“So Lydia Welch made you an offer you couldn’t refuse.” Spike was doing his best Godfather impersonation, which, if I was going to be honest, was not all that great.
“I saved the piece of paper she wrote it on,” I said. “I may have it framed.”
“Oooh, let me see.”
We were having lunch at his restaurant, Spike’s—something we did a lot on workdays. I slipped the ivory stationery out of my purse and placed it on the table face up.
Spike read the number. He let out a whistle.
I quickly put it back in my purse. “Right?”
“I’ve killed for less than that.”
“To be fair, you’ve often killed pro bono.”
“True. But still.”
“I know.”
The server came by with our orders—a bleu cheese burger for Spike and a classic Greek salad for me, plus two iced teas. The server’s name was Norah and I knew her well. She asked me where Rosie was, a concerned look on her face. I told her Rosie was fine—just taking a personal day.
When she left, Spike asked to see Lydia’s offer again, just to make sure he’d read it correctly. I obliged.
“I’m awestruck,” Spike said.
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen you awestruck,” I said. “In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you use the word awestruck.”
“You haven’t,” he said as I put the stationery back in my purse. “If it wasn’t lunchtime on a Monday, I’d break out my best champagne.”
“Rain check on the champagne,” I said. “And I’m buying.”
He raised his glass of iced tea. “To future champagne,” he said.
“Future champagne.” I clinked my glass with his.
Spike sipped his tea. I took a bite of my salad, thinking about how much champagne I could buy with the sum Lydia Welch had written so casually on that luxe piece of stationery. A life-changing number, to be sure. But the truth was, it wasn’t just the money that had made me accept Lydia’s offer. It was that lost look in her eyes—the very obvious fact that, despite all she had in this world, she was missing something she needed, and that something was a person. Okay, an asshole of a person. But it wasn’t my job to judge the missing.
Spike asked me how the investigation was going so far. I told him that, with Blake’s help, I’d called all the names on Lydia’s list. And of the few who had deigned to pick up their phones for us—two ex-girlfriends, three former employees from the dating app, a college suitemate, a cousin—none of them had seen Dylan in months, if not years. Blake was emailing the non-answerers, but I didn’t have much hope there, either. “Dylan Welch doesn’t seem to forge lasting friendships,” I said.
“I’m sure brief friendships don’t happen much for him, either,” Spike said.
I nodded. “His mother loves him, though,” I said. “That’s obvious. When Bill Welch met with me, he seemed…I don’t know…Like someone had put him up to it. But Lydia was sincere.”
“You’re a sucker for sincerity,” Spike said. “You always have been.”
“Fortunately, it’s a very rare quality,” I said.
Spike took another bite of his burger. I went back to my salad. It was quite good. The perfect balance of olives and feta, and the dressing was bright and tangy.
Spike asked if I’d checked with Dylan’s bank and credit card providers to see if he’d withdrawn money or put any charges on his cards since he went missing. And I told him the sad truth about Dylan Welch: After a post-college spending spree that resulted in maxed-out cards, close to a million in debt—and massive humiliation for his family—Lydia took it upon herself to oversee all of Dylan’s finances.
“He can’t withdraw five dollars without the bank alerting Lydia,” I said. “He has only one card in his own name. And it has a limit of one thousand dollars.”
“The ultimate poor little rich boy,” Spike said.
“Yep,” I said. “Anyway, Lydia said there’s been no activity on any of those accounts since he went missing. So he’s either obtaining funds from other sources or…” I took a sip of tea. I didn’t feel like finishing the sentence.
“So what’s next?”
“After lunch, I’m going over to the Gonzo corporate offices,” I said. “I figure I’ll have more luck talking to people there, and I always do better in person.”
“Nobody can hang up on you.”
“Exactly.”
Spike drank some of his tea. “Speaking of doing better in person…” He gave me a meaningful look that I understood instantly.
I rolled my eyes at him. “The weekend was good. Richie’s good,” I said. “We had fun.”
Spike kept looking at me. I knew he was waiting for me to say more. Just like I knew what he meant by “speaking of doing better in person” without his having to explain. When your friendship has lasted longer than most people’s marriages—and Spike and mine had, to say the least—you can read each other’s minds with an alarming facility.
He took another bite of his burger and stared at me some more. I ate some more of my salad and stared back. He drank his iced tea. I drank mine. The whole time, our gazes stayed locked. It was a game of chicken, albeit one that was, compared to most games of chicken, rather polite and low stakes. All Spike wanted was for me to tell him if my relationship status had changed from complicated to super-complicated.
“Okay, you win,” I said finally. “I’m considering moving down the shore.”
Spike’s eyes widened. “Wow.”
“Just for part of the year,” I said.
“Get you.”
“Get me.”
“Which part of the year?”
“Probably winters, weird as that sounds.”
Spike took another sip of his iced tea. “It doesn’t sound that weird.”
“I like it there in the winter.”
He nodded. “So you really did have fun with Richie.”
“I did.”
“And you think you can make it work this time.”
“I do.”
We ate in silence for several minutes.
“I’m happy for you,” Spike said finally. I could tell he’d put a lot of thought into that response. And he was telling the truth. Spike always told the truth. “One question,” he said.
“Yes?”
“Are you still going to call me when you need some heads busted?”
“It’s a five-hour drive,” I said. “You might not be able to get there in time.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe you should teach me karate.”
Spike gave me a long, appraising look. “Judo,” he said. “With those skinny arms, you’d be much better at judo.”