"He hasn't come back from lunch yet."
"Who's out front?"
"No one, but I'll hear the bell if a customer comes in."
Joe grabbed a brush and the paint can and walked into the small storage room. This was the part of undercover police work that drove him just south of sane-the waiting around for a suspect to make a move. Still, he supposed working inside the shop was better than sitting outside in an unmarked car and getting fat on Yankee Dogs. Better, but not by much.
He covered the floor with a drop cloth and leaned the boards he'd cut for shelves the day before against the wall. Mara followed him like a puppy and chatted nonstop about the immature college guys she'd dated. She left once when the bell rang, but she reappeared shortly to assure him she was in the market for a mature, older man.
By the time Kevin returned, Joe had just finished painting the two shelves and was preparing to paint the walls of the small room. Kevin took one look at Mara and sent her to help Gabrielle, leaving the two of them alone.
"I think she has a crush on you," Kevin said as Mara cast one last look over her shoulder and walked out the door.
"Yeah, maybe." Joe placed one hand on the back of his own shoulder and raised his arm above his head. As much as he hated to admit it, his muscles ached like a bitch. He kept his body in good shape. There was only one other explanation. He was getting old.
"Is Gabrielle paying you enough to put up with sore muscles?" Kevin was dressed in designer everything and held a sack from a party outlet store in one hand and a bag from the women's underwear shop down the street in the other.
"She pays me enough." He dropped his arms to his sides. "Money isn't all that important to me."
"Then you've never been poor. I have, my friend, and it sucks. It affects your whole life."
"How do you figure?"
"People judge you on the brand of your shirt and the condition of your shoes. Money is everything. Without it people think you're trash. And women, forget it. Women won't have anything to do with you. Period."
Joe sat on the edge of a trunk and crossed his arms over his chest. "Depends on what kind of women you're trying to impress."
"Strictly high maintenance. Women who know the difference between a Toyota and a Mercedes."
"Ahh." Joe tilted his head back and looked at the man before him. "Those women cost serious cash. Do you have that kind of money?"
"Yeah, and if I don't, I know how to get it. I know how to get the things I need."
Bingo. "How's that?"
Kevin just smiled and shook his head. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"Try me," Joe pressed.
"Afraid I can't."
"Do you invest in the stock market?"
"I invest in me, Kevin Carter, and that's all I'm going to say."
Joe knew when to back off. "What's in the sack?" he asked and pointed to Kevin's hand.
"I'm giving a birthday party for my girlfriend, China."
"No shit? Is China her real name or her stage name?"
"Neither," Kevin chuckled. "She just likes it better than her real name, Sandy. I mentioned the party to Gabe this morning when I stopped by her booth. She said the two of you had made other plans."
Joe thought he'd made himself real clear when he'd told Gabrielle she had to stop getting in the way of his investigation. Obviously, he was going to have to talk to her again. "I think we can make it to your party for a little while."
"Are you sure? She seemed pretty set on spending the evening at home."
Normally, Joe wasn't the sort of guy to sit on a bar stool and talk about women, his or anyone else's. But this was different, this was his job, and he knew how to play. He leaned forward slightly as if he were about to share a secret. "Well, just between you and me, Gabrielle is a nymphomaniac."
"Really, I always thought she was a prude."
"She's the closet kind." He leaned back and grinned like he and Kevin were of the same hound brotherhood. "But I think I can hold her off for a few hours. What time is your party?"
"Eight," Kevin answered as he headed to his office, and Joe was stuck painting for the next two hours. After Anomaly closed for the evening, he drove to the police station and read over the daily report on the Hillard theft. Nothing much in the way of new information since that morning's roll call. Kevin had met an unidentified woman for lunch at a downtown restaurant. He'd bought party supplies and stopped at a Circle K for a Big Gulp. Exciting stuff.
Joe reported his conversation with Kevin and let Luchetti know he'd been invited to Kevin's party. Then he grabbed a stack of paperwork off his desk and headed home to Sam.
For dinner, he barbecued some ribs and ate the macaroni salad his sister Debby had left in his refrigerator while he'd been at work. Sam stood on the table next to his plate and refused to eat his bird seeds and baby carrots.
"Sam loves Joe."
"You can't have my ribs."
"Sam loves Joe-braack."
"No."
Sam blinked his yellow-and-black eyes, raised his beak, and mimicked the telephone ringing.
"I haven't fallen for that in months." Joe speared some macaroni with his fork and felt like he was taunting a two-year-old with an ice cream cone. "The vet said you need to eat less and exercise more or you'll get liver disease."
The bird flew to his shoulder, then rested his feathery head against Joe's ear. "Pretty bird."
"You're fat." He remained strong during dinner and didn't feed Sam, but when the bird mimicked one of Joe's favorite phrases from a Clint Eastwood movie, he relented and fed him bites of Ann Cameron's cheesecake. It was as good as she'd claimed, so he guessed he owed her coffee. He tried to remember Ann as a kid, and vaguely recalled a girl with wire glasses sitting on one of those emerald green crushed velvet couches at her parents' house, staring at him while he'd waited for her sister, Sherry. She'd probably been about ten, six years younger than him. About Gabrielle's age.
The thought of Gabrielle brought a dull ache to his brow. Joe pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and middle finger and racked his brain to figure out what to do about her. He didn't have a clue.
As the setting sun washed the valley in twilight, Joe put Sam in his aviary and plugged Dirty Harry into the VCR. Besides Jerry Springer's Too Hot For Television, it was about the only tape Sam liked. In the past, Joe had tried to encourage his bird to watch Disney or Sesame Street or one of the educational tapes he'd bought. But Sam was a Jerry junkie, and like most parents, Joe gave in a lot.
He drove to the small brick house across town and parked his Bronco next to the curb. A pink porch light glowed above the front door. A few nights ago, the bulb had been green. Joe wondered at the significance but figured he probably didn't want to know.
A pair of squirrels darted across the lawn and sidewalk and skittered up the rough bark of an ancient oak. Halfway up, they paused to glare at him, the ends of their bushy tails snapped. Their agitated chatter filled his ears, reaming him as if somehow he'd been rude enough to steal their stash. He liked squirrels even less than cats.
Joe pounded on Gabrielle's door three times before it swung open. She stood before him wearing a big white shirt that buttoned up the front. Her green eyes widened, and her face flushed a deep red.
"Joe! What are you doing here?"
Before he answered her question, he let his gaze take her in, from the auburn curls falling from the ponytail on top of her head, to the string of beaded hemp tied around her ankle. She'd rolled the sleeves of her shirt up her forearms while the tails hit her about an inch above her bare knees. As far as he could see, she wore little else except multicolored paint smudges. "I need to talk to you," he said, returning his gaze to the increasing flush in her cheeks.