Gerald was a pretty good listener; that was the thing, even if Will had spent the first ten minutes of this conversation telling a very disorganized version of the events of the last two days. Jonah’s fall. Nora’s rushed return from San Diego and their seeming reconciliation. This morning’s meeting, and Nora’s insistence afterward that she would “take it from here.” He’d tried to stick to the plan he made: suggested that they call Benny, or Mr. and Mrs. Salas, offered to drive Nora back to her place. But she’d wanted none of it. Wanted none of him.

“I’ll call you,” she’d said, cool and remote, and it’d sounded like San Diego all over again.

“Yes, but only because—”

“The problem is obvious. She’s very protective of her neighbors, whom you’ve said are basically her family. There’s been a lot of change in her building, and most of it has been your doing.”

“Don’t sugarcoat it, Gerald,” he said. “But also, that’s a little unfair. Her grandmother died, and so did my uncle. Now this, with Jonah. None of that’s my doing.”

“Hmm.” This was the noise Gerald made whenever Will introduced a new complexity to a case. Possible undiagnosed diabetes. A secondary infection that complicated the pharmaceutical plan.

Will felt liked he’d scored the most worthless point.

“I admit, I shouldn’t have mentioned the third-floor thing. At that moment.”

He’d figured that out even before he’d gotten on the elevator to leave, realizing what that tug of memory had been when he’d seen Nora turn pale and sick-looking at the mention of the building’s accessibility. That’s what he’d probably looked like, that day in the backyard when Mrs. Salas had found his parents’ photograph.

I’m rattled, he remembered telling her.

“But things had been going well before that. I was taking care of her. I took care of things for her neighbors, before she got there. I was only trying to—”

“You’re making her sound like a patient,” Gerald said, and Will straightened, defensive.

“You’re one to talk. You got Sally back—with my help, by the way—by planning nonroutine dates and not telling her anything about her table manners.”

There was a pause, and Will looked up to find Gerald rocking back slightly on his heels. Should he not have mentioned he knew about the elbows on the table thing, or . . . ?