She settled the stained napkin in her lap, fussed until it was square. The fabric had started out red and was now a nappy red-gray, edges fraying, old stains like ghostly Rorshach blots. The large one looked like the shadow of a knife.

“So,” Sol said. She looked up to see his eyes on her, dead-man gray behind rimless glasses. The shine in his slicked-back hair looked oily enough to be a fire hazard. “Baby, you look great. Just great.”

“Thanks, Sol,” she murmured, and sipped wine to keep from having to return the compliment. It was rough and vinegary on her tongue.

“I was just saying the other day to Mario, Mario, that Robby, she’s a real classy lady. Class through and through. Right? Hey. Pavarotti.” Sol snapped manicured fingers at the waiter. “What’s the matter with you? The lady needs a menu. Move.”

“Don’t you think we should wait until Jim gets here?” Robby asked a little desperately. The waiter scurried over and thrust a plastic-covered menu into her hands. Sol smiled at her and flicked his fingers to make the waiter go away. He leaned toward her across the table, and the red-glassed candlelight flickered hot over the side of his face and made red rainbows in his diamond pinkie ring.

“Sweetheart, I thought you understood, it’s just you and me. Just you and me. Business.” He didn’t bother to give her a choice, just shrugged and topped off her wine another quarter-inch. More red drops on the tablecloth; she resisted the need to wipe them away. She held her menu like a life preserver, a shield, but before she had time to do more than read the title—Pasta Romana— she heard Sol saying, “A bowl of minestrone for me and the lady. And two Caesar salads.”

His thick fingers pried the menu out of her hand and laid it aside. She looked up and saw that he was smiling, a benign contented smile.

“Something wrong?” he asked. She blinked. “You look worried, sweetheart. I don’t like it when you look worried. Gives you wrinkles.”

“I’m not worried.”

“Not even after the trouble yesterday?”

Oh, Jesus. She had to force herself to keep staring at him.

“Trouble?” she asked neutrally. “What trouble was that?”

“You think I don’t know?” He sounded smug instead of mysterious. “This stranger, this woman—”

“It wasn’t any big thing, Sol,” she said. Did she have an earnest look on her face? She couldn’t tell.

Sol chose to give her the reproving silent treatment, staring, and she gave in to nervousness and wiped up the wine droplets on the tablecloth, shook her napkin, folded it carefully in eights.