by Cleo Coyle
I glared and he tilted his head, leering at me in that awful, confident way that seemed to say, “You never cease to amuse me, Clare.” Then he sat on the Thonet—its seat adorned by a Bordeaux velvet chair cushion—and coolly leaned back.
“Well, Detective. I’m seated. I’m relatively calm. But unless you want to charge me with something, I’m not about to answer any questions.”
“All right,” said Quinn. “Then I take it you don’t want to explain this?”
The detective’s hand disappeared into his shirt pocket and reappeared with a small vial positioned between his thumb and forefinger. Three-quarters of the vial was filled with white powder.
“Here we go—” said Matt wearily.
“Where did you find that!” I blurted to Quinn, knowing full well I didn’t want to know the answer.
“The right front pocket of your ex-husband’s jeans.”
I closed my eyes, shook my head. Didn’t want to hear it. Didn’t want to see it. Didn’t want to go through it. Not again.
“Take it easy, Clare,” said Matt. “It’s not what you think—”
“Matt, I can’t believe you’d take us down this road again—”
“I didn’t.”
“I can book you right now for possession,” said Quinn.
“Possession of what, Detective? Just what do you think you’ve got there?”
“Cocaine!” Langley blurted. “Right, Detective?”
“Wrong,” said Matt.
“I see,” said Quinn. “And from you ex-wife’s reaction, you’re going to tell me you weren’t an addict?”
“Christ. It’s caffeine.”
“Excuse me?” said Quinn.
“Caffeine. Pure caffeine.”
I laughed. It was a little hysterical, I admit, but I knew Matt was telling the truth. He’d said something to me last year about finding a way to get over jet lag without subjecting himself to the heinous vagaries of airport coffee. This must have been the solution.
“Rub a little on your gums, Detective, and you’ll see,” said Matt. “Coke numbs the gums. This doesn’t.”
Quinn shook the vial, contemplating the powder. “Caffeine?”
“Isn’t caffeine brown?” Langley asked.
“Coffee’s brown,” I told him. “Because of the roasting process the green beans are put through. But if that white powder is caffeine, it’s the by-product of the chemical process for decaffeinating coffee beans. It’s what supplies the caffeine in soft drinks.”
“And if it’s caffeine, this amount is legal?” Quinn asked.
“Well,” said Matt, “you’re holding about ten grams. A cup of joe has anywhere from one hundred to two hundred milligrams of caffeine. So I guess if you want to book me for possessing the equivalent of one hundred cups of coffee, you can try.”
“I don’t know,” said Quinn without a moment’s hesitation. “I guess I can believe you. Or maybe I can have it tested. That might take a while. Maybe even a day or two. Now where do you think I’d have you waiting during that time?”
“Fine,” said Matteo at last. “Ask your damned questions. What do you want to know?”
I couldn’t believe it. I hadn’t seen anyone trump Matteo Allegro in years. Quinn had managed it inside of five minutes.
Quinn glanced at Langley. “Take the cuffs off.”
“Thank you,” said Matt, standing up so Langley could release him.
“What are you doing here? Your ex-wife says you don’t live here.”
“I travel most of the year,” said Matt, rubbing his wrists and sitting back down on the cane-backed Thonet. “But my mother owns this building, and around a month ago, when I was in Rio, she sent me a contract giving me the right to use this duplex when I’m in New York—”
“She what?!” It wasn’t that I couldn’t believe my own ears. I just didn’t want to.
“Ms. Cosi,” said Quinn. “I have to ask you to—”
“She made no mention of that to me!” I blurted.
“Why should she?” asked Matt. “You live in New Jersey, don’t you?”
“Not anymore. Last month I signed a contract with her, too,” I said. “I’m managing the Blend for a salary, a share of equity, and the right to live in this duplex!”
“Oh, Jesus.” Matt sighed. “Not again.”
Madame had perpetrated numerous schemes to get Matt and me back together. This was obviously her latest.
