“You must be mistaking me for Milo.”

“Being Milo has its advantages, hon. C’mon, let’s go in, I told you I’d provide cover. A single guy spying on them would attract attention. We’re in love, everyone will rejoice.”

She opened the passenger door, paused. “Do we need a plan?”

“Just be unobtrusive and learn what we can.”

“I can do unobtrusive,” she said. “We can hold hands, pretend there’s nothing on our mind but us.”

The restaurant was mostly empty, which worked to our advantage as the hostess consolidated her seating strategy.

Escorting us to a pine-shrouded patio, she led us to a table that offered privacy and a sweet view of babbling water.

Charming. But it put us too close to the rear booth where Phil Suss and the curvy brunettes had settled. Positioned our backs to the festive trio.

Robin said, “How about there?” and pointed to a less favored station with a clear frontal view of Suss’s party.

The hostess’s eyebrows climbed. “Whatever you prefer.”

“Thanks for the first one but that one’s our special table,” said Robin. “We were here on our last anniversary, happened to be driving by and decided to be spontaneous.”

The hostess smiled. “Spontaneous is good.”

Phil Suss ordered two iced teas, one that he drank, the other that he covered with a folded napkin. The women opted for flutes of champagne.

Giddy girls, with all the right moves: hair tosses, lip licks, strategic touches of Phil Suss’s shoulders and arms and cheek.

The one in the red top—a halter that exposed a flawless, velvety back—had dense, wavy black hair artfully streaked with bronze.

Black Top’s ironed-straight locks were bronze-highlighted ebony.

As if the two of them worked as a team, had coordinated a joint pheromone attack.

Both women displayed traces of augmentation at all the strategic spots: chest, eyelashes, cheekbones. I revised my age estimate: midthirties to forty.

Phil glowed, loving the attention.

Robin and I picked up our menus, hid behind the oversized, hemp-bound litany as we continued to sneak peeks.

Refills of champagne, girlish giggles.

Robin said, “Hmm, vegan duck. They didn’t have that before.”

“Didn’t know ducks were that philosophical.”

She laughed. We touched hands, ordered salads, continued to spy.

From the rapt expressions on the brunettes’ flawless faces, Phil Suss was the wittiest man on the planet.

Another man walked past us.

One of the women called out, “Baby!”

Robin and I continued to peruse but let our eyes drift.

Dr. Franklin Suss, bald head glowing, wearing a slate-blue Nat Nast shirt embroidered with billiard balls, cream linen pants, and brown calfskin loafers, kissed the woman wearing the black top, then her friend.

Then he walked to his brother and both men embarked on a garrulous ritual of hugs, double-cheek kisses, more hugs, back pats, power shakes.

Red Top said, “Enough, you two, I’m gonna get jealous.”