Doppelgangster - Laura Resnick [78]
However, the next day, Danny Dapezzo phoned me in a blind panic, his sense of humor all gone. He had just seen his perfect double, and he knew death was coming for him.
15
I was scrubbed clean, well-rested, and flushed with excitement when Lopez arrived the next day for the afternoon we had planned.
With the sit-down over and no word from Lucky, Max, or anyone else since then, I was hoping to have a whole day and night to myself and the attractive man who was admirably persistent in his efforts to date me.
I had gone shopping that morning and stocked my kitchen with romantic delicacies that I couldn’t afford, such as champagne, fresh shrimp, French cheese, juicy strawberries, and Belgian chocolate, so that we wouldn’t have to go out when we got hungry. I also bought a jumbo package of condoms; ah, yes, the romance of dating in our era. Then I washed my sheets, plumped my pillows, tidied my bedroom, and chose a pretty outfit that, while not sluttily obvious, wouldn’t be too difficult for Lopez to remove in a hurry: a simple knit dress, black and short-sleeved, with low-heeled red shoes.
I was so ready to take a new lover that I was quivering by the time I buzzed him into the building, opened my front door, and listened to his footsteps ascending to my apartment with flattering haste.
When he got to the top of the stairs, I saw he was wearing a crisp, pale shirt tucked into blue jeans, and carrying a big paper bag in one arm. He smiled when he saw me. “Hi.”
“Hi!” When he reached my door, I asked, “What’s in the bag?”
“Tomorrow’s breakfast.” He slid his free arm around my waist and drew me close for a kiss. “Lox,” he whispered against my lips. “Bagels.” He kissed me softly. “Cream cheese.” A longer kiss. “Coffee. Do you have a grinder?”
“Huh?” I said dizzily.
“I got beans, not ground,” he murmured. “It was all they had.”
“Huh?”
“The coffee,” he breathed against my neck.
“Um . . .” I’d already forgotten the question.
He backed me into the apartment while kissing me, then kicked the door shut behind him. The bag he was carrying interfered with his attempt to pull me closer, and we both laughed.
“Here,” I said, “give that to me.” I slipped out of his embrace, took the bag, and carried it a few steps into the kitchen. “I speak from bitter experience when I say we don’t want to forget about the lox and leave it sitting out all night.”
He folded his arms across his chest and leaned one shoulder against the wall, next to where the kitchen phone hung, and watched me as I unpacked the groceries. “Some other guy was generous enough to bring you lox? And here I hoped I’d be the first.”
“It was my bat mitzvah party, not a date.” I pulled fresh bagels and a rich-smelling bag of roasted coffee beans out of the paper bag. “And it took days to get the odor out of the house.”
“Since I can’t eat all that fish alone, I hope you’ve recovered by now. A bar mitzvah is when you’re what, thirteen?”
“Yes.” I put the smoked salmon and the cream cheese in the refrigerator. “But ‘bar’ is for boys. A girl has a bat mitzvah.”
“Ah. You see how much I learn by going out with you?”
His coal black hair was shiny, crisp, and a little ruffled from his trip here. The pale shirt showed off the golden dark color of his skin. His blue eyes were sparkling, and his smile was sexy.
I said, “I guess you’re here because you cleaned my slate with Detective Napoli?”
“You know why I’m here.” His look was sultry. I quivered again. But then he said more matter-of-factly, “But, yeah, I talked to Napoli. Everything’s okay now. You’re not under suspicion, and there won’t be a material witness warrant. He wants to question you again—”
“What?” I said in alarm.
“Hey, you witnessed a hit, Esther. Of course he wants to question you again, if only to get your official statement verifying that you didn’t see anything that can help us find the killer.”
“Oh. Right.”
“But I convinced him that you’re not lying or concealing anything. So it won’t be a hostile interview. And I’ll be in the room, too. Okay?”
I nodded. “Okay.” And if we stuck