“Matt, don’t tell me you’re earning equity, too?”
“Yes,” said Matt. “Apparently she eventually wants us to co-own this place.”
“Excuse me, Ms. Cosi,” said Quinn, “but if you don’t allow me to continue with my questions, I’ll have to ask Officer Langley to escort you out of the room.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll sit. I’ll listen.”
But for a minute or two after taking a seat on one of the carved rosewood chairs, I did little more than silently stew. How could Madame have tricked me like this? How?!
In the meantime, Quinn was asking Matt a series of specific questions about his whereabouts the night before. I watched him take careful notes about the name of the airline he’d been traveling on and his flight number, and it occurred to me, with slow alarm, that Quinn was trying to determine whether Matt had anything to do with Anabelle’s fall.
“Did anyone witness your arrival here?” asked Quinn.
“Sure. The taxi driver.”
“Did you get his name or license?”
Matt smirked at Quinn for five long seconds. “What do you think?”
“And no one else saw you arrive?”
“It was five-fifteen in the morning. I was exhausted from a six-hour Jeep ride out of the Peruvian Andes, a fourteen-hour connecting flight from Lima to Dallas to JFK, and a two-and-a half-hour tango with U.S. customs. I collected my luggage, fell in a cab, and collapsed into bed the first chance I got. That’s it.”
“Did you notice anyone entering or leaving the premises when you arrived?” asked Quinn.
“No.”
“Notice anything out of the ordinary? Anything at all?”
“No.”
“Think about it, Mr. Allegro. What did you see when you exited the cab?”
Matt began to shift in his chair. He crossed a leg over his knee, rubbed his forehead, turned toward me. “Clare, did something happen last night at the coffeehouse?”
“Don’t talk to her right now,” said Quinn. “Just answer my question.”
Matt inhaled and closed his eyes. “The lights to the coffeehouse were on. I remember thinking it was early for that, but then I checked my watch and realized the bakery delivery was due between five-thirty and six.”
“And did you see anyone inside, through the windows?”
“No.”
“You didn’t enter the coffeehouse at all?”
“No. I was exhausted. I came in through the alley, went up the back garden stairs to the duplex, and that’s it.”
“Do you know Anabelle Hart?”
Matt looked taken aback. I leaned forward.
“Anabelle Hart?” asked Matt. “What’s she got to do with—”
“Just tell me,” said Quinn.
“Of course I know her. She’s one of our baristas downstairs.”
“And?”
“And what? That’s it.”
Quinn seemed unsatisfied with Matt’s answer. Or the way he answered. He stared for a few silent moments. “You don’t have any sort of special relationship with her?”
“Christ. She’s my daughter’s age.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning she’s a child. She works downstairs. She works well. She has a boyfriend. That’s all I know. Why? What’s she been telling you?”
“No reason to have been angry with her?”
“What’s this about? Clare?”
I was about to answer when Quinn spoke up—
“Miss Hart’s had an accident. A fall down the service staircase.”
Matt’s e
yes met mine. “Clare? Is she all right?”
I shook my head. “It’s not good. She’s in intensive care.”
“Aw, no—”
“Mr. Allegro, you have a key to the duplex, correct?” asked Quinn, continuing to scribble in his rectangular notebook.
“That’s obvious.”
“And a key to the coffeehouse downstairs?”
“Yes, of course. I’m the Blend’s coffee buyer and the owner’s son.”
“We may have more questions for you, Mr. Allegro,” said Quinn. “Do you have any plans to leave the city in the next week?”
“No. I’ll be here for at least two.”
“And you’ll be living here—”
“No!” I blurted. “He’s not living here.”
Matt’s eyebrow rose. “We’ll see,” he mouthed. Then he rose and dug into his back pocket. “Here’s my card. Cell phone number’s on there.”
“Fine,” said Quinn. He held up the vial of white powder. “I’m going to have this tested.”
