Page 73 of Killer Body

“Now,” he said. “Are you ready to listen to reason?”

Tania Marie nodded slowly.

TWENTY

Lucas

Bobby W looked almost like his old self as they got off the boat in Avalon. He always perked up on the ocean, the way flowers did in water. The shore patrol nudged up next to them, and Bobby W hopped on. The sail had smoothed years from his life. They both stood, and for the first time in a long time, Bobby W didn’t appear one step away from collapsing.

“Sea air. I love it.” His voice attracted the attention of others on the boat. A couple nudged each other. A few women smiled.

“Hey,” a young blonde, maybe nineteen, her fine hair fanned and tangled by the wind, said. “Aren’t you the Killer Body guy?”

“And a few other forgettable titles along the way.” Bobby W flexed through his black turtleneck and gave her what Lucas had come to call the look of assessment. Boobs, legs, then, finally the face. “Sometimes,” he said, “especially when we’re young, nature is kind. Later on, less so. May I say nature has been extremely kind to you, my dear lady.”

“Thanks.” She nudged her friend and preened in her tight black top, full breasts threatening to spill through the deep, keyhole-shaped neckline.

The old man’s charm never failed him. His rosy cheeks caught the glow of the harbor lights. His eyes glinted as he chatted with the blonde. Lucas hoped this was the right move, a positive move, and that it might be able to get Bobby W’s mind off his obsession with Julie and whether or not she’d return.

What will Rikki think?

The thought arrived unbidden, followed by the image of her intense, annoying gaze, staring him down, chin uplifted, blatant accusation in those amazing blue eyes. For the first time since his brief marriage, he was thinking about a woman more than he thought about his job.

“So.” The blonde turned to Bobby W, offering up her chest like a plate of buffalo wings at happy hour. “When are you going to pick another Julie? My boyfriend and I love Princess Gabby.”

Bobby W steadied himself on the rail. “I can’t really say. There will never be another Julie, and she’ll be back very soon, you know.”

His voice drifted off. The blonde frowned. As they neared the pier, Lucas could see she’d lost interest in the conversation.

“So,” she said to her friend. “You want pizza or pasta tonight?”

Bobby W shook his head and gave Lucas an indulgent smile. “Your greatest strength is your greatest liability,” he said, low enough so that no one heard him this time.

“So what’s that young lady’s?”

“She thinks she’ll be like this forever.”

“That’s a strength?”

He raised a cagey brow. “Can be. Depends on which side of the screen you’re viewing the movie from.”

They ended up in a café eating bowls of minestrone and yeasty bread, from which Bobby W ripped out and discarded the centers. He gnawed at the crust between sips of bourbon.

“So, what are we going to do, Luke?”

“About?”

Another sip. Another nibble. “About getting Jules back, of course.”

Lucas looked out between the blue-and-white-checked curtains of the café’s windowpanes, where boisterous visitors strolled toward any number of locations, all ending with food, drink, entertainment. No one came to this side of Catalina Island with any longer-term goals.

“Don’t you think Julie will come back when she wants to?”

“No.” He shook his head. “I don’t think she can, or she’d already be here. There was something fake about that conversation we had on the phone.”

“Fake how?” As always, he tried to discern how much was real and how much was just Bobby W being Bobby W.

“As if she was reading it, maybe.” He took his credit card receipt and rose. “Something’s wrong with her. Maybe where she is, she can’t get back.”