I drank most of the Falstaff, then examined the cat's tray. Crumbs of dry food speckled the paper towel around his food bowl and a hair floated in his water. He'd probably slipped down the stairs during the day when no one was home, eaten, then made his escape. I tossed the old food and water, put out fresh, and wished that he was here.

I finished the Falstaff, then opened a bottle of pinot grigio, poured two glasses, and brought one to Lucy. She was still reading the magazine, so I put the wine on the table near her. I said, 'I meant to get home sooner, but Rossi's in pretty bad shape, and the day just sort of grew from there.' I didn't tell her about James Lester. Lester would bring us back to Green, and I didn't want to go there. 'I was hoping that we'd have more time together.'

Lucy's face grew sad and she covered my hand with hers. 'Oh, Studly, I know you can't be with us every moment. It's okay.'

'It doesn't seem okay.'

Lucy stared past me and the sadness grew deeper. She wet the corner of her mouth as if she were going to say something, then shook her head as if changing her mind. 'There's a lot going on right now, Elvis, but it doesn't have anything to do with us.'

'Can we talk about it?'

She wet the corner of her mouth again, but she still didn't look back at me. She was staring at a point in midspace as if there was a third presence in the room, floating in space and demanding the weight of her attention. 'I'd really rather not. Not now.'

I nodded. 'Okay. Up to you.'

She looked back at me and made the little smile again, and now it was clearly forced. 'Let me help you cook. Would that be okay?'

'Sure.'

We went into the kitchen and collected things for the spaghetti sauce and talked about her day. We chopped mushrooms and onions and green peppers, and opened cans of tomatoes and jars of oregano and basil, and talked as we did it, but the talking was empty and forced, the way it might be if there was a distance between us and we had to shout to make ourselves heard. I asked how her meetings had gone and she said fine. I asked if she was finished with the negotiation, and she said that a final meeting tomorrow would do it. Ben came in and parked on one of the counter stools, but he seemed to sense the tension and said little. After a time, he went into the living room and turned on my Macintosh and went online.

We had just put the spaghetti in boiling water and were setting the table when the doorbell rang. I said, 'If it's a reporter, I'm going to shoot him.'

It was Joe Pike and Angela Rossi. Rossi looked ragged and uncertain, and there were great hollow smudges beneath her eyes. Lucy stared soundlessly from the kitchen, and Rossi glanced from her to me. 'I hope you don't mind.'

'Of course not.' I introduced them.

Angela Rossi glanced at Lucy again, and in that moment there was something very female in the room, as if Rossi somehow sensed the tension and felt that she was not so much invading my space but Lucy's. She said, 'I'm sorry.' To Lucy, not to me.

Lucy said, 'We were going to eat soon. Would you like to join us?' She was holding the sauce spoon over the pan, frozen in mid-stir.

Rossi said, 'No. Thank you. I can't stay very long.' She smiled at Ben. 'I have children.'

'Of course.' Lucy put the sauce spoon on the counter, then excused herself and took Ben out onto the deck.

We watched the glass doors slide shut, and Rossi looked even more uncomfortable. 'Looks like I've come at a bad time.'

'Forget it.'

Pike moved behind her. He hadn't yet spoken, and probably wouldn't.

Angela Rossi looked at the floor, then looked at me, as if her energy reserves were so depleted she had to conserve what little remained. She said, 'Joe told me about Lester. He told me what you've been trying to do.'

I nodded.

'I lost it this morning and I want to apologize. You're caught in this, too, just like me.'

'Yes, but it's worse for you.'

'Maybe.' She looked at the floor again, then looked back. 'I want you to know that I didn't lie to you. I want you to know that everything I told you was the truth. LeCedrick Earle is lying, and so is his mother. I didn't do those things.'

'I believe you, detective.'

When I said it her breath gave and her eyes filled and her face collapsed, but in that same instant she caught herself and rebuilt the calm cop exterior: her breathing steadied, her eyes dried, her face calmed. It wasn't easy to recreate herself that way, but I imagined that she'd had plenty of practice over the years and that, as with every other professional police officer that I'd known, it had become a necessary survival skill. She had allowed a window to her heart to open, then had slammed it shut the way you take a covered pan off the fire when it begins to boil over, removing the heat so that you don't lose the contents. 'I'm suspended. I've been ordered to stay away from all official police business or activities pending an IA investigation. The district attorney's office is also investigating me.'

'I know.'

'The people I work with, there's only so much they can do.'

I knew that, too. If Tomsic or the others did anything to find out what was going on, they'd be pounded for obstructing justice and probably accused of trying to cover up Rossi's alleged crimes.

She looked at Joe. 'You guys offered to help. Joe said that the offer still stands.'

'Of course.' I glanced at Lucy on the deck. She and Ben were at the rail. Ben was pointing at something far down the canyon and yakking, but Lucy seemed neither to hear him nor to see. As if the other presence were out there, too, and drawing her attention. I felt my own eyes fill, but, like Angela Rossi, I also knew the tricks of survival. 'We're not going to walk away, Angie. We're not going to leave you hanging.'

Angela Rossi looked at me for a time, first in one eye and then the other, and then she glanced again at Lucy and Ben. 'I'm sorry I intruded.'

'Don't worry about it.'

She put out her hand. We shook, and then Angela Rossi left my home.

Joe Pike stood in the entry, staring out onto the deck, as if he, too, could somehow sense the tension. Maybe I should just put up a huge sign: DOMESTIC PROBLEM. I said, 'What?'

Pike stared a moment longer, then turned and followed Angela Rossi, leaving me in the shadows.

I went back into the kitchen, stirred the sauce, then turned off the heat. The spaghetti was limp and swollen. I poured it in the colander, rinsed it, and let it drain.

I could see Lucy and Ben in the light at the rail, haloed by a swirl of flying insects, Lucy still there but not there, Ben now quiet. The cat door made its clack-clack behind me, and the cat crept in. He moved cautiously, pausing between steps, sniffing the air. I smiled at him. 'It's okay, bud. They're outside.'

He blinked at me, but you could tell he was suspicious. He crept to the dining area, still testing the air, then came back and stood by my feet. I broke off a piece of the venison sausage, sucked off the tomato sauce, then blew on it until it was cool. I offered it to him, and as he ate it I stroked him. His fur was flecked with dust and bits of plant matter, and felt cool from the night air. White hairs were beginning to show through the black, and I wondered how old he was. We had been together a long time.

When he was finished he looked up at me, and I smiled. I picked him up and held him close, and after a time he purred. I said, 'Life is complicated, isn't it?'

He licked my cheek, then bit my jaw, but he didn't bite hard.

After a time he hopped down and made his way through the house. He moved slowly, staring toward the deck for a very long time before finally bolting up the stairs and into my bedroom.

I told Lucy and Ben that dinner was ready. We ate, and not long after that we doused the lights and went to bed.