink. Katie looked apologetic and distraught, and Quinn murmured her consolation as she mopped up the urine and then took a bottle of spray disinfectant out of the cupboard. “She’s a submission pee-er,” she told Bill as she scrubbed. “I didn’t know because I’ve been holding her all day. She gets nervous when people pat her and—”

“Well, obviously it can’t stay here,” Bill said, triumph in his voice. “We can put paper down in the bathroom tonight, but tomorrow it goes.”

Quinn finished mopping without saying anything. When she’d washed her hands, Bill extended his peace offering. “Your stroganoff’s getting cold.”

Quinn slid into her chair and picked up her fork.

Bill smiled at her, approving. “Now Edie will take the dog—”

“I’m keeping the dog.” Quinn put her fork down.

“You can’t,” Bill said. “It’ll ruin the carpet and there goes our damage deposit. Plus you’re at school all day. Who’s going to take care of it then?” He shook his head, calm in his own logic. “You’ll give it to Edie.”

“No.”

“Then I will,” Bill said, and began to eat.

Quinn felt cold. “That’s a joke, right?”

“You’re being irrational,” Bill said when he’d chewed and swallowed. “This dog would drive you crazy in no time. Look at it. All it does is shake. And pee.”

“She’s cold,” Quinn said, and Bill shook his head and kept on eating. “Are you listening to me?” she said, as she felt the heat rise in her.

“Yes, I’m listening,” Bill said. “And I’m taking care of you by taking it to Edie.”

Quinn went dizzy for a minute with rage and then bit back her anger because yelling would only create a problem she’d have to fix.

“It’s the sensible thing to do,” Bill told her. “Eat your dinner.”

Looking at his smug, sure face, Quinn realized she’d created a monster. Bill thought she was going to give in because she always had; so why should he expect anything else? She’d trained him to be smug. She looked around. This wasn’t even her apartment. Bill had picked it out and moved them in, and when she said, “It’s too beige,” he’d said, “It’s five minutes from school,” and that made so much sense she’d given up. And he’d bought furniture, everything in minimalist stripped pine, and when it was delivered and she said, “I don’t like it, it looks cold and modern,” he said, “I paid for it, and it’s here. Give it a chance, and if you still hate it in a couple of months, we’ll get something you like.” And she’d said okay because it was just furniture, not worth fighting over.

Katie leaned against her leg, her butt rolling on the carpet. Katie was worth fighting for.

And maybe the furniture had been worth fighting over, too. All that damn beige.

Bill smiled at her across the table, equally beige.

In fact, right about now, anything was worth fighting over.

“Now, don’t sit over there and sulk,” Bill said. “Edie will be good to the dog.”

“I hate this furniture.” Quinn shoved herself away from the table and got up to get her coat.

“Quinn?” Bill sounded a little taken aback. “What are you talking about?”

“All of it.” She shrugged into her peacoat. “I like old stuff. Warm stuff. I hate this apartment. I hate beige carpet.”

“Quinn.”

She turned her back to him to pick up Katie. “And right now, I’m not too crazy about you, either.”

The last thing she heard as she went out the door was Bill saying, “Quinn, you’re acting like a child.”

Nick was just getting into Carl Hiaasen’s latest when somebody knocked on his door. He’d only been home an hour, the cubes in his second Chivas hadn’t started to melt yet, and now company. One of the many benefits of being single was that he got to be alone a lot in a quiet place, so he dropped the book on the floor and pushed himself out of his ancient leather armchair, determined to get rid of whoever it was.

But when he yanked the door open, it was Quinn, swathed to her nose in a thick, fuzzy blue scarf, her copper hair shining under the porch light, and shutting the door on Quinn was never a possibility. She was holding a skinny black dog that looked at him with imploring dog-orphan eyes, so he said, “I don’t want a dog,” but he stood back to let her in.

Quinn brushed by him and put the dog down as he shut the door. She pulled the scarf from her mouth and said, “That’s good because you can’t have her.” She smiled down at the dog, who was cautiously surveying the apartment, and then she turned to him, all shining eyes and glossy hair, her cheeks glowing red in her round little-girl face. “I’m keeping her.”

“Dumb idea,” he said, but he said it without heat, smiling at her from habit and from pleasure because she was there. “Drink?”

“Yes, please.” Quinn unwound her scarf and dropped it on the hardwood floor next to his mother’s old braided rug, and the dog immediately curled up on it, looking at Nick as if it expected to stay. Don’t even think about it, dog.

“Boy, what a day,” Quinn said.

“So tell me.” Nick went out to his tiny kitchen and she followed, taking a glass down from the pine shelves over his sink while he cracked ice from a tray in his ancient fridge.

