We necked like two teenagers for endless minutes. I undid a button of her blouse. She made a throaty sound, caught my lower lip between her teeth, licked my ear. My hand slithered around to the hot silk of her back, working with a mind of its own, undoing the clasp of her brassiere, cupping around her breast. The nipple, pebble - hard and moist, nestled against my palm. She lowered one hand, slender fingers tugging at my fly.

I was the one who stopped it.

"What's the matter?"

There's nothing you can say in a situation like that that doesn't sound like a cliche or totally idiotic, or both. I opted for both.

"I'm sorry. Don't take it personally."

She threw herself upright, busied herself with buttoning, fastening, smoothing her hair.

"How else should I take it?"

"You're very desirable."

"Very."

"I'm attracted to you, dammit. I'd love to make love to you."

"What is it, then?"

"A commitment."

"You're not married, are you? You don't act married."

"There are other commitments besides marriage."

"I see." She gathered up her purse and put her hand on the door handle. "The person you're committed to, it would matter to her?"

"Yes. More important, it would matter to me."

She burst out laughing, verging on hysteria.

"I'm sorry," she said, catching her breath. "It's so damned ironic. You think I do this often? This is the first time I've been interested in a guy in a long time. The nun cuts loose and comes face to face with a saint."

She giggled. It sounded feverish, fragile, made me uneasy. I was weary of being on the receiving end of someone's - anyone's - frustration but I supposed she was entitled to her moment of cathartic stardom.

"I'm no saint, believe me."

She touched my cheek with her fingers. It was like being raked with hot coals.

"No, you're just a nice guy, Delaware."

"I don't feel like that, either."

"I'm going to kiss you again," she said, "but it's going to stay chaste this time. The way it should have been in the first place."

And she did.

18

There were two surprises waiting for me when I got home.

The first was Robin, in my ratty yellow bathrobe, stretched out on the leather sofa, drinking hot tea. A fire burned in the hearth and the stereo played the Eagles' "Desperado."

She was wearing a magazine photograph of Lassie around her neck like a miniature sandwich sign.

"Hello, darling," she said.

I threw my jacket over a chair.

"Hi. What's with the dog?"

"Just my way of letting you know that I've been a bitch and I'm sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry for." I removed the sign.

I sat beside her and took her hands in mine.

"I was rotten to you this morning, Alex, letting you leave like that. The moment the door closed I started missing you. You know how it is when you let your mind wander around - what if something happens to him, what if I never see him again - you go crazy. I couldn't work, couldn't be around machines in that state. The day was blown. I called you but I couldn't get through. So here I am."

"Virtue has its rewards," I muttered under my breath.

"What's that, sweetie?"

"Nothing." Any recounting of my minor - league indiscretion would suffer in the retelling, emerging as either a boorish bathroom scribble - "Yeah, I copped a fast feel from another broad, honey' - or, worse, a confession.

I lay down beside her. We held each other, said nice things, talked baby talk, stroked each other. I was pumped up from the waist down, some of it a residue of the curbside session with Raquel, most of it belonging to the moment.

"There are two giant porterhouses in the refrigerator and a Caesar salad and burgundy and sourdough." She whispered, tickling my nose with her pinkie.

"You're a very oral person," I laughed.

"Is that neurotic, Doctor?"

"No. It's wonderful."

"How about this? And this?"

The robe fell open. She kneeled above me, letting it slide down her shoulders. Backlit by the glow of the fire, she looked like a piece of glorious, golden statuary.

"Come on sweetie," she coaxed, "get out of those clothes." And she took the matter into her own hands.

"I do love you," she said later. "Even if you are catatonic."

I refused to budge, and lay spreadeagled on the floor.

"I'm cold."

She covered me, stood and stretched, and laughed with pleasure.

"How can you jump around afterwards?" I groaned.

"Women are stronger than men," she said gaily, and proceeded to dance around the room, humming, stretching more so that the muscles of her calves ascended in the slender columns of her legs like bubbles rising in a carpenter's level. Her eyes reflected orange Halloween light. When she moved a shudder went through me.

"Keep jiggling like that and I'll show you who's stronger."

"Later, big boy." She teased me with her foot and leaped away from my grabbing paws with fluid agility.

By the time the steaks were ready Mrs. Gutierrez's cuisine was a vague memory and I ate with gusto. We sat side by side in the breakfast nook, looking out through leaded glass as lights went on in the hills like the beacons of a distant search party. She rested her head on my shoulder. My arm went around her, my fingertips blindly traced the contours of her face. We took turns drinking from a single glass of wine.

"I love you," I said.

"I love you too." She kissed the underside of my chin. After several more sips:

"You were investigating those murders today, weren't you?"

"Yes."

She fortified herself with a large swallow and refilled the glass.

"Don't worry," she said. "I'm not going to hassle you about it. I can't pretend I like it, but I won't try to control you."

I hugged her by way of thanks.

"I mean, I wouldn't want you treating me that way, so I won't do it to you." She was giving liberation the old school try, but worry remained suspended in her voice like a fly in amber.

"I'm watching out for myself."

"I know you are," she said, too quickly. "You're a bright man. You can take care of yourself."

She handed me the wine.

"If you want to talk about it, Alex, I'll listen."

I hesitated.

"Tell me. I want to know what's going on."

I gave her a rehash of the last two days, ending it with the confrontation with Andy Gutierrez, leaving out the ten turbulent minutes with Raquel.

She listened, troubled and attentive, digested it, and told me, "I can see why you can't drop it. So many suspicious things, no connecting thread."

She was right. It was reverse Gestalt, the whole so much less than the sum of its parts. A random assortment of musicians, sawing, blowing, thumping, yearning for a conductor. But who the hell was I to play Ormandy?

"When are you going to tell Milo?"

"I'm not. I spoke to him this morning and he basically told me to mind my own business, stay out of it." "But it's his job, Alex. He'll know what to do."

"Honey, Milo will get bent out of shape if I tell him I visited La Casa."

"But that poor child, the retarded one, isn't there something he could do about it?"

I shook my head.

"It's not enough. There'd be an explanation for it. Mile's got his suspicions - I'll bet they're stronger than he let on to me - but he's hemmed in by rules and procedures."

"And you're not," she said softly.

"Don't worry."

"Don't worry, yourself. I'm not going to try to stop you. I meant what I said."

I drank more wine. My throat had constricted and the cool liquid was astringently soothing.

She got up and stood behind me, putting her arms over my shoulders. It was a gesture of support not dissimilar from the one I'd offered Raquel just a few hours earlier. She reached down and played with the ridge of hair that vertically bisected my abdomen.