Page 35 of Inferno

Manninghuffeda shaky laugh. “You be buggin’, pops. All you smell on me is soap and water.”

“Hmm.”As a firefighter, Stan had developed a keen sense of smell that enabled him to detect gas leaks and smoke with the precision of a bloodhound. So when he told Manning that he smelled different, he knew he wasn’t imagining things.

Slowly he returned to his chair, eyes narrowed speculatively as he searched his son’s face.

Manning resumed eating, but there was a new guardedness to him.

Picking up his coffee mug, Stan casually remarked, “I saw Caitlyn on my way back from walking your brothers to the bus stop.”

Manning bit into a slice of bacon.“Yeah?”

“Yeah.She was heating up her car in the driveway.” Stan sipped his coffee, watching his son over the rim of the mug. “She wanted me to tell you that she’s ready to give you another ride whenever you want.”

Manning choked on the bacon. Coughing and gasping, he grabbed his glass of orange juice and downed half the contents.

“You all right?”Stan drawled.

Manning quickly bobbed his head. “It just, uh, went down the, uh, wrong way,” he rasped, plunking down the glass.

“You should be more careful,” Stan warned mildly. “Eating, like anything else in life, should never be done in a hurry.”

Manning nodded and dropped his gaze to his plate, his lips twitching with amusement.

“I assume, of course, that Caitlyn was referring to giving you another ride toschool.”

“Of course.”But Manning could barely keep the smirk off his face.

Stan grew still. “Look at me.”

Manning hesitated for a moment, then slowly lifted his head to meet Stan’s suspicious gaze.

“Something you wanna tell me?”

Long pause. “Like what?”

Stan frowned. “Boy—”

Suddenly the phone rang.

Father and son stared at the ringing instrument, then at each other.

A second later, Manning jumped up from the table as if his chair had suddenly caught on fire. “I’d better get to work. Lots to do, you know?”

After dumping his empty plate in the sink, he beat a hasty retreat as Stan stood and crossed to the wall phone. He picked up on the last ring. “Hello?”

“Hello, Stan,” a warm female voice greeted him. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”

Hell, yeah!

“Um, sort of.Hold on.”

Quickly setting down the receiver, Stan crept to the kitchen doorway. After several moments, Manning jogged down the staircase and headed into the garage, bopping his head to the beat of whatever song was playing on his Walkman.

Heart thudding, Stan strode back to the phone. “Sorry about that.”

“No, I’m the one who should apologize. It’s after eight, so I just assumed you had the house all to yourself by now.”

“I would have,” Stan said with wry humor, “but my eldest had other plans.”