a mirror."
"What mirror? Did you take a picture of it?"
"No, I didn't take a picture." And she could, privately, kick herself for that later. "I don't know what difference it makes what mirror. The bathroom mirror. I'd just gotten out of the shower. A hot one. The mirror was steamy, and the message was written on it through the steam."
"Written or printed?"
"Ah, printed, with an exclamation point at the end. Like this." She picked up one of his pens, demonstrated. "Since it wasn't threatening or earth-shattering information, I figured it could wait."
"Next time don't - figure it can wait. What had you been doing before you . . ." Don't think about her naked in the shower, he ordered himself. "Before you went up to shower?"
"As a matter of fact, I'd been out in the garden talking to you."
"To me."
"Yes, that day you came by and I was mulching up branches."
"Right after your holiday party," he said, making notes. "I asked you out to dinner."
"You mentioned something about - "
"No, no, I asked you out socially." In his excitement, he came around the table, sat on it so they were closer to eye level. "Next thing you know, she's telling you men lie. Fascinating. She was warning you away from me."
"Since I'm not heading in your direction, there's hardly any reason to warn me away."
"It doesn't seem to bother her that I'm working here." He took off his glasses, tossed them on the table. "I've been waiting, actually hoping for some sort of sighting or confrontation, something. But she hasn't bothered about me, so far. Then I make a personal overture, and she leaves you a message. She ever leave you one before?"
"No."
"Hmm." But he caught something flicker over her face. "What? You thought of something."
"Just that it might be a little odd. I saw her recently right after I'd taken a long, hot bath. Shower, bath. Strange."
Don't think of her naked in the tub. "What had you been doing before the bath?"
"Nothing. Some work, that's all."
"All right. What were you thinking while you were in the tub?"
"I don't see what that has to do with anything. It was the night that I did that insane bout of Christmas shopping. I was relaxing."
"You'd been with me that day, too."
"Your ego looks a little heavy, Mitch. Need any help with it?"
"Facts are facts. Anyway, she might have been interested, or upset, by what you were thinking. If she could get into Stella's dreams," he said when she started to brush that aside, "why couldn't she get into your waking thoughts?"
"I don't like that idea. I don't like it at all."
"Neither would I, but it's something to consider. I'm looking at this project from two ends, Roz. From what's happening now, and why, to what happened then, and why. Who and why and what. It's all of a piece. And that's the job you hired me to do. You have to let me know when something happens. And not a couple weeks after the fact."
"All right. Next time she wakes me up at three in the morning, I'll give you a call."
He smiled. "Don't like taking orders, do you? Much too used to giving them. That's all right. I can't blame you, so why don't I just ask, politely, if I could take a look at your bathroom."
"Not only does that seem downright silly at this point, but aren't you supposed to be meeting your son?"
"Josh? Why? Oh, hell, I forgot. I've got to go." He glanced back at the table. "I'm going to just leave this - do me a favor and don't tidy it up."
"I'm not obsessed with tidy."
"Thank God." He grabbed his jacket, remembered his reading glasses. "I'll be back Thursday. Let me know if anything happens before then."
He hurried toward the door, then stopped and turned. "Rosalind, I have to say, you were a lovely bud at seventeen, but the full bloom? It's spectacular."
She gave a half laugh and leaned back on the table herself when she was alone. Idly she studied her ancient boots, then her baggy work pants, currently smeared with dirt and streaks of drying concrete. She figured the flannel shirt she was wearing over a ragged tee was old enough to have a driver's license.
Men lie, she thought, but occasionally, it was nice to hear.
Chapter Seven
WITH THE NURSERYclosing early for the holiday, Roz earmarked the time to deal with her own houseplants. She had several that needed repotting or dividing, and a few