She read it. Then nodded. It was going to be one of those it-will-all-go-better-to-be-really-honest conversations. “And when he was on the force there was…extra. I never knew the details, nor should I have, but neither did I pretend to myself that I was blind. Then, when he left the force, and he and Cohen bought your business, we were still doing well. But the last few years the money seemed to dry up. After he died I expected there would be more than what was covered by the partners’ insurance to buy me out.”

“Could he have been…”—euphemism time, and a shrug—“…spending it other places?”

She laughed, it somehow mixed an earthy sort of R&B attitude with a drier cackle. “I learned long ago what to check for. A woman who can’t smell it on her man, who can’t tell it from his conduct and timing, and for that matter, when he’s taking care of business, is no woman at all. He was good and we were good, especially these last several years.”

“You’re sure?”

“Very sure.”

“Because…”

“Because when I wasn’t sure, I checked up on him.”

I laughed.

She asked, “How come you sound so unsure?”

“Something someone said.”

“You mean Owen?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t trust that man. You shouldn’t trust that man.”

“They were partners,” I said. “In the great myths…”

“What great myths?”

“All of them,” I sighed. “In reality and fiction. Partners are supposed to back each other up, protect each other, lie for each other, and do something about it if one of them gets killed.”

“They didn’t like each other,” she said.

“It’s not supposed to matter,” I said.

We were side by side. She looked out at the mountains, not at me. She said, “The race thing. Blacks and whites. The race thing. Always. You can bend around it, paper over it, pretend it’s died and gone to heaven, but there’s always the race thing.”

“Come on,” I said. “I’m not saying it’s not true, but they were together a long time.”

“They knew how to use it,” she said, looking at me. Professionals talking. “They played it like good cop, bad cop, on people’s expectations. If it was down and dirty it was ‘send the big nigga.’ If it was financial stuff, embezzlement and such, Owen would do his tricky Hebe shtick. It worked when they were police and clients ate it up when they went private.

“Then the things that are underneath started coming out, like the old grudges in a marriage that’s not quite right. Owen started acting like a white motherfucker who thinks people of color shouldn’t get too uppity. My Winston was a hard man in the ways he had to be and wild in his time, I knew that, you know that, but he wasn’t stupid, I promise you that.”

I said, “Yes, I know.”