Part 20 (1/2)

”What if I made out with you right now? Could I lecture you then?”

”No. First, you need to tell me what you want from me because it can't be all business sometimes and... something else... other times.”

He let her hands go, and she felt the loss of his touch deeply. ”What do I want from you? It hasn't been obvious since the day we met? I treated you different from anyone else from the minute you walked in the door. We hung out for how many hours in the mornings? Do you think I wanted to show up at seven thirty every day? h.e.l.l, no. But you were there, so I was there. Jesus, I'm expanding all over the place, but I found a way to cut you a piece of my showroom. We're tacking orders and sharing staff. What the f.u.c.k, Laura? You want something stupid like a card or flowers?”

”But it's always business.”

”If I'm letting you into my business, I'm letting you into my life. You know that.”

There was a moment when they looked at each other and an understanding pa.s.sed between them. This was who he was, and she could love him or leave him, but she knew what she was getting into.

Emira walked in before Laura had a chance to wiggle out of her predicament. ”JJ, Carlos cut himself.” Seeing them so close seemed to catch her up short. ”Oh. Ah, never mind? It's not serious. He just wanted you to see it.”

Jeremy stood and helped Laura up so her cast wouldn't catch her off balance. Then he took her left hand, knotting their fingers together. She squeezed with everything she had. He pulled her into the hallway with their hands knitted together for everyone in the design room to see.

As they stood waiting for the elevator, she said, ”You don't get to yell at me. I don't like it.”

”I know.”

”You're a real a.s.shole. You've been toying with me for years.”

”What was I supposed to do? I took you any way I could have you.” The elevator doors slid open, and they stepped in.

”I can't stand the sight of you,” she said.

When the doors shut, he put his arms around her, and he kissed her and said, ”Sorry, sorry, sorry,” until she kissed him back.

CHAPTER 20.

The cab was clean. Probably the cleanest she'd seen in years. But wasn't it just like Jeremy to stroll outside with a shaking girl and barely have his arm up before the cleanest cab in the city appeared for him? He was a magical person, but did she love him?

Her face burned from the fifteen minutes of kissing lips surrounded by stubble, fifteen minutes of pure thoughtless heaven, where it all went away. She defined ”it” as the murder she'd seen that morning, or would have seen if she'd shown up ten minutes earlier. ”It” was her sister in trouble and not allowed to go back to her own apartment without pulling up a closet floor. ”It” was losing her business. ”It” was Stu and his n.o.body-seems-to-mind-that-I'm-named-after-a-grocery-item-but-you girlfriend.

For fifteen minutes, all that mattered was his lips, his smell, and his hands on her neck and back.

He never joked about her broken ”humorous” or pressed for any more information about why she'd broken it. He considered it a distraction from what she should be doing and didn't want to encourage her by asking questions. Or so he said. In the back of her mind, she feared he really didn't care.

Or maybe he was right. How could she be great at anything if she kept spreading her energy around? Maybe she should leave the investigating to the lawyers and cops, who knew what they were doing.

”Drop me at the corner,” she said. She could walk a block to the house. For some reason, getting out of a cab with a cast on her arm and with a news van right there felt embarra.s.sing.

She could see the van in the dark, a hulking white and blue thing with a satellite dish on top. As she made her way to the house, she found the big vehicle had a gravitational pull. She thought briefly about her deal with Stu and promised herself she would honor his exclusive right to the story, but she knew that the only people with more information, besides lawyers and cops, who were sworn to silence, were reporters.

Jeremy had told her to forget about it and go to bed, and she would, as soon as she did one thing. Then she was going to drop it like a bar of soap in the bathtub. She knocked on the back door of the news van.

Roscoe Knutt answered in a windowpane cotton s.h.i.+rt unb.u.t.toned to his belly, revealing a marginally clean crewneck T-s.h.i.+rt. He was chewing a green sweet pea crispy salty thing when he said, ”You're making it too easy for me.”

”I aim to please.”

”What happened to your arm? Don't tell me. Something to do with that kerfuffle on Park and 48th.”

”I don't remember a kerfuffle.”

”Smoking too much pot, I'll wager. Rots the short-term memory. Reduces your RAM.” He tapped his head so hard with his second finger she feared he'd make a hole. ”Come on in if you're coming in.”

The van was not what she expected. Sure, there were short circuit monitors and the requisite complete lack of s.p.a.ce and dials and k.n.o.bs all over the place. What she didn't expect was the big screen propped up high with multiple Twitter feeds and flas.h.i.+ng social media windows.

”Hanging out on Facebook?” she asked.

”They don't let me. Honesty is not the best policy in journalism, apparently. It landed me here in a box in the middle of the night.”

”What do they have you looking for?”

”You.”

”You should get a promotion now.”

”Not if you came knocking looking for Snap Peas.” He held out a bag of green crunchies.

She was starving.

”Who you been kissing?” he asked.

Her hand shot to her mouth, but she ended up getting green snack dust all over her cheek.

”Raw lips.” He chuckled. ”Big tell. We know you don't have a boyfriend besides that kid who writes for the New Yorker. You know he's sleeping with the Caston Bleach heiress, right?”

Oh, Tofu was an heiress. That was just freaking rich.

”Yeah. He's not my boyfriend.”

”Huh. If you say so.”

She could almost see him making a note in a little book in his head. ”So, what made you think I was involved in the Park Avenue kerfuffle?”

”Your boyfriend's name came up in the arrest records. We get all that on the ticker.” He pointed at something on the screen that looked like a Twitter feed. ”He's been arrested before. Never misses a 'nonviolent' protest neither. His commie lawyer'll have him out in the morning. Don't worry.”

”I'm not worried.”

He tilted his head like she must be lying or crazy or both. But in the world of people she knew or had ever met, Stu was the person she was least likely to worry about. He brought self-sufficiency and practicality to new levels daily.

”Stu really got Rolf Wente good,” she continued. ”Even though he's a size or two bigger. Rolf, I mean.”

”That's the only lick you're ever gonna get. That guy's got some lawyers, and they ain't pinkos. They're barracudas.” He rubbed his fingers together to indicate that they were the most expensive predatory fish in the city. ”Family, you know. They kicked him out, but funnel him cash. My kid did what he done, I woulda thrown a nickel at him, then kicked him to the curb. Possibly I'd've killed him myself if no one held me back.”