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Erin had been following the news but she’d been asking Kevin
questions every now and then about the case.
“You know what you need after you’re finished in court?” she
asked. “A night out. We should get dressed up and go out to
dinner. You’re off on Friday, right?”
“We just did that on New Year’s,” Kevin grumbled, sopping up
more yolk on his plate. There were smears of jelly on his fingers.
“If you don’t want to go out, I can make you something special
here. Whatever you want. We can have wine and maybe start a
fire and I could wear something sexy. It could be really romantic.”
He looked up from his plate and she went on. “The point is, I’m
open to whatever,” she purred, “and you need a break. I don’t like
it when you work so hard. It’s like they expect you to solve every
case out there.”
He tapped his fork against his plate, studying her. “Why are you
acting all lovey-dovey? What’s going on?”
Telling herself to stick to the script, she pushed back from the
table.
“Just forget it, okay?” She grabbed her plate and the fork clattered
off it, hitting the table and then the floor. “I was trying to be
supportive since you’re going out of town, but if you don’t like it,
fine. I’ll tell you what—you figure out what you want to do and
let me know sometime, okay?”
She stormed over to the sink and turned the faucet on hard. She
knew she’d surprised him, could feel him vacillating between
anger and confusion. She ran her hands under the water then
brought them to her face. She drew a series of rapid breaths,
hiding her face, and made a choking sound. She let her shoulders
heave a little.
“Are you crying?” he asked. She heard his chair slide back. “Why
the hell are you crying?”