“Jerry,” I say to the bartender. That’s a good bartender name, Jerry. “Put his beer on my tab.”
Jerry, a portly guy with a big round head and a green apron, gives me a crosswise look. I nod and he shrugs, pulling on the lever to fill Aiden Willis’s mug with a Budweiser he couldn’t afford.
Aiden’s deep-set eyes move in my direction. He doesn’t say anything. There may be a glint of recognition, if he noticed me at the cemetery. My biggest flaw as a cop is my bright-red hair. When I was undercover for a year and a half and didn’t want to be memorable, I dyed it black.
I go back to my Pinot, trying to remind myself that I’m off duty but wondering if Aiden the cemetery caretaker will come over. When I glance back up a few minutes later, Aiden is still looking at me, his beer untouched. He doesn’t acknowledge me in any way, just stares with those raccoon eyes. But even his stare isn’t really a stare. His eyes move about, wandering aimlessly, always returning to me but never staying on me.
My cell phone buzzes, a text message. Ten mins away. R U at home?, the message reads. My hesitation to respond surprises me, but there it is. Always trust your gut, my father used to say. Sometimes it’s all you have.
Well, Pop, I had a gut feeling about Noah Walker, and look where that got me.
I type in the address of the bar and hit Send. I look back to the corner of the bar, where Aiden’s mug remains full of beer, but Aiden himself is gone.
I’m into my next glass, which now puts me at about five too many, if anyone’s counting, when the door of the place pops open and a lot of people’s chins rise. I don’t even need to turn around to know it’s Matty, who would stick out in this place like an oil stain on cotton. A moment later, an arm comes over my shoulder and playfully around my neck. His cologne greets me next, before his face is against mine. This is where I’m supposed to swoon with unbridled delight.
“Hey, gorgeous. What’s with the depressing-bar thing?”
Matty Queenan is a Wall Street investor with a job I can’t really describe because I’ve never really understood all the financial hocus-pocus these guys pull. All I really understand is that it’s a game without rules: You pick a winner for your clients, then bet on them to lose behind their backs, and if everything goes to shit, the little guy will get screwed but the government will bail you out.
“Want a drink?” I ask Matty.
“Here? No. Let’s go someplace decent.”
I look at Jerry, who pretends he didn’t hear what Matty just said.
“Seriously, Murphy. This place is a dump. I’m going to need a tetanus shot—”
“Keep your voice down.” I’m standing now, whispering harshly in his ear. “People can hear you. You’re being rude.”
He takes me by the arm, but I pull away. “Jerry,” I say, “I apologize for my rude friend, and please buy everyone a round on me.” I slap a fifty on the bar, having already paid for my other drinks, and get some applause for the gesture along with some hard stares in my boyfriend’s direction.
I hear my cell phone ring in my purse, but I’m too hacked off to do anything but storm out of the place, Matty not far behind.
9
“WHAT’S WITH THE asshole routine?” I say to Matty as soon as I’m back in the sweltering heat outside.
“What’s with being half in the bag before I show up? What’s with hanging out in a seedy dive like that?”
I turn to look at my boyfriend of eleven months, the first two of which we spent together when I lived in the city, the last nine of which have been long-distance. I probably am a little tipsier than I should be, but he didn’t even call and let me know he was coming until a few hours ago, when he was already on his way. That’s Matty for you, always on his own schedule, just assuming I’ll drop everything and jump into his arms when he shows up.
Okay, to be fair, it’s not like I was working on my doctoral thesis or trying to end world hunger when he called.
I turn back to him. Matty looks like a Wall Street guy even when he dresses down, in an Armani sport coat, silk shirt, and expensive trousers, with Ferragamo shoes that would consume an entire paycheck of mine, his long hair slicked back. He’s got the looks, no doubt. His confidence, more than anything, drew me to him when we met—guess where—at a bar in Midtown.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he says, moving to me. “I like you when you’re tipsy.”
I push his hands away. “Those people in there are nice folks. You insulted them.”
He thinks for a moment, then puts a hand on his chest. “Then I will march back in there and give a bar-wide apology. Will that make Jenna happy?” He doesn’t wait for an answer, instead raising his arm and checking his watch. “I just decided something,” he says.
I guess I’m supposed to ask what. A few one-liners leap to mind.