“Christ,” said Matt. “Why? I don’t plan on participating in any Olympic events in the next forty-eight hours, and that’s about the only institution I can think of that considers caffeine a prohibited substance.”
Matt was right. One of our customers, a former Olympic fencer and coffee lover, had nearly tested positive for more than 12 micrograms of caffeine per milliliter of urine. He’d drunk something like three cups of coffee before his event. Consuming just two more would have gotten him banned from the Games.
“I’m testing it purely for Ms. Cosi’s sake,” said Quinn. “I think she has a right to know whether or not her ex-husband is telling her the truth about kicking his addiction.”
Matt’s eyes found mine. “I am.”
A moment later Langley was pulling open the door to the back staircase and heading out. Quinn was about to follow when Matt called, “Detective—”
“Yeah?”
“I’m really sorry to hear about Anabelle. If there’s anything more I can do, let me know. I mean that.”
Quinn paused to study Matt’s face, then he nodded and, after a brief unreadable glance at me, the detective turned and left.
NINE
O N the other side of the door, two pairs of heavy-soled shoes clomped down the back steps with the conviction of people who knew exactly where they were going and why.
On our side of the door, it was another climate entirely.
Matt and I didn’t move.
We didn’t speak.
We didn’t breathe.
An arctic freeze had settled in to the extent that if we’d breathed, condensation clouds surely would have appeared.
The silence was so deafening the ringing phone felt like a World War II air-raid siren. I jumped and Matt shuddered. When it rang a second time, Matt moved toward the side table, where the cordless receiver sat nestled in its recharging unit.
But it was my apartment, I thought, and therefore my phone, so I moved, too. My hand grasped the receiver a millisecond before his.
What I hadn’t figured on was the collision.
In recent years, Matt may have shown signs of aging in the slight wrinkles around the edges of his eyes and the gray strands threading through his black hair. But his athletic body seemed to have aged very little—and our unexpected contact, unfortunately, proved it.
Receiver in hand, I glanced off his tanned torso, nearly taking a fall. But his arms were quick, wrapping around my waist in an automatic save that crushed my pillowy C-cups into the slab of granite he called a chest.
The phone rang again. I pushed the ON-OFF button then put it to my ear.
“Hello?”
“Hello—” I managed while attempting to wriggle free of the warm, naked flesh of my ex-husband’s chest. Much to my annoyance, Matt’s muscular arms held firm.
“Mom, what’s up? Your message sounded weird.”
“Everything’s okay, honey—”
I met Matt’s eyes. “It’s Joy,” I whispered, trying to ignore the fresh, clean smell of recently showered male skin.
“Who’s there?” my daughter asked at once.
“Your father.”
“He’s back! Oh, boy! Put him on, I want to say Hi!”
“Uh—yeah, okay—”
Reluctantly I offered up the cordless receiver. I felt one of Matt’s arms move off my waist to reach for it. The other arm, he kept firmly around me. I could back off now, I reasoned, but if I did that, I’d be too far away to hear Joy’s end of the conversation, and I wanted to eavesdrop.
“Hi, muffin,” said Matt.
“Hi, Daddy!”
Dawn broke in Matt’s face. A grin from coast to coast.
“When did you get in?”
“The wee hours.”
“Whatcha doin’ at Mom’s?”
One of Matt’s dark eyebrows arched suggestively as he stared down at me. “Getting into trouble.”
“Like—as usual!”
“Yeah, like that.”
“Mom invited me for dinner,” Joy said, “so I’ll be coming by tonight. Tell her, okay?”
“Okay,” said Matt.
“And you come, too, Daddy. Okay?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
Damn. I thought. This was not a good idea—
“And, Daddy, tell Mom I’m bringing a surprise, okay?”
“Sure. She’ll like that. I have a surprise for you, too.”
“Cool!” cried Joy. “But I’m late. Gotta get to my saucier class!”
“Bye, honey.”
“Bye, Daddy, see you tonight.”
He clicked off the phone, and I exhaled. After the morning’s events, I was glad, at least, to have finally heard Joy’s voice.
