“Did I get a delivery,” he asked, “or a phone call?”
“You got both.” Bennis poured coffee for him, then for herself, and sat down across the table. There was a huge pile of printouts between the two of them. She picked it up and put it on the floor. “There were a bunch of these things that came around eight thirty. There was a note stuck to them. It’s around here somewhere. I think it was from John Jackman.”
“What did it say?”
Bennis gave him a look. “It said ‘SEE? WORKING NIGHT AND DAY.’ And don’t look at me like that. It was written on a Post-it and stuck to the envelope. It wasn’t exactly a secret. It wasn’t signed though; I just thought I recognized the handwriting.”
“You probably did.”
“And there was a phone call from Alexander Mark. He’s one of those men you just sort of look at and think, What a waste.”
“What a waste?”
“That he’s gay,” Bennis said. “I mean, not that I’m against his being gay, you know, but if he were straight—I’m putting this very badly.”
“I think I get the drift. That was all?”
“You’ve got an eleven o’clock meeting on the body find the other day. Rob Benedetti’s office called and said to make sure you were at his office at eleven thirty. He said to tell you you were right, only one of them counted. Was I supposed to understand what that meant?”
“Not necessarily,” Gregor said. “Did Alexander Mark leave a message?”
“Yes,” Bennis said. “He said to tell you that he didn’t find anyone else among Dennis Ledeski’s clients, but all the ones he knew about before lived in Green Point buildings. Was that supposed to mean something to me?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what you know and what you don’t know,” Gregor said.
“Do you know?” Bennis asked him. “Do you know who killed them, I mean? I’m a little out of the loop on this one. I don’t think I always was.”
Gregor opened the foam container from the Ararat. It had eggs and bacon and sausages and hash browns in it. He didn’t say anything about the fact that he had spent most of the last month or so eating salads because he missed her nagging him about it.
“Is this going to be cold?” he said.
“Give it to me and I’ll heat it up in the microwave,” Bennis said. “Although what you’ve been doing with the microwave is beyond me. It looks like the Keebler elves had a food fight in there and everything burned to a crisp.”
“I wasn’t sure I was allowed to get it wet,” Gregor said.
Bennis put the foam container in the microwave and pushed a lot of buttons. She did not turn around to give him a funny look, but Gregor thought she wanted to.
“Here’s the thing,” he said. “I don’t really believe you’d believe I couldn’t get along without you, in the physical sense. That I wouldn’t know how to run the apartment or get my clothes together in the morning.”
“That’s true.”
“So I won’t try that,” Gregor said. “But I don’t want to get along without you. I never have. So there’s that.”
“I never wanted to get along without you either,” Bennis said. “I don’t know how else to explain it. I didn’t leave because of anything you did or because I was dissatisfied with you or because the relationship was going bad. I don’t blame you for Anne Marie. Anne Marie’s only real problem was Anne Marie. I was just—I really don’t know how to explain it.”
“If you don’t know how to explain it, how do you know it won’t happen again?”
“I don’t.”
“Well,” Gregor said, “that’s a problem. Because it was upsetting. And inconvenient, I assume you’re not interested in having children—”
“Gregor, for goodness sake. I’m at the tail end of the point where I’d be able to have children, and it would be one hell of a risk to take with the health of the child.”
“I know. That was what I meant. I assume you aren’t interested in having children, or we’d have had one by now. So there’s no risk you’d walk out on a child—”
“I wouldn’t anyway,” Bennis said. “I’ve got some sense of responsibility. Some people think I have a significant sense of responsibility.”
“My problem is that I want you to have a sense of responsibility to me,” Gregor said. “I do have one to you. I know I do because the first thing I thought when you left was that you were in some kind of trouble. I was scared to death.”