“He phrased it a little differently with me,” Maureen said.

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him it was up to you. It’s all up to you.”

He studied her face. “What if I wanted to quit? Take early retirement. Do something else.”

“That’d be up to you too.”

“You’d like me to, wouldn’t you?”

“I’ve never said that. You’re doing what you love. I couldn’t ask you to give that up.”

He flipped his hand over and squeezed hers. “I think about it once in a while.”

“About quitting?”

He nodded very slowly. “It’s a young man’s game.” He gave a wry smile. “It’s a thinner man’s game, too.”

She got out of her chair, came around the table, sat on the one next to him. She leaned her body into his, rested her head on his shoulder. “I’ll go along with whatever you decide, but it has to be what you want. I don’t want you doing it for me.”

“Why would that be so bad?”

Maureen shifted in her chair, her knees touching his thigh. She leaned in and planted a soft kiss on his cheek.

“Someone needs to shave,” she said.

“I’m going for the Miami Vice look.”

“My God, how long ago was that?”

She gave him another kiss, then cupped his chin with her hand and turned his head to her. She touched her lips to his and held them there for several seconds. Duckworth raised a hand and rested it on her cheek.

“I love you, you know,” she said.

“For the life of me I don’t know why,” he said.

“Oh shut up.”

“You’d been out with some hot guys but settled on me.”

“I never settle.”

“I didn’t mean it that way. But you could have done better.”

“And you could have done a lot worse,” she said, and gave him another quick kiss. “I picked you.” She grinned. “No one else came close.”

He held his wife in his arms as he said, “I had to call Cal Weaver today. You remember him?”

“Of course.”

“Left him a message.” He reached for his phone, flipped it over, brought it to life for a second. “I wish he’d call me back. Anyway, I was thinking about what he does.”

“Working privately, you mean?” She linked her fingers at the back of his neck.

“Yeah. Getting to pick and choose what you do, instead of having to deal with everything that drops into your lap.”

“You want to be peeping into people’s bedrooms, gathering evidence for divorce cases? That’s beneath you. I can’t see you being happy doing that.”

“I don’t think Cal does a lot of that kind of work.”

“If he gets hungry enough, I bet he does.”