“She’s coming for dinner tonight.” His free arm returned to its earlier position, locking around my waist.
“I heard.”
“Then you know I’m invited, too.”
“Yes, but do you think that’s a good idea—”
“Of course,” said Matt, obviously ignoring my conflicted tone. “And she’s bringing a surprise—”
“Matt, I don’t think it’s a good idea—”
“Wonder what she’s making?”
“—for her to see you and I here together—”
“She wrote me that she’s having a hell of a time with the French sauces. Maybe it’s a new dessert. She loves baking.”
“I’m telling you, Matt, it’s not a good idea. Don’t you remember that time when she was thirteen and we spent the night together—and she thought—”
“You know what, Clare?”
“What?”
“I never kissed you hello.”
I felt his muscles moving, his lower body trying to establish a more significant press between us.
“We don’t kiss hello,” I told him, beginning to squirm again. “Not anymore.”
“But I’d like to.”
His hand lifted off my waist and landed light as a sparrow on the back of my neck. His thumb and fingers began to move there, slowly, tenderly, breaking up the knots of stress I wasn’t even aware had formed there.
I could let him kiss me. I knew that.
And I would enjoy it. I knew that, too.
Matt’s kisses were like a late-afternoon cup of full-city roast. Warm, earthy, relaxing yet stimulating, too. And he meant them to be. Like a full-city roast, they had enough potency to wake up parts of me I didn’t want woken.
Make your decision now, I told myself. Because in another minute your body’s going to make it for you—
“No, Matt,” I said. “Don’t.”
It was the frosty tone. A thermostat level he knew well. Applying palm to chest, I pushed. Hard.
He broke off immediately and stepped back. “Too bad,” he said, his brown eyes registering hurt, rejection. The Wounded.
God, he had nerve. The very idea made my blood pressure begin to rise again.
“Stale,” he said a few seconds later. His look ha
d changed. His eyes were squinting in distaste.
“More soured than stale,” I said, contemplating our relationship. After all, I thought, the chemistry was still there between us, so “stale” really wasn’t the right word. The problems between us were more—
“Coffee doesn’t sour, Clare.”
“Coffee?”
“Yes, of course.” Matt sniffed the air and lifted his chin toward the kitchen. “You’ve got stale coffee in there—”
“Oh my god, Lieutenant Quinn’s coffee!”
I rushed into the kitchen and the acrid scent assaulted me at once. The coffee had been sitting on the burner for nearly forty-five minutes. What a waste! After ten minutes, fifteen to eighteen at the very most, there was no point in trying to pass off any cup of coffee as good, let alone great.
I poured the bitter brew down the drain and shut off the electric drip coffee maker. Then I took the jug of filtered water from the fridge and poured it into a kettle. The electric drip machine would take ten minutes to cool off so the Melitta method would have to do.
I pulled out the Melitta cone, cleaned my gold-plated mesh filter and placed it inside, plopped it over the mouth of the thermal carafe, and began scooping whole beans into the grinder.
“You’re not staying here, you know,” I called into the living room.
Matt sauntered over, crossed bare arms over bare chest, and leaned against the archway.
“It’s my place, too, Clare,” he said. “By contract.”
“I just sold my house, Matt, and I’m not about to leave.”
“So don’t.”
“And I’m not about to shack up with you—”
“Shack up?” Matt laughed. “What are you doing? Watching old Doris Day movies on the Classic Movie channel again?”
“Move into a hotel.”
“I only need to use the place, at the most, ten days or so out of every month. Some months you won’t even see me. I won’t get in your way.”
“You will get in my way, and you know it.”
“Do you know what a ten-day hotel bill comes to in Manhattan?”
“I don’t care.”
“Well, you should if you want me to continue taking care of Joy’s tuition and living expenses.”
“If money’s a problem, why don’t you ask your mother.”
Matt sighed. “You don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“She’s got no money, Clare.”