Page 65 of First Date: Divorce
Thanks to the nose in, mouth out, he had enough breath to say, “Uh-uh.”Then “minute.”
She allowed him half of that.
“You followed me,” she accused.
Still at a disadvantage, he did get out.“I left first.Here first.”
“How could you have left before—?”
“You were in the bathroom.”A complete sentence in one breath.Life looked better.
She made a huffing noise, and he envied her the breath.
“You sauntered down here and walked in and—”
“Uh-uh.Door was locked.”
“How’d you open it?”
He reached into his robe pocket and straightened enough to hold a plastic card in the narrow stream of light from the flashlight she methodically cast over the small enclosure.“Misspent youth.”
This time she clicked her tongue.
That sound he might have been able to make.Didn’t take a lot of breath.
“It’s a janitor’s closet.”She sounded disgusted.
He knew how she felt.
“No safe,” he agreed.
She swung the light around and into his eyes.This time he put a hand up to shield them.
“So you did see that on the plans.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And didn’t say anything about it.”
“Neither did you.”
Another huff.That was showing off.
She shifted the light and continued her survey.By the time she finished, he’d started to feel like his lungs hadn’t permanently gone on strike.
“Dead end,” he said.
“Eliminating false trails helps find the real ones.”
“According to Cully, we shouldn’t follow trails.Just present ourselves as bait for the mole to spot, serve up to Bledsoe.”
Their eyes met for a long moment.
He said, “You’re thinking what Cully doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”
“Neither of us could tell on the other for doing more than being bait without the accusation being thrown back at us,” she said.
“That’s cynical.Though completely true.”
