He turned the question back on her. “I could ask the same of you, about Tween.”
“Agreed, Tween is not a hive of criminal activity.”
“Neither, it seems, is Selig.”
“Guess there’s not much point being a detective without any crimes to solve.”
He found himself chuckling. “Very true.”
Her posture wasn’t quite as rigid now that they were talking, and the tension in his own shoulders eased somewhat. He cast her profile a quick glance. These past three years had added a maturity to her features, as though her innocence had been robbed from her. A sadness played around the contours of her mouth, in the fan of fine lines around her eyes.
Had he done that to her?
“It’s going to feel strange, going through Natalie’s apartment when I haven’t seen her in years,” she mused.
“You were close?”
“She was the only friend I had at school. We were inseparable back then.”
“Dropping you like a hot cake doesn’t sound like the act of a good friend.”
She was silent, and he realized his blunder. Gods, he was as tactless as Saul.
After a moment she said, “I think she believedIwas desertingher.”
“Were you?”
“No. But I needed a bigger canvas to paint on, and Tween couldn’t give me that.”
He refrained from asking why she’d gone back to work in Tween after he left. He suspected he knew why: because she needed to get away from the memories of that night just as much as he did. He shifted in his seat as he recalled their final interaction.
The morning after the PD dinner, he’d gotten into work early. The first thing he’d done was to pick up the phone and accept a job that had been sitting on his desk for weeks, an opportunity to head up the investigations bureau in Selig.
The second thing he’d done was not of his choosing. Because when he looked up, Clare was standing in the doorway of his office, her hand gripping the doorknob so hard her knuckles were white. Her green and gold eyes blazed with unmistakable anger.
“Yes, Clare?” he managed out of suddenly parched lips.
“Did you get waylaid, sir?”
He raised an eyebrow. “When?”
“Last night,” she hissed through gritted teeth. “Did something hold you up—sir?”
He knew he deserved her anger, her contempt. And gods damn it, she sure had courage, coming in and confronting him like this.
Shuffling papers on his desk, he growled, “Something did come up, yes.”
“I have a phone. You could have called me.”
When he didn’t answer she ground out, “Nothing came up, did it? You just chose not to return.”
“There was no point continuing something we would both regret in the cold light of day.”
She nodded tersely. Didn’t budge, just stood there, a ball of beautiful rage, like an avenging angel.
Hardening his heart, Oliver said tersely, “Come in for a moment.”
She stepped into his office, closed the door, and stood ramrod straight against it, her hands clasped tightly in front of her.
