Crow's mouth was a tight line. "I would like to point out that, traditionally, it's the man who gets down on one knee and does the asking. Even these days."

"I'd like to point out that, traditionally, it's the man who rides to the damsel's rescue," Tess said. "Even these days."

Kristina and Rick laughed, but Tess had never been more serious. Neither had Crow, it seemed. He sipped his iced tea-the others were drinking Tecates, but his antibiotics couldn't be mixed with alcohol-and cut his quesedilla into careful fourths, then eighths, still not eating any of it.

"Okay, your terms," he said. "But I have a condition, too. One day, I get to save you."

"Oh Crow-" She reached out and took his hand. The world was almost unbearably vivid. She was aware not only of the blue sky above them, but the coolness of his hand in hers, the peppers in the thin brown salsa, the lime in her beer, the prisms of light refracted by Kristina's diamond. It was enough. It was too much. Plentitude. She finally got it.

"Oh Crow," she repeated. "I think you just did."

About the Author

LAURA LIPPMAN was a newspaper reporter at the Baltimore Sun for fifteen years. Her Tess Monaghan novels-Baltimore Blues, Charm City, Butchers Hill, In Big Trouble, The Sugar House, and The Last Place-have won the Edgar, Agatha, Shamus, Anthony and Nero Wolfe awards, and her novel, In a Strange City, was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Her latest standalone crime novel, Every Secret Thing, was published by William Morrow in September 2003.