if I wasn’t saying anything much, the cops—”
“I’m not talking about this weekend, though you should hear what that witch with a “b” Noreen is saying about you.” I was surprised to hear Lissa so angry. “I’m talking the past couple of years. You figure that no one would read the papers or hear what the field crews were saying or anything?”
“Well, you know.” I looked around at the subdued group around me. “One lives in hope.”
“One lives in fairyland, more likely. Sounds like you’re avoiding something.”
“Not anymore. Not really.” I took a drink of my soda. “Just figuring out how to spring the news, now that I’m dealing with it myself. You know how it is.”
“I guess I do at that.” Lissa smiled. “We get kinda caught up in other people’s perceptions of ourselves. Me, the boozing party-girl, you the uptight Yankee—”
“Hey!”
“Okay, how about ‘serious scholar from a tony northeastern school’?”
I shuddered. “You make it sound so…dire.”
“Nah, just a convenient pigeonhole. People are comfortable with them, gets hard to shake them, even when you want to.” She looked guilty for a minute, then shrugged it off. “Okay, so spring it on me. Your secret, that is.”
“I’m thinking about branching out. Maybe forensics.”
“Shoot, is that all?” She looked relieved. “Hey, I can help you with that.”
I looked up. “How’s that?”
“Emma, my dear idiot, I work on battlefield sites. My Rolodex is absolutely crawling with people who would be delighted to talk your ear off.” Lissa gave me a look full of guile and innocence. “And, hey, you should talk to Carla. Our very own Bone Lady.”
I nodded, but my heart wasn’t in it. “I don’t know, I’m still kinda shy about it. Wouldn’t she think I was moving in on her—oh, shit.”
Petra Williams had gone into the bar and was sitting by herself. I wanted to talk with her before anyone else took a seat. And if I brought Lissa, maybe she wouldn’t just take off on me.
“What?”
“There’s Petra, I need to talk to her. Come with me, just for a second?”
“Sure.”
Neither of us was really eating anyway. We bolted over to the bar.
“Hey, Petra, I was wondering if we could join you for a moment?”
She looked past my shoulder, then coldly at me. “What we?”
I looked left, whipped my head to the right: Lissa was nowhere to be seen. I turned to see if she was still behind me, but the crowd was thin enough for me to see her retreating back. “I guess Lissa had to go to the ladies’ room.” Again. I just couldn’t get past the fact that she always baled out on a situation when she was nervous. “May I?”
As much as I didn’t like talking to Petra again, I knew I would have to. I had too much I wanted to know.
“I got shot at last night. I’m convinced that Garrison’s death…wasn’t…” I knew as soon as I said the words out loud that it sounded far worse than I ever imagined. “…an accident.”
She looked at me sharply. “On what do you base this?”
“It’s not fair, I know, but until I know for sure, I don’t want to tell you, exactly. Too many people might get hurt if I’m wrong.”
Her face creased with distaste. “You don’t ask much, do you? Why do you keep at me, like this?”
“No, I’m just trying to…you knew him better than anyone here, I guess.”
“Yes.”
“And…someone said that they saw you going into his room Wednesday night. Late.”
“Yes, of course. I told you I walked him up—”
“No, not then. Really late. In your robe. And you had a key to his room. Were you still friends? I mean, after the divorce? Did you, you know, talk?”
“Yes, of course, we, ‘you know,’ talked,” she snapped back. “We were divorced, and it was painful, but we were better as friends. And, since it’s making the rounds, we were still occasionally involved. Not that it’s any of your business.”
She looked at me, past me, to something behind me. “Or perhaps it is. Are you interested in the Connecticut job too?”
I gaped. What? “No, I—”
“Like so many of your fellows, maybe you wanted Garrison’s imprimatur for it? I know Bradford DuBois did. Wouldn’t leave poor Julius alone, not even when he told him he couldn’t stand him and wouldn’t support him if he was the last candidate on earth. I mean, we all know Julius was outspoken, but it took an awful lot for him to explode at Dr. DuBois like that.”
Just then, Duncan