Page 65 of The Maverick
I leaned in close enough to the window that the air conditioning came out cool against my face.
I dropped the smile.
I didn't drop it all the way. I left a little of it on, the way a man left a little of a knife in a wound to keep the bleeding controlled. But the warmth went out behind it, and Mendez saw it go, andhis pupils did the small thing pupils did when a man who'd been talking to one person realized he was talking to a different one.
"Tell Deputy Director Craine," I said, low and friendly, "that if he wants to see me, he can make an appointment to come see me at Dominion Hall. He knows where it is."
Mendez didn't answer.
"And if he doesn't want to do that," I said, "he can keep doing whatever he's doing. With the trucks and the men in windbreakers and the watching of doorways. That's his prerogative. But if it goes on for more than the next twenty-four hours, I'm going to call my congressman."
A small flicker at the corner of his eye.
"He's a friend," I said. "Real close. I'm sure you know what I do for a living, Mendez. I'm sure your people put together a folder on me before you knocked on my door yesterday morning, and I'm sure my congressman's name is in that folder somewhere, because that congressman has more than once gone to bat for the kind of work I do when other people in your building have tried to make life difficult for it." I let the smile come back a quarter inch. "He doesn't like it when people get in the way of me doing my job."
Mendez worked his jaw.
"You got that?" I said. "Want me to repeat it?"
"I got it."
"Good man."
I patted him twice on the upper arm. Light, friendly, the way you'd pat a teammate at the end of a play that hadn't gone your way.
"See you around, Menendez."
I straightened up.
I tipped my chin at the ex-Marine driver, who tipped his chin back, because some men understood other men.
The Tahoe pulled away from the curb. It went the opposite direction down the street, slow, deliberate, and the second Tahoe disengaged from the corner and followed it, and the foot man in the windbreaker fell into a stride that was just casual enough not to look like he was leaving.
I watched the back of the Tahoe until it took the next left.
I crossed the rest of the street and walked into the flower shop.
The bell over the door rang the small bright ring bells gave in old buildings.
A woman behind the counter looked up. She was in her fifties, half-glasses pushed up on her hair, an apron with stains on it that meant business.
"Morning, sugar. What can I do for you?"
"Morning, ma'am. I need a dozen of something."
"Of what?"
"Of whatever a man brings to a girl when he doesn't want her to think he's trying too hard."
She put her hands flat on the counter and gave me a long, slow look over the top of her glasses. The kind of look mothers had been giving me since I was about ten.
"Honey," she said, "you have come to the right shop."
I let her work.
I stood at the window with my hands in my pockets and watched the sidewalk while she fussed over a bucket of something cream-colored with the smallest blush of pink at the edge of the petals. I watched the sidewalk because it was the smart thing to watch and because I needed something for my eyes to do that wasn't her.
Outside, the cheerful didn't move on my face.
