“Anything, you know that.”
She paused to ponder, mirroring her father’s tortured expression, hours before. “Yes. I suspected my mom might be having an affair, too.” She took another drink from her glass. “Not until I was older, in my teens, but I started noticing the same things my dad brought up today. Gone a lot. Sometimes a weekend or nights, out late. You know, when you’re in high school, it’s all about you, and you feel angry and lonesome. And then I started to wonder if there was more to it. Also the tension between my parents was a big elephant in that apartment. I even started trying to get to our mail before she did so I could look for any letters from men or anything. It’s crazy, but it’s what it became.”
“Was she seeing someone?”
“I never knew.”
“And you never talked to her about it directly?”
“Like I’d do that.”
“And she never confided in you? Not even a hint?” Nikki gave him a derisive sniff. “Hey, just asking. I got the impression you and your mom were close.”
“In our own way, yes. But my mother had this very private side to her. It was a bone of contention between us. Even the night she was killed. Know the reason I was gone from the apartment for such a long time before I went to the market? I needed to take a walk because things were tense between us about her … what should I call it …? Separateness. Don’t get me wrong, my mom was warm and loving to me, so I’m not invalidating that. But … there was a part of her that she kept totally to herself. As close as we were, she had this wall that divided us.”
Understanding now why Nikki had balked at digging into her mother’s past, Rook said, “There’s no shame here. We all have our private areas, right? Some people erect a little more protection around theirs than others. What did my man, Sting, call it, ‘A Fortress Around Your Heart’?” He ate a marinated artichoke with his fingers and added, “You, of all people, should know that.”
Nikki frowned and studied him. “Meaning?”
He swallowed wrong, coughing on some vinegar as he realized his mistake. Trying to contain the damage, he said, “Nothing. Forget it.” But it was out there.
“Too late. What exactly should I know that you have now somehow become an expert on from listening to Classic Rock?”
“Well … OK, look, we all have aspects we inherit from our folks. I have my mother’s brash theatricality and adorable impulsiveness. As for my dad, I have no clue. Don’t even know who he is.” He hoped that sidetrack would end that thread of discussion, but he was wrong.
“Spit it out, Rook. Are you saying I’m inaccessible?”
“Not at all.” He felt himself trapped in a sparring match he didn’t want to be in and that everything he said was the wrong thing. Such as stupidly adding, “Not all the time.”
“And at what times am I inaccessible?”
He tried to dodge. “Not most of the time.”
“When, Rook?”
Seeing no way out, he chose the Robert Frost path and went through. “OK, sometimes, when I want to broach certain subjects with you lately, you do ice me.”
“You think I’m cold?”
“No. But you do know how to freeze me out.”
“I freeze you out, is that your point? Because that’s ridiculous. You’re the first person I’ve ever heard say that about me.”
“Actually …”
She had started to take another sip of wine, but the color left her face and she clanked the glass down on the cold stone countertop. “You’d better finish that.” Already feeling up to his neck, Rook’s brain clawed for a way out, but all the passages were marked “No Exit.” “I mean it, Rook. You can’t lay something out there like that and retreat. Finish it.” She fixed him with that unblinking X-ray stare he’d seen her melt bull-necked sociopaths with during interrogation.
“All right. The other night in Boston, Petar and I were talking and—”