She had on the same perfume she’d worn the night before.

And how fitting her name was. She’d certainly felt divine.

“Jim?” diPietro said.

Jim waited a moment longer, to give her time to look at the side of his face and compose herself. Seeing him from far away was one thing; having him in her home, close enough to touch, was another. Was she in blue again?

No, red. And diPietro had his arm around her waist.

Jim nodded at her, refusing to let even one memory enter his head. “Nice to meet you.”

She smiled at him and extended her hand. “Welcome. I hope you like Italian food?”

Jim shook her palm quickly and then stuffed his hand in the pocket of his jeans. “Yeah, I do.”

“Good. The cook is off for the next week, and Italian is pretty much all I can do.”

Shit. Now what.

In the silence that followed, the three of them stood around as if they were all wondering the same thing.

“If you’ll excuse me,” Devina said, “I’ll just go check on dinner.”

Vin dropped a kiss on her mouth. “We’ll have drinks here.”

As the clipping of those high heels receded, diPietro went over to a wet bar. “What’s your poison?”

Interesting question. In Jim’s old line of work, he’d used cyanide, anthrax, tetrodotoxin, ricin, mercury, morphine, heroin, as well as some of the new designer nerve agents. He’d injected the stuff, put it in food, dusted it on doorknobs, sprayed it on mail, contaminated all manner of drink and medications. And that was before he’d gotten really creative.

Yup, he was as good with all that as he was with a knife or a gun or his bare hands. Not that diPietro needed to know it.

“Don’t suppose you have any beer?” Jim said, glancing at all of the top-shelf liquor bottles.

“I’ve got the new Dogfish. It’s fantastic.”

Right, Jim had been thinking a Bud, and God only knew what that was—neither dogs nor fish were something you wanted brewing with hops. But whatever. “Sounds good.”

DiPietro fired up two long glasses and opened a panel that turned out to be a mini-fridge. Grabbing a pair of bottles, he popped off the caps and poured out a dark beer with a head so white it looked like ocean foam.

“I think you’ll like this.”

Jim accepted one of the glasses along with a little linen napkin that had the initials V.S.dP. on it. A single sip…and all he could say was, “Damn.”

“Good, right?” DiPietro took a draw and then lifted the beer to the light as if inspecting its character. “It’s the best.”