“We aren’t the marrying kind.”

“How about Edge and his Missus?”

“I think King would marry Juliette if only to make things easier on their kids. But Juliette’s dead set against it. Bad past experience.”

“Ah, I get that,” Cyrus said. “I’m about the only guy in town who handles domestics. Stuff I’d seen, damn. Marriage can get ugly fast.”

“Domestics?”

They’d picked up speed, so Nora had to raise her voice. The wind whipped her black hair around her face, but it didn’t seem to bother her. She looked good, a little wild like that.

“Yeah, that’s what we call it in the business. Domestic cases—those are cheating husbands, gambling husbands, deadbeat dads who buy brand-new Ford F-150s while their kids are wearing clothes from St. Vincent’s.”

“How’d you get into that line of work?” she asked.

“Mmm…” Cyrus considered telling her the whole story but stopped himself. No need to be getting personal. “I was a cop for ten years. Got shot on the job and decided not to go back. I feel like I can help more people this way. Women and children, I mean. That’s all I ever work for. Husbands don’t hire me. Just wives or girlfriends.”

“So you really are a knight-errant then?” she asked, glancing at him to smile.

“Been called worse.”

She pulled up to the drive of Edge’s 6th Street palace, and punched in the security code for the iron gates. When they parked inside, her dog ran to her, panting and wagging his tail. She pushed her sunglasses up on her head and reached for her dog.

“Sorry I abandoned you last night, boy,” she said, going down on her knees to scratch the Shepherd’s enormous black ears. “Mama had a date.”

“He’s a good-looking boy,” Cyrus said. “Too bad he eats men.”

Nora stood and tucked her fingers into her dog’s collar and held him against her thigh.

“Hasn’t eaten a man yet,” she said. “But every time Søren walks by, he does start to drool. Then again, so do I.” Nora winked at him.

Cyrus heard laughter and voices as they walked around the house. In the backyard, they found Edge standing in the shallow end of a swimming pool waiting to catch his daughter, who was perched on the edge of the pool in a pink swimsuit, pink arm floaties, and a pink swim cap over her curls.

Edge said something in French and the little girl laughed and then launched herself into her father’s arms.

“You speak French?” Nora asked Cyrus.

“Three years of French in Action in high school. Don’t remember a damn word.”

“He said, ‘Don’t jump on me. You’ll mess up my hair,’” Nora translated. “So of course she jumped on him.”

“Kids,” Cyrus said.

With his daughter in his arms, her skinny stick legs around his waist, Edge waded over to the side of the pool. He had on black sunglasses that he pushed up to his forehead.

“Hi, Tata Elle,” the little girl said, waving.