“I don’t even know where to start,” she said.

The kitchen was a tight fit for two, but it was Quinn, so it didn’t count. She held the glass to her chest because they were too close for her to hold it out, and he dropped the ice into it and then reached past her for the Chivas on the shelf, absent-mindedly enjoying her nearness. “Start with the worst stuff,” he told her, as he poured about a quarter inch in the glass for her. She was driving home, so that was all she was going to get. “That way we’ll end on an up note.”

She grinned up at him and said, “Thank you. Can I have some more?”

“No.” He nudged her toward the living room with his hip as he put the Chivas back. “You’re too young to drink anyway.”

“I’m thirty-five.” Quinn dropped to the rug beside the dog, all long legs and bright hair above her paint-stained sweater and jeans. “I’m allowed to do anything I want.” She stopped as if she’d just heard herself say something radical instead of sarcastic, and then she shrugged. “Okay, the worst is that I had a fight with Bill.”

Nick appreciated the color for a moment, the copper in her hair, the honey of the oak floor, the soft blue of her sweater and the faded greens of the rug, and most of all Quinn herself, everything she was, glowing in the middle of all that warmth. Then he registered what she’d said. “What?”

“I had a fight with Bill. At least, I think it was a fight. It’s hard to tell because he never gets mad. I told him I was keeping this dog and he said no. Like I was a little kid or something.”

Quinn was so flustered, widening her big hazel eyes at him, that Nick grinned. “Well, you act like a little kid sometimes. You live in an apartment. Where are you going to keep a dog?”

She shook her head, her hair swinging like copper silk. “That’s not the point. The point is that I want it, and he just said no.”

“Well, he doesn’t want it.” Nick settled back into his armchair, determined not to get sucked into Quinn’s fight but not worried about it. He could resist getting involved in Quinn’s life. He just couldn’t resist her company. “He shouldn’t have to live with an animal if he doesn’t want to.” The dog looked at him reproachfully, so he ignored it.

Quinn shook her head. “And I shouldn’t have to live without one.”

“So one of you will give in,” Nick said. “You’ll work it out.” He watched her stick her chin out and thought, Bill, you just became a dog lover. He’d known Quinn since she was fifteen, and when she dug her heels in like that, there was no moving her.

“I’m not working it out,” Quinn said. “I’m keeping Katie.”

“Who?”

“Katie. That’s her name.”

Quinn pulled the dog onto her lap and stroked its head, and Nick studied it, trying to see what Quinn saw in it. Slick and bony, it looked like a rat on stilts, and its huge dark eyes made him nervous. Save me, it seemed to be saying. Take care of me. Be responsible for me forever. He shook his head. “Couldn’t you have named it something about a thousand times less cute than Katie?”

“You want to get a dog of your own and call her Killer, be my guest,” Quinn said. “This is my dog, and her name’s Katie.” She looked at him, suddenly thoughtful. “You know, a dog would be good for you.”

“No.” Nick settled deeper in his chair. “An apartment is a lousy place for a dog. Also, I do not need another responsibility.”

Quinn looked at him with affectionate contempt. “A dog wouldn’t be another responsibility since you don’t have a first responsibility. It would be your first responsibility. It’d be a sign you’re maturing.”

“I have enough signs I’m maturing,” Nick growled. “I’m going gray.”

“I know.” Quinn sounded smug. “Just at the temples. It’s very attractive, but it’s probably going to cut down on those teenyboppers you’ve been dating.”

“I do not date teenagers.” Nick glared at her. He did not date teenagers. He had some morals, for Christ’s sake.

“Oh, please, how old is Lisa? Twelve?”

“Twenty-two,” Nick said. “I think.”

“An immature twenty-two,” Quinn said. “And you’re pushing forty.”

“Thirty-eight.” Nick thought about telling her he hadn’t seen Lisa since Christmas and decided not to. It would open up a whole different conversation he didn’t want to have, one they’d already had several times, the one about how he dated women who were too young for him so he wouldn’t have to get involved. That was true, but it also worked, so why discuss it? Time to change the subject. “So what’s new? I haven’t seen anybody all day. I worked right up to six. Bucky Manchester’s Chevy has a dead muffler.”

“He can afford it,” Quinn said. “Mama said Bucky’s making money hand over fist at the real estate office.” She took her first drink of Chivas, knocking back half of it at once.

“Well, that’s good because Max and I are siphoning some of it off.” Nick pointed his finger at her. “Don’t chug that. You’re driving.”

