Divine Evil

a town this size, you never get off duty. There's no telling when I'll have to chase off some kid skateboarding down Main or break up a fight over a checkers game in the park.”
    “Old Fogarty and McGrath still at it?”
    “Every week.”
    “You can get to the park for round three just as quickly from our place. Why don't you give me a lift home, maybe hang around for some barbecued chicken?”
    “That's neighborly of you,” Cam said and grinned.
    She wasn't upset that he was there, Clare thought. She glanced over at the echoing clank of metal on metal and noted that Cam had just missed tossing a ringer.
    She wasn't angry with him. Not really. All she was trying to do was distance herself a bit, give herself some perspective. She'd let things get out of hand much too quickly as far as Cam was concerned. The proof was the way they'd grated on each other since the accident.
    Rob had always said she played dirty in a fight, tossing out illogical arguments and past grudges or retreating into frigid silence. Of course, the arguments had seemed perfectly logical to her, and …
    She was doing it again, Clare thought, and poked viciously at the grilling chicken with her barbecue fork. Rob was old business, and if she didn't stop carrying around that particular baggage, she'd be right back on Janowski's couch.
    If that wasn't enough to straighten her out, nothing was.
    Cam was new business, she decided. She hadn't liked the fact that he'd questioned her like a cop one minute, then tried to bundle her off into a safe corner like a concerned lover the next. And she would tell him so. Eventually.
    In the meantime, she'd just wanted some room to reevaluate. Then he'd shown up. First with the burl that he'd damn well known would weaken her. Then today, waltzing into the backyard with Blair. Showing off his wonderful body in snug jeans and a shirt rolled up over his tanned and muscled arms.
    She poked at the chicken, turned it, and forced herself not to look up when she heard the shouts and masculine laughter, the ringing of horseshoes.
    “He's got terrific buns,” Angie commented and offered Clare a glass of the wine she'd just poured.
    “I've
always
admired Jean-Paul's butt.”
    “Not his. Though God knows it's fine.” She sniffed atthe sizzling chicken. “This is a talent you've hidden well, girl·”
    “It's hard to barbecue in the loft.”
    “This from a woman who welds in her living room. Are you going to let him get away?”
    “You're full of non sequiturs today, Angie.”
    “Are you?”
    “I'm just taking time out to think.” She glanced up and smiled. “Look, poor Bud is making cow's eyes at Alice, and Alice is making them at Blair.”
    “Who's your money on?”
    “Bud. He's slow but steady. Blair will never be anything but a visitor in Emmitsboro.”
    “How about you?”
    Clare said nothing for a moment, only slathered sauce on the browning chicken. She could smell lilacs from the big gnarled tree as the light breeze loosened some of the petals and had them drifting like snow. Sun and shadow played over the patio. The music crooning from the radio was old tunes from those sweet and happy years before she had had to make decisions or think of futures.
    “Did you see the sculpture I was working on last night?”
    “The brass piece. It made me think of a woman stretched out on an altar about to be sacrificed.”
    “It's almost scary how easy it is to work here. How compelled I am to pull it out of my head. I always thought I was made for New York.” She looked at her friend. “Now, I'm not so sure.”
    “Because of the work or because of those grade-A buns over there?”
    “I guess I'll have to figure that out.”
    “Sonofabitch.” Blair jogged over to snag a beer out of the cooler. “Jean-Paul must think we're playing bocce.When do we eat? I'm tired of being humiliated by a couple of hick cops.”
    “I'll let you know once you guys have shucked that corn.”
    They complained, but they did it. When everyone settled down at the old picnic table on the terrace to a meal of grilled chicken and corn, with Alice's potato salad and chilled French wine, the mood was easy. There was no talk of murder investigations, but a rehash of horseshoe games.
    Along the edging stones, the early roses bloomed, fronted by the impatiens Clare had planted. There was the scent of lilacs and spicy sauce. Bud had positioned himself beside Alice and was making her laugh so often that her gaze hardly ever drifted