'I'm fine.' I removed the sweatshirt and hung it over the back of a kitchen chair. 'Where is everybody?'

'Your father's running errands. And Valerie took the girls shopping. Why?'

'Just making conversation.'

'I thought maybe you were going to make a big announcement.'

'What would I announce?'

'It's getting obvious,' my mother said.

'Okay, so I've moved out of Morelli's house. It's not like it's the end of the world. We haven't even totally broken up this time. We're still talking to each other.'

'You moved out? But aren't you pregnant?'

I was stunned. Pregnant? Me? I looked down at my belly. Yikes. I did look pregnant. I was on the pill, but I guess there could have been a slip-up. I did a fast calculation and stifled a sigh of relief. I wasn't pregnant.

'I'm not pregnant,' I said.

'It's the doughnuts,' Grandma said. 'I know a doughnut butt when I see one.'

I looked around for a knife. I was going to kill myself. 'I've been under a lot of stress,' I said.

'You could get that fat sucked out,' Grandma said. 'I saw a show on it last night. They showed a doctor sucking a whole load of fat out of some woman right on television. I almost threw up watching it.'

The front door crashed open, and Mary Alice galloped in. Valerie followed with the baby. Angie followed Valerie. Angie and Mary Alice immediately went to the television. Valerie brought the baby into the kitchen with her.

'Look who's here,' Grandma said to Valerie. 'Stephanie came early, and she's not even going to leave right away.'

Valerie set the diaper bag on the floor and looked at me wide-eyed.

'Oh my gosh,' she said. 'You're pregnant!'

'That's what we thought, too,' Grandma said. Turns out she's just fat.'

'It's stress,' I said. 'I need to relax. Maybe I'm drinking too much coffee.'

'I'm telling you, it's the doughnuts,' Grandma said. The Plum side of the family finally caught up with you. You don't watch out you're going to look like your Aunt Stella.'

Stella had to have someone else tie her shoes.

'Your pants aren't buttoned,' Mary Alice said to me as she galloped through. 'Did you know that?'

Okay. Fine. I'll never eat again. Not ever. I'll drink water. But wait a minute, suppose the Junkman finds me and I get shot. I could end up on life support, and I could need the extra fat. Maybe the extra fat is a good thing. An act of God!

'What have we got for dessert?' I asked my mother.

'Chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream.'

If God had wanted me to lose weight he would have made sure there was creamed spinach for dessert.

Albert Kloughn arrived at six o'clock sharp.

'I'm not late, am I?' he asked. 'I was working, and I lost track of time. I'm sorry if I'm late.'

'You're not late,' my mother said. 'You're just in time.'

We all knew who was late. Joe. The pot roast and green beans and mashed potatoes were set on the table, and Joe's chair was empty. My father sliced up the roast and took the first piece.

Grandma plopped a glob of potatoes onto her plate and passed right. My mother looked at her watch. No Morelli. Mary Alice made horse sounds with her tongue and galloped her fingers around her water glass.

'Gravy,' my father said.

Everyone jumped to attention and passed him the gravy.

I had a plate heaped with meat and potatoes smothered in gravy.

I had a buttered roll, four green beans, and a beer. I'd taken the food, but I hadn't yet dug in. I was having an inner dialogue with my stupid self. Eat it, the stupid self was saying. You need it to keep up your strength. And suppose you get run over by a truck tomorrow and die? What then? You'll have dieted for nothing. Eat and enjoy!

My mother was watching. 'You're not that fat,' she said. 'I always thought you were too thin.'

Kloughn picked his head up and looked around. 'Who's fat? Am I fat? I know I'm a little roly-poly. I've always been like that.'

'You're perfect, Snuggy Uggums,' Valerie said.

Grandma knocked back her glass of wine and poured another.

A car door slammed shut at the curb, and everyone sat straight and still in their seat. A moment later, the front door opened, and Morelli walked in.

'Sorry I'm late,' he said to my mother. 'I was stuck at work.' He moved next to me, dropped a friendly kiss on the top of my head, and took his seat.

There was a collective sigh of relief. My family feared Morelli was my last shot at marriage. Especially now that I was fat.

'What's new?' I asked Morelli.

'Nothing's new.'

I made a show of looking at my watch.

'Don't push it,' Morelli said softly, smiling for the family. 'Are you still driving the truck? I didn't see it out front.'

'It's in the garage.'

'Are you really going after Ward?'

'It's my job.'

Our eyes locked for a moment, and I felt the handcuff clamp around my left wrist.

'You've got to be kidding,' I said, holding my wrist up for inspection, the remaining bracelet dangling loose.

'Private joke,' Morelli said to the rest of the table. Then he clicked the other half of the cuffs onto his right wrist.

'Kinky,' Grandma said.

'I can't eat like this,' I told Morelli.

'You eat with your right hand, and I cuffed the left.'

'I can't cut my meat. And besides, I have to go to the bathroom.'

Morelli gave his head a single shake. 'That is so lame,' he said.

'I do,' I said. 'It's the beer.'

'Okay,' Morelli said. 'I'll go with you.'

Everyone sucked in some air. A piece of pot roast fell out of my father's mouth, and my mother's fork slipped from her fingers and clattered onto her plate. We weren't the sort of family who went to the bathroom together. We barely admitted to using the bathroom.

Morelli looked around the table and gave a small defeated sigh. He reached into his shirt pocket, extracted the key to the cuffs, and released me.

I popped out of my seat and ran upstairs to the bathroom. I locked the door, opened the window, and climbed out onto the roof over the back stoop. I'd used this escape route since junior high. I was good at it. I dangled myself off the roof, and I dropped to the ground.

Morelli grabbed me, spun me around, and trapped me against the back of the house. He leaned into me and grinned. 'I knew you'd go out the window.'

In a perverse way, I liked that Morelli had me figured out. It was reassuring to know he paid attention. 'Very clever of you.'

'Yep.'

'Now what?'

'We go back to the table. And when dinner is over, we go home… together.'

'And what happens in the morning?'

'We sleep late, read the Sunday paper, and take Bob for a walk in the park.'

'And Monday?'

'I go to work, and you stay home and hide.'

I did a major head slap. 'Unh,' I said.

His eyes narrowed. 'What?'

'To begin with, I'm afraid to hide in your house. I'm afraid to hide in my apartment or in my parents' house. I don't want to endanger anyone, and I don't want to make it easy for the bad guys to find me. And if that isn't enough, I hate when you order me around. I'm in law enforcement, too. I'm key to this mess. We should be working together.'

'Are you crazy? What did you have in mind? I should use you for bait?'

'Maybe not bait.'

Morelli grabbed the front of my shirt, pulled me to him, and kissed me.

It was a great kiss, but I didn't know what the heck it meant. It seemed to me a breaking-up kiss would have had less tongue.

'So,' I said, 'do you want to explain that?'

'There's no possible explanation. I am so messed up. You frustrate the shit out of me.'

I knew the feeling. I was the mess-up queen. There was a contract on my head, and I was weirdly involved with two men. I didn't know which was more frightening.

'I'm going to take the coward's way out and leave,' Morelli said.