“Just home to Bill.” Quinn sipped her drink, tense all over again. “You know, if he doesn’t give in on this dog, I’m moving out.”

“Well, think about it first,” Nick said, definitely not interested in discussing Bill. “How’s school?”

“School?” Quinn blinked at him, readjusting subjects. “The same. Edie’s got the school play again, and Bobby’s giving her fits over it. If it isn’t athletics, he doesn’t care about it. She wants me to do the sets and costumes, but I said no. More headaches I don’t need. And Bobby’s driving Greta nuts, too, but all our money is on her since she’s been school secretary forever, and he’s just brand-new. He can’t run the school without her.”

“You call him Bobby to his face?”

“No. We don’t even call him Bobby in the teachers’ lounge. Edie started calling him the Boy Principal when he took over in November, and now everybody calls him the BP. I think that’s one of the reasons he’s so mad at her.”

“That would do it,” Nick said, mostly to keep her talking. Quinn talked with her entire body: arms, eyes, shoulders, mouth. She was performance art, so alive that sometimes he argued with her just so he could watch her flush and gesture.

Her smile was rich in her voice as she said, “Well, that, and I think he overheard her one day after he’d been shooting his mouth off, and she said”—Quinn shifted tone to mimic Edie’s blonde little soprano, the quasi-Southern lilt with the scorpion’s sting—“‘You know, it’s so much easier to like Robert when he’s not in the building.’” Nick grinned, and Quinn finished, “Well, yeah, but the BP didn’t think it was funny.”

“No sense of humor,” Nick said.

“No brains,” Quinn said. “He thinks he knows it all. Smug little twit. I used to think Harvey was a mess, but now that he’s gone and we’ve got the BP, I realize how lucky we were to have somebody that let Greta run the school. Bobby’s obsessed with changing everything, and he’s screwing things up right and left, and he won’t listen when we tell him he’s making mistakes. The only person he listens to at all is Bill, but then he thinks Bill hung the moon. All those championships. If Bill wins the baseball trophy this spring, the BP will probably ask Bill to adopt him. And as far as I’m concerned, they deserve each other.”

The shadow was back in her face again, and Nick felt uneasy. “Look, Bill can’t be dumb enough to risk losing you over a dog,” he said finally, not wanting to get in the middle of the mess but wanting to give her some kind of comfort. “When he sees how much it means to you, he’ll give in.”

“I don’t know,” Quinn said. “Sometimes I don’t think he sees me. I think he just sees the person he wants me to be. You know? The person he can cope with. Because the real me is too messy and difficult.”

Nick shook his head. Bill couldn’t possibly be stupid enough to miss who Quinn was and what she meant to him. She leaned forward to pull the dog into her lap, and her hair swung like copper silk, the lamplight making it gleam rich against the pale gold flush of her skin.

It would take a real moron to miss Quinn.

“So tell me about how you found this rat,” he said, just to see her eyes flash, and when she jerked her head up and glared at him, he laughed.

Good old, safe, predictable Quinn.

When Bill rolled over the next morning, Katie was stretched out between him and Quinn on the bedspread, a damn dog in bed with them in spite of his plans for newspaper in the bathroom. Quinn had just said, “No,” and put a folded blanket beside the bed, and of course during the night the dog had jumped up. It was a miracle it hadn’t peed in the bed. He felt his temper rise and calmed himself the way he always did, with deep breaths and clear thinking. Quinn was just confused. She’d come in late last night and shook her head when he tried to talk to her, refusing to eat the stroganoff he’d reheated for her, taking the dog into the bedroom with her. She was acting like a child, but he was used to dealing with children. He was a teacher. Patience was everything.

Besides, last night after she’d stomped out, he’d tried to figure out what was wrong and realized that she was probably just tense because she wanted to get married and have children like he did. Of course, he had plenty of time to have kids, but she was thirty-five and not getting any younger. And there he was, not telling her they were getting married because he was focused on the season. So all he had to do was get the dog out of the way and propose early, and then they’d get married and have the children she wanted, and he’d wake up and find Bill Junior snuggled between them. The thought warmed him. A little boy with all of his strength and honesty and intelligence and all of Quinn’s sweetness. All he had to do was be patient and get rid of the dog and things would be fine.

The dog stretched, all skinny legs and body, and then curled closer to Quinn’s back.

“Get down,” Bill whispered as sternly as he could without waking Quinn.

The dog opened its eyes and glared at him.

Bill shoved at the dog’s butt with his hand. “Down.”

The dog curled a lip and growled low in its throat, viciously staking its claim to Quinn, and Bill pulled his hand back.

“What’re you doin’?” Quinn mumbled sleepily over her shoulder.

