“Cat. It’s me.”

She tossed the carton onto the counter and went to the door. Garcia was standing in the hallway with a pizza box in his hands. “Hope you don’t mind. I slipped inside the building right after one of your neighbors went outside. The front door doesn’t shut all the way unless you force it. You should tell the caretaker—it’s dangerous and should be fixed.”

“I’ll add it to the list.” She inhaled. “Sausage and green peppers and onions. Now that’s dangerous.”

He looked past her into the open loft. “I thought I heard someone else in here.”

“I wish. Can’t remember the last time I had a date.” She pointed to the CD player. Sinatra was launching into another song. “You must have heard the Voice.”

“Right.” Garcia adjusted his grip on the box. “You didn’t eat already, did you?”

“Nope.”

“Let’s tear into it before it gets cold.”

She directed Garcia to the kitchen. “Set it down. I’ll get the plates.”

He dropped the box on the table. Dipping his hands into his trench pockets, he produced a wad of paper napkins. “We don’t need plates.”

“Beer, wine, or water?”

He peeled off his trench and blazer and draped them over the back of a kitchen chair. “Beer for me. A beer would be good.”

“St. Pauli okay?” she asked as she headed to the refrigerator.

“Perfect.” He spotted the carton on the counter and pointed at it. “Lean Cuisine’s on the menu at my house at least once a week.”

Embarrassed, she retrieved the turkey dinner and shoved it back in the freezer. “Cooking for one sucks. What can I say?”

“Aren’t we a couple of pathetic singles?”

She pulled a beer and a bottle of Chardonnay out of the refrigerator. “You didn’t have to make a house call. I told you I was fine.”

“I know you’re fine,” he said, loosening his tie. “I was in the neighborhood. It was dinnertime.”

“Right,” she muttered, and popped the top off the St. Pauli.

AFTER POLISHING OFF the pizza, Bernadette took one end of the couch and Garcia sat on the other. He was working on his second St. Pauli while she held her second glass of white wine in her hand.

She propped her stocking feet up on the coffee table. “When do I get those files?”

“I’ve got to wrestle them away from Thorsson. He and his partner were digging into them tonight.”

“Thorsson. You shouldn’t let that moron anywhere near those files.”

“I hate it when you kids fight.” He kicked off his shoes and pushed them under the coffee table. “Can’t we all just get along?”

She took a sip of Chardonnay. “Watch. He’s going to hang on to them just to tick me off.”

“I won’t let him hang on to them.” Garcia took a bump off his beer. “I’ll get them off him first thing tomorrow.”

“Should I swing over to Minneapolis and pick them up?”

“I’ll come by the cellar with them. I’ve got a meeting over at the St. Paul cop shop.”

“Don’t forget the—”

“The scarf. I know, Mom. I’ll remember.”

“I caught the six o’clock news,” she said. “Television played it just the way we wanted. There wasn’t even a mention of the other drownings.”

“That’s enough work talk, okay?”

She took a sip of wine. “Fine with me.”

Garcia pointed across the room, to a chrome and red Honda parked in a corner of her condo. “Your trail bike or motocross bike or whatever you call it. I swear to God I see dust on the seat.”

“You do.” Rather than leave the bike in the condo garage or on the street, she routinely sneaked it up in the elevator so she could keep it under her sight. It hadn’t seen much action lately.

“When you gonna take the thing out for a ride? You should get some mud on it before the snow flies.”

“You’re right. Maybe this weekend, if the weather holds out.”

“I wouldn’t mind going with.”

Surprised by his request, she paused before answering. “Sure.”

With his beer bottle, he motioned toward her DVD collection. “Why don’t we pop in a movie?”

She set her glass down on the table and went over to the rack. “What’s your pleasure? Something scary? A comedy?” She took down a copy of The Departed. “How about a police flick?”

“I hate cops-and-robbers movies. They never get it right. Bunch of bullshit. Comedy sounds good.” He polished off his St. Pauli and set the empty on the table. “I could use a laugh after what we saw today.”

“I second that,” she said, and started riffling through her Adam Sandler movies. “Help yourself to another beer.”

“In a bit.” Garcia yanked off his tie and tossed it on the table. “That’s better. I hate those things.”

She looked over and nodded to his chest. “You must hate your dress shirt, too. You’ve got sauce all over it.”

He looked down. “This is my lucky shirt.”

She went over to him with her hand out. “Give it to me, and I’ll run some water over it, so the stain doesn’t set.”

He stood up and started unbuttoning. “Do you mind? My wife bought me …”

His voice trailed off, and she knew why. Garcia’s wife was dead, her car run off the road by an unknown driver years ago. Bernadette preferred her own tragedy; at least she knew whom to blame for her spouse’s death. The uncertainty continued to haunt Garcia. “Give it here. It’ll just take a minute.”

As he peeled off the shirt and passed it over to her, their eyes met. “Appreciate it.”

“Not a problem,” she said. Garcia wore a tank T-shirt under his oxford, and she couldn’t help but notice the well-muscled arms and the six-pack rippling through the cotton. She went over to the sink, turned on the water, and held the fabric under the stream. “The stain’s coming out.”

“Great.” Burying his hands in his pants pockets, he walked around her condo while she worked on his shirt. “So … any visitors recently?”

“Visitors?”

“You get what I mean.”

Garcia knew she could see her dead neighbor, August Murrick, the former owner of the condo building. “Mr. Murrick hasn’t made an appearance in quite some time,” she said.

“Really?”

“Really.” She wasn’t lying.

“What happened? Why’d he hit the road?”

“I have no idea why he took off.” That she was lying about. She’d never confided to Garcia that she and Augie had been intimate once, before she realized he was a ghost. For weeks, she rebuffed his efforts to get her back into bed. He finally got the message and disappeared for good over the summer. She prayed Augie had gone to a truer heaven than a converted warehouse on the banks of the Mississippi.

“He sounded like an interesting character,” said Garcia, stopping to examine the movie titles.

“Oh, he wasn’t all that interesting.” She turned off the faucet, wrung out the wet shirt, and held it up over the sink. “Good as new. How lucky is that?”

“Thanks a bunch,” said Garcia, coming up next to her.

She pivoted around and found his body inches from hers. “Glad to … do it,” she stumbled, and felt her face heating up.

“Maybe we should forget the movie,” he said evenly.

She nodded and said with the same careful lack of emotion, “I’ll put this in a plastic sack for you.”

While she dug under the sink for a bag and stuffed the wet shirt into it, he slipped his shoes back on and pulled on his blazer. “Thanks for the brew.”

“Thanks for dinner.” She handed him the bagged shirt.

He grabbed his trench coat and headed for the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“Wait,” she said after him, retrieving his tie from the coffee table.

He turned around. “What, Cat?”

“You forgot your tie.”

As he took it from her, his hand locked over hers. “I’m sorry I can’t stay,” he said hoarsely.

“You sure you can’t?”

“More sure than I’ve ever been of anything.” He released her hand, opened the door, and stepped into the hallway.

Bernadette watched his back as he headed for the elevators, putting his trench coat on as he went. She wished like hell he’d turn around and come back. At the same time, she knew that would be a huge mistake for both of them.