"I do, don't I?" said Sandy. "Come, we have a table in the back. I've missed you terribly. God, it's good to see you. You look wonderful yourself, even with all of this going on. How do you do it?"

The dinner was a fusion of Indian and European that couldn't be found in the States, at least not anywhere around Washington. Sandy and I talked for well over an hour about the case. But over coffee we lightened up and let things get a little more personal. I noticed a gold signet ring and a trinity band she wore on her pinkie finger.

"Beautiful," I told her.

"From Katherine," she said, and smiled. Sandy and Katherine Grant had been living together for about ten years and were one of the happiest couples I had ever met. Lessons to be learned, but who can ever figure it all out? Not me. I couldn't even master my own life.

"I see you're still not married," she said.

"You noticed."

Sandy smirked. "Detective, you know. Investigator par excellence. So tell me everything, Alex."

"Not a lot to tell," I said, and found my choice of words interesting. "I'm seeing someone I like a lot —"

Sandy interrupted. "Oh, hell, you like everyone a lot. That's the way you are, Alex. You even liked Kyle Craig. Found some good in the creepy, psychopathic bastard."

"You could be right, generally speaking. But I'm over Kyle. And I don't like anything about Colonel Geoffrey Shafer. Or the Russian who calls himself the Wolf."

"I am right, dear boy. So who is this incredible woman you like a lot and whose heart you'll break, or she'll break yours—one or the other, I'm certain of it already. Why do you keep torturing yourself?"

I grinned, couldn't help it. "Another detective—well, actually, her title is inspector. She lives in San Francisco."

"How convenient. That's brilliant, Alex. What is it, two thousand miles from Washington? So you have a date, what, every other month?"

I laughed again. "I see your tongue is as sharp as ever."

version history

"Practice, practice. So you still haven't found the right woman. Pity. A real shame. I have a couple of friends. Well, hell, let's not even go there. Let me ask you a personal question, though. Do you think you're truly over Maria?"

The thing about Sandy, as an investigator, is that she has thoughts that others don't; she explores areas that are often ignored. My wife, Maria, had been murdered over ten years ago in a drive-by shooting. I'd never been able to solve it—and maybe I wasn't over Maria. Maybe, just maybe, I couldn't find closure until I solved her murder. The case was still open. That thought had been tugging at me for years and still caused some pain whenever it entered my head.