Margrit looked up through her fingers. “Yeah.”

“Did you say yes?”

“Of course not!”

“Margrit! He’d pay you half a million dollars a year! What’d you say?”

She snorted and flopped violently onto her back. “And move me to the upper East Side. What do you think I said?”

Cole shook his head and turned his attention back to her closet, rifling through it. “I think you went back to work and said to your racist boss you’d take the case against Daisani, despite it not being your area of expertise, and despite your fears about how it’ll play to the media. Grit, you’ve got more clothes than Cameron and me put together. How can you have nothing to wear?”

“Those ones are all dirty!” Margrit pointed accusingly at her closet without looking at it. “And those ones are all- wrong! ” She smacked the pile beside her, then shoved it away as she scowled. “And that’s exactly what I did. He’s not racist,” she added in another mutter. “He’s playing the advantages he has, and it pisses me off.”

“All wrong…” Cole sounded exasperated, ignoring her defense of Russell. “Where are you going for dinner?”

“I don’t know. Moroccan, I think. He knows I like it. So not dressy.” Margrit picked up a handful of clothes from the bed and discarded them again with an overwrought sigh.

Cole snorted. “You’ve been totally played, Grit. Are you aware of that?”

Margrit frowned at his shoulders. “What are you talking about?”

“‘Eliseo Daisani is a dangerous man. You might make an enemy.’ Russell might as well have painted a bull’s-eye on the case and loosed you at it like an arrow, Grit. Either he knows you incredibly well or he’s astonishingly lucky. Here, wear this.” Cole pulled out a gold camisole and a red cashmere sweater, tossing them on top of her. “And jeans. It’s not like you have to make a stellar first impression.”

“Maybe I should try. This whole thing with Tony…Do you really think he played me?”

“Tony?” Cole blinked at her. “You two play each other like violins, Grit. That’s why you keep getting back together.”

“Russell, Cole. Do you think Russell played me?”

“Oh. I think anybody who knows anything about you knows that waving a red flag in front of you will get you to charge the target. You’re the world’s most stereotypical Taurus.”

“I am not.” Margrit sat up with the camisole and sweater clutched against her chest. “What’m I going to do when you and Cam get married and move to the boonies and I don’t have my favorite metrosexual to clothe and feed me?”

“You’ll go on dates naked. What time’s he picking you up?”

The doorbell rang. Margrit started guiltily and hugged the sweater harder. Cole laughed, wagging his spoon as he left her room. “I’ll distract him. You owe me, Grit.”

Shouts of laughter greeted Margrit when she emerged from the bedroom a few minutes later. She followed the sound through the apartment, finding Cole and Tony relaxed in the living room and drinking beer. Tony climbed to his feet, holding the bottle behind his back as he glowered good-naturedly at Cole. “You promised she’d be half an hour.”

“Well, she usually is. You gave him that shiner, Grit?”

The skin around Tony’s left eye, along the nose and under the socket, shone deep blue and purple. The inner corner of his eye was red and weepy, fluttering as if it could neither stay open nor close comfortably. Margrit put a hand over her mouth, staring in surprise. “Wow.” She flexed her other hand, glancing down at the swollen, reddish knuckles, then looked back up at the bruised man before her. “I think you lost that fight.”

He touched the area gingerly. “Ya think?” He dropped his hand and looked her up and down, a smile crooking his mouth. “You look fantastic. I like the red. We ready?”

“Almost. I just have one question.”

Tony exchanged a glance with Cole. “This can’t be good.” He looked back at Margrit. “Shoot.”

“How on earth did you get those roses to the office so fast? It didn’t take me that long to get back to work.”

Laughter crinkled Tony’s eyes, and then he winced, touching his fingers to the bruise again. “I called Anita and begged her for a favor.”

“I thought her flower shop wasn’t open yet.”

“It opens officially on the first, but this was an emergency. I threw myself on her big-sisterly mercies.”

“Did you tell her what you’d done?”

“She wouldn’t send the flowers until I did. She said men pulling that sort of shit was exactly what keeps her from getting married again.” Tony made a face. “Despite Mama and Papa nagging.”

“Or maybe because of their nagging. Your mom puts mine to shame. Well, tell her thank-you for the flowers. They were beautiful.”

“I don’t get thanked? My sister does?”

“Life isn’t fair, is it?” Margrit sat down on the couch to pull her shoes on, then stood again, smiling.

Tony cast a despairing look at Cole. “Why do I keep trying to make this work?”

“Because she’s beautiful, intelligent and challenging?” Cole suggested.

Margrit dimpled. “Careful, or I’ll try stealing you from Cam. Do we have reservations, Tony?”

“Yeah. We should go. Anaconda says hi, by the way. She wants to know if you’re all coming over for the Superbowl on Sunday. It’s tradition.”

Margrit laughed. “We’ve only done it twice!”

“Tradition gets set fast in my family. Besides, Ana’s thirteen. You wouldn’t want to break her heart.”

“Okay, but I’m telling her you’re calling her Anaconda out of her hearing.”

“I’m going to have to marry her,” Tony said under his breath to Cole. “Out of self-defense, if nothing else.”

“Marrying me means I couldn’t be forced to testify against you, Tony, not that I wouldn’t volunteer to.”

Tony clutched his heart. “Ow. All right, let’s go before I get stung by any more slings and arrows. They’re holding a table for us.”

“So.” They spoke the word at the same time and let laughter take them, Tony reaching across the table to curl his fingers over Margrit’s before releasing her hand. “I did my best,” he said, gesturing to the restaurant. Booths were set around its outer perimeter, crimson velvet curtains separating one from another. A lightweight gauze net fell over the entrance to their own booth, making the lighting hazy and friendly and offering an illusion of solitude. Sound was surprisingly muffled, giving them more privacy than Margrit expected in a busy restaurant.

“You did good,” she acknowledged. “I’m amazed we both got the night off. Tony, I’m sorry I hadn’t called. In the last few weeks, I mean.”

He held up a hand, cutting off the apology. “This is how we do it every time, Grit. Can we try something different?”

Margrit leaned back and gave him a dubious smile. “I don’t know. That sounds like a chick line. Have you been reading relationship books?”

Something between embarrassment and smugness crossed Tony’s face. “Worse. I’ve been talking to Anne-Marie.”

“Oh, God. Professionally?”

“Are you kidding? I’m a cop. I can’t afford a therapist. No, just more of that big-sisterly advice. I get flowers from the one and relationship advice from the other.”

“How’s her son doing?”

“Still in trouble. You know how boys are at sixteen. Sometimes I think Amie got a psychotherapy degree so she could understand her kid. You’re changing the subject, Grit.”

“I still don’t get how you got Amie out of Anne-Marie. Anyway. Sorry, I didn’t mean to change the subject.” Shivers crept up Margrit’s spine, making her wonder how true the statement was. She leaned forward again, suddenly and uncomfortably aware she was using what Anne-Marie would call open body language. “Okay. I’m listening.”

“I just want to skip all the recriminations, Grit. No more of this my fault your fault, I’m sorry you’re sorry thing. We’ve been doing that for years.”

“Are you sure you haven’t been reading relationship books?”