“Sure thing,” Robert said, smiling at Aria with his toothless smile, pleased to be included in the sudden intrigue of the mystery afoot.

Aria ran back toward the car, knocking on the passenger window to indicate her readiness to go.

The Subway store smelled like Elysium. The yeasty smell of freshly baked bread turning from white to golden brown made both Taylor and Aria feel buttoned up in warmth. The gift card had $10 on it. They ordered a foot-long veggie sandwich and deliberated over what makings to add to it while the man behind the counter slid it down the bar. They took it, with a bag of salt and vinegar chips, to one of the tables and each took half of it.

They indulged in silence until Taylor decided to throw in casually, “I met a guy. I mean, it’s prob’ly nothing, but whatever.”

“You’re just now telling me this?” Aria asked, amused.

“He came into the studio a couple of times this week. And when I was on my break, he took me to go get a coffee. He looked at me all weird ’cause I ordered an orange juice. He took me home after my shift was done and I fucked him.” Taylor lifted his eyebrow and opened his mouth wide; impersonating the look of self-congratulatory shock that he imagined Aria would feel hearing the news.

Aria smacked his arm affectionately. “Well … what’s his name?” she asked.

“His name’s Dan,” Taylor said, his mouth full of food.

“Do you like him?” Aria asked.

“Yeah, I mean I guess. He’s good so far,” Taylor said, sorting through the way he really felt about the sizeable gap in their age difference and life circumstances.

Taylor had been working at the front desk the day that Dan came into the studio. Dan was in his fifties, a retail real estate executive with an affinity for buying houses at auction and flipping them. Except for the impeccable fit of his black turtleneck sweater and perhaps the tightness of the way he strung his words together, nothing about him would lead someone to guess that he was gay. His penchant for real estate was surpassed only by his penchant for stage acting and for younger men. In the first two minutes of their meeting, Dan had told Taylor that he looked like a Roman statue come to life. The hunt had already begun.