She placed a paper bag on the counter and began putting away groceries. I knew she knew what I was doing there, but she chose to ignore it.

“You going to stay for dinner?” she asked. “I think you’ve lost weight.”

“She has not,” said Roland.

“She’s too skinny,” complained my mom. “Not that I’d mind a little of that.”

I smiled. My mom looked amazing.

“You need to eat more,” she continued.

“I eat, like, three candy bars a day. I’m not depriving myself of calories.” I walked over and poked her in the arm. “Watch it, you’re being all momlike. Smart, professional moms aren’t supposed to be that way.”

She cut me a look. “I’m a therapist. I have to be twice as momlike.”

In the end, I stayed for dinner. Tim was a great cook, but nothing could ever really replace my mom’s food. While we ate, we talked about their vacation in Idaho. Neither Jasmine nor the keres ever came up.

When I finally got back home, I found Tim getting ready to go out with a gaggle of giggling girls. He was in full pseudo-Indian regalia, complete with a beaded head wrap and buckskin vest.

“Greetings, Sister Eugenie,” he said, holding up a palm like he was in some sort of Old West movie. “Join us. We’re going to a concert over in Davidson Park, so that we may commune with the Great Spirit’s gift of springtime whilst letting the sacred beat of the music course through our souls.”

“No thanks,” I said, brushing past him and going straight to my room.

A moment later, he followed sans girls.

“Oh, come on, Eug. It’s gonna be a blast. We’ve got a cooler of beer and everything.”

“Sorry, Tim. I don’t really feel like being a squaw tonight.”

“That’s a derogatory term.”

“I know it is. Very much so. But your bleach-blond posse out there doesn’t deserve much better.” I eyed him askance. “Don’t even think about bringing any of them back here tonight.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know the rules.” He flounced into my wicker chair. “So what are you going to do instead? Shop on the Internet? Work puzzles?”

I’d actually been thinking of doing both those things, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.

“Hey, I’ve got stuff to do.”

“Fuck, Eugenie. You’re becoming a hermit. I almost miss Dean. He was an asshole, but at least he got you out of the house.”

I made a face. Dean was my last boyfriend; we’d broken up six months ago. The split had been kind of unexpected for both of us. I hadn’t expected to find him screwing his real estate agent, and he hadn’t expected to get caught. I knew now I was better off without him, but some niggling part always wondered what about me had made him lose interest. Not exciting enough? Pretty enough? Good enough in bed?

“Some things are worse than staying home alone,” I muttered. “Dean is one of them.”

“Timothy?” one of the girls called from the living room. “Are you coming?”

“One moment, gentle flower,” he hollered back. To me he said, “You sure you wanna hole up here all night? It isn’t really healthy to be away from people so much.”

“I’m fine. Go enjoy your flowers.”

He shrugged and left. Once by myself, I fixed a sandwich and shopped on the Internet, exactly as he’d predicted. It was followed by a puzzle depicting an M. C. Escher drawing. A bit harder than the kitten.

Halfway through, I found myself staring at the puzzle pieces without seeing them. Roland’s quiet, fierce words played over in my head. Let Jasmine Delaney go. Everything he’d told me had been true. Dropping this was the smart thing to do. The safe thing to do. I knew I should listen to him…yet some part of me kept thinking of the young, smiling face Wil had shown me. Angrily, I shoved some of the puzzle pieces aside. This job wasn’t supposed to be about gray moral decisions. It was black and white. Find the bad guys. Kill or banish. Go home at the end of the day.

I stood up, suddenly no longer wanting to be alone. I didn’t want to be left with my own thoughts. I wanted to be out with people. Clarification: I didn’t want to talk to people, I just wanted to be around them. Lost in the crowd. I needed to see my own kind-warm, living and breathing humans, not undead spirits or magic-infused gentry. I wanted to remember which side of the fence I was on. More important, I wanted to forget Jasmine Delaney. At least for tonight

I threw on some jeans and the first bra and shirt I could find. My rings and bracelets always stayed on me, but I added a moonstone necklace that hung low in the shirt’s V-neck. I brushed my long hair into a high ponytail, missing a few strands. A dab of lipstick, and I was ready to go. Ready to lose myself. Ready to forget.

I’d been people-watching for almost an hour, so I saw him as soon as he walked in. It was hard not to. The eyes of a few other women in the bar showed that I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed.

He was tall and broad-shouldered, nicely muscled but not over the top in some crazy Arnold Schwarzenegger way. He wore khakis with a navy blue T-shirt tucked into them. His black hair was not quite to his chin, and he had it tucked behind his ears. His eyes were large and dark, set in a smoothly chiseled face with perfect, golden-tanned skin. There was some mix of ethnicities going on there, I suspected, but none I could discern. Whatever the combo, it worked. Extremely well.

“Hey, is anyone sitting here?” He nodded at the chair beside me. It was the only empty one at the bar.

I shook my head, and he sat down. He didn’t say anything else, and the only other time I heard him speak was to order a margarita. After that, he seemed content just to people-watch, like me. And honestly, it was a great place to do it. Alejandro’s was right next to a midlevel hotel and drew in patrons and tourists from all sides of the socioeconomic scale. TVs showed sporting events or news or whatever the bartender felt like putting on. A few trivia machines sat at the other end of the bar. Music-sometimes live, but not tonight-forced the TVs to have closed-captioning, and dancing people crowded the small space among the tables.

It was humanity at its best. Teeming with life, alcohol, mindless entertainment, and bad pick-up lines. I liked to come here when I wanted to be alone without being alone. I liked it better when drunk, stupid guys left me alone. I wasn’t sure about articulate, good-looking ones. One nice thing I soon discovered was that with Tall, Dark, and Handsome sitting next to me, no losers dared approach.

But he wasn’t talking to me either, and after a while, I realized I’d kind of like him to-not that I’d have any clue what to say back. With the glances he kept giving me, I think he felt the same way. I didn’t know. A sort of tension built up between us as I nursed my Corona, each of us waiting for something.

When it finally came, he started it.

“You’re edible.”

Not the opening I’d been expecting.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your perfume. It’s like…like violets and sugar. And vanilla. I suppose it’s weird to think violets are edible, huh?”

“Not so weird as a guy actually knowing what violets smell like.” It was also weird that he could even smell it. I’d put it on about twelve hours ago. With all the smoke and sweat around here, it was a surprise anyone’s olfactory senses could function.

He shot me a crooked grin, favoring me with a look that could only be described as smoky. I felt my pulse quicken a little. “It’s good to know what flowers are what. Makes it easier to send them. And impress women.”

I eyed him and then swirled the beer in my bottle. “Are you trying to impress me?”

He shrugged. “Mostly I’m just trying to make conversation.”

I pondered that, deciding if I wanted to play this game or not. Wondering if I could. I smiled a little.

“What?” he asked.