“That dog growled at me.”

“You prob’ly woke her up.” Quinn yawned and patted the bed on the other side of her. “C’mere, Katie.”

Katie stood up slowly, stretching, insolent, and then clambered over Quinn’s waist to curl up victorious against her stomach. Quinn let her hand fall carelessly along the dog’s back, patting a little as she drifted back to sleep.

Bill took some more deep breaths and then sneezed. Probably allergic to dog dander.

That dog was history.

 

“Is Max here?” Nick straightened from under the hood of Mary Galbraith’s ancient Civic and said, “Pardon?” but he’d recognized the voice even before he saw the slender blonde in the powder blue suit. First National Bank Barbie, Darla called her, which was a lot kinder than Lois Ferguson’s nickname for her. She did have that plastic look that made it hard to believe she was stalking Max, but there she was. “Hi, Barbara. Nope, he’s out right now. Your car’s all right, I hope.”

“Oh, he did a wonderful job.” Barbara looked uncertain, out of place in the dingy garage, but then Barbara looked out of place anywhere but the bank. She gave Nick the creeps, but he knew that wasn’t fair. For one thing, she was damn good at her job. Nobody’s deposit ever got screwed up when Barbara took it.

“I don’t know when he’ll be back,” Nick said, when Barbara seemed stalled out on the next thing to say.

“I just brought him these.” She stuck a painted tin out toward him tentatively, and Nick felt sorry for her and wary for Max. The tin was plaid with a painted green bow and a painted white card that said THANK YOU! “They’re cookies,” Barbara said. “Because he did such a good job.”

“Oh.” What the hell was he going to do with cookies? “Why don’t you put them in the office? I’ll tell Max you left them.”

“Thank you. That would be nice.” Barbara stood there, perfectly dressed, stuck again.

“Right there in the office,” Nick said, trying to be encouraging.

Barbara took a deep breath. “He’s really good with cars, isn’t he?”

“The best,” Nick said. “The office is right there, through that door.”

“Because my car is running much better. He even fixed the heater.”

“It was just a loose switch,” Nick said, not mentioning he was the one who’d fixed it. “Max is good at catching things like that.”

“Well, that’s what I thought.” Barbara came a step closer, and Nick realized there was something different about her. She didn’t look as flashy for some reason. Like her hair was darker or something. “I think paying attention to details is important, don’t you?”

“Yeah.” Nick gave up on remembering what color her hair had been before because he didn’t care. “Well, you can just put those cookies in the office.”

“Is he good around the house, too?” Barbara asked, and Nick decided she was weird.

“He does okay,” Nick said. “Darla never complains.” He debated saying more and decided against it. No point in getting involved.

“I know. She does wonderful hair.” Barbara seemed guileless. “She’s lucky to have Max.”

“Right there in the office,” Nick said. “That would be the place to put those cookies.”

“You’re busy.” Barbara backed up a step. “It must be wonderful to work with Max.”

“Makes my day,” Nick said.

“I’m sure you’re good, too,” Barbara said politely.

“Not very,” Nick said.

“I’ll just put these in the office.”

“That would be the place.” Nick stuck his head back under the hood of the Honda and thought, Max, you’re going to have to handle this.

And then he concentrated on the Honda because Max and Barbara were none of his business.

 

Quinn got home a little after three, faster than usual because she was so excited to see Katie. Katie would need to go out right away, so she’d take her out in back of the apartment the way she had that morning, watch her jump and skip across the frozen ground and then come running back, and she’d feel the exhilaration she’d felt then, the lift of having something that loved her without expecting anything from her. She’d pick Katie up as she pawed at her coat, shivering all over from anxiety and excitement, cuddle her warm, and feel Katie’s little head rest on her shoulder again. It was so amazing to have a dog of her own that she smiled as she opened the door to the apartment and called “Katie!”, waiting to hear the newly wonderful clatter of dog toenails on the kitchen tile.

The apartment stayed silent.

“Katie?”

Still no toenails. Quinn shut the door behind her and began to look, her heart pounding, checking to make sure Katie wasn’t locked in the bathroom or asleep on the pine poster bed. The apartment was small enough that she had the entire place searched in two minutes. No Katie.

She tortured herself with the thought that the dog might have gotten out somehow, but when she went to see how much dog food was left, evidence of how long Katie might have been in the apartment, both bowls were gone. Quinn found them in the dishwasher.

Bill was always tidy.

The blood rose in her face and all the irritation and frustration she’d been feeling coalesced into rage.

He’d taken her dog.

He’d stolen her dog.

It took her no time at all to cover the mile back to school.