without looking like an ass.
Like the time the guy swallowed his nervousness and asked Egan to make a public announcement about the abominable way chinchillas were treated on chinchilla ranches before they became coats.
What did Egan care about chinchillas? What the fuck actually was a chinchilla?
Egan glanced at his watch and wished again the guy would get here. He was already five minutes late, which was inconveniencing people. Like Doris, Egan’s uniformed secretary who called herself his assistant, who ordinarily would have left by now but was waiting in the outer office.
Doris, sitting straight as a soldier behind her desk as she always did, like she had a pole up her ass, maybe catching up on some word processing. Egan leaned back in his leather desk chair and thought about Doris. She wasn’t a beauty, and Egan didn’t usually mix business with fornication, but since her divorce six months ago, Doris was beginning to look more attractive to him. Sure, she was in her fifties, but she still had a shape, and if she wasn’t a blue-ribbon beauty, she wasn’t butt ugly. And there was another thing Egan liked about her: now more than ever, she needed to hold on to her job.
Egan smiled. Doris was highly ethical and acted around the office like she didn’t even have erogenous zones. But with hubby having left her for some younger cunt, she still might come around, like her predecessor. What some women will do to stay employed…
There was a familiar three-knock tattoo on the office door; then it opened halfway and Doris stepped into sight.
Was she wearing tighter uniform slacks since she’d become single? She was definitely getting grayer, Egan noticed, and thicker through the middle. Still…
“Patrolman Mercer is here, sir.”
Mercer. Damn it! He’d told Charlie Mercer not to come here unless it was important. Even now, four years later.
Egan felt suddenly uneasy. So, maybe it’s important.
He nodded and sat forward in his leather chair, using his right hand to push away some papers on his desk, as if he’d been busy contemplating them.
“Send Officer Mercer in, Doris.”
9
Marcy Graham couldn’t figure it out, and she wondered if she should even try.
There was the leather coat she’d tried on at Tambien’s, the one that had prompted the argument between Ron and that salesclerk who was trying so hard to work her; just doing his job, and Ron got all pissy. It was lying draped over the arm of the sofa, not carelessly but as if someone had carefully arranged it there so she’d see it when she came in. A nice surprise.
Marcy put down her purse on a lamp table and went to the coat, touched it, stroked it. The leather was so soft. That really was what had attracted her to it in the first place. She lifted a lapel, then an arm, and could find no sales tag.
She held up the coat at arm’s length and looked it over. There was no clue as to where it had come from. She slipped it on, thinking it felt as good as it had at the shop, and walked to the full-length mirror near the door.
Smiling at her reflection, she turned this way and that, almost all the way around, gazing back over her shoulder as if at a lover she was leaving.
She removed the coat and placed it back on the sofa arm. A gift from Ron? Most likely. In fact, that was the only possible explanation. He felt guilty about smarting off and almost blowing up in Tambien’s, and he wanted to make it up to her. It wouldn’t be unlike him. He had a temper, but he could be sweet.
She stood with her hands on her hips, staring at the coat. Now, how should she react? What would Ron expect when he walked in the door? Should she leave the coat on the sofa? Maybe it was better to hang it in the closet, play dumb, toy with him and make a game of it. The kind they used to play. Or she could lay the coat on the bed and let him find it. That might be interesting. Then she’d show him her appreciation for his unexpected gift, making a gift of herself. The old games.
There was a slight sound in the hall; then the ratcheting of a key in the dead-bolt lock.
The door opened and her options disappeared as Ron stepped into the apartment.
At first he didn’t notice her or the coat as he turned and closed and relocked the door. Then he turned back, saw her, and immediately his gaze shifted to the sofa where the coat lay. He appeared genuinely puzzled, but she knew he could act convincingly if he had to, feigning surprise at seeing the coat.
“Isn’t that-”
“You know it is,” she interrupted, smiling.
“You went back and bought it?” She could see his confusion changing now to anger, and silent alarms went off in her head.
“Of course not. You know I didn’t!”
“How would I know that?”
“Because you bought the coat and put it there on the sofa so I’d find it when I came home.”
He yanked his tie loose violently so it hung crookedly around his neck, reminding her of a hangman’s noose, then jutted out his chin and unfastened his top shirt button. “Now why the hell would I do that?”
Marcy was stunned, searching for words. “I…uh…Well, I don’t know.”
Not because you love me. Your eyes and that throbbing vein in your temple say now isn’t the time to remind you of that.
“You thought it was a gift from me?” He pulled the narrow end through the knot and let the tie drape loosely around his neck. Almost as if he were preparing to remove it and strangle her with it if that was what he decided.
“What else would I think? I came home from work and there was the coat you knew I wanted.”
“And that we didn’t buy.”
“You could’ve changed your mind.”
“The point is, I didn’t change it. So where’d the coat come from?”
“I told you, I assumed it was from you. Who else would have left it there? I was at work all day, and you and I are the only ones who have keys. Except for Lou the super.”
Ron shook his head. He might have been angrier, only he couldn’t quite figure out who was his target. “Lou’s sixty-five years old and couldn’t afford a coat like that. Besides, it’s impossible to get him in here to fix a leaky faucet, much less shower us with gifts. After the chat I had with him, Lou wouldn’t let anybody in here even for a minute without one or both of us being present.”
“Then who?”
He clenched his right hand into a fist, holding it close to his chest. “That asshole salesclerk at Tambien’s- Ira.”
“But how could he? Why would he?”
“He knew you wanted the coat.” Ron went to the coat and lifted it, then wadded it and tossed it in a heap back on the sofa. “There was no note or anything?”
“Nothing. I found it just like you saw it.”
He picked up the coat again and tucked it, still wadded, beneath his arm. “C’mon!”
“Come on where?”
“To Tambien’s.”
“You’re taking it back?”
“No. I never took it from! We’re giving it back to Ira the wiseass salesclerk, along with a warning.”
“We simply can’t give this back, Ron! I can’t. Let’s put this off, think about it some more.”
“There’s no place else the coat could have come from. Nobody else who might have given it to you.”
“How could Ira get in?”
“I don’t know, Marcy,” Ron said impatiently. “I don’t know how magicians guess the right card, either, but they do.”
