Nickel City Storm Warning (Gideon Rimes Book 3) by Gary Ross (100 best novels of all time txt) 📗

To the left was a spacious sunken living room with potted plants, hardwood floors, built-in shelving with books and half a dozen small sculptures, plush chairs and sofas, four paintings that looked original, and a flat-screen TV that filled an entire wall. Soft jazz at a low volume came from a sound system I could not see.

“We’ll go to my room,” Marlo said, moving into the corridor. “It’s cozier than the living room.”

“As you wish,” Drea, said.

At the end of the corridor was a master bedroom with one of its sliding doors open to reveal a king-sized bed and a floor-to-ceiling window. Perpendicular to the master bedroom on either side was a pair of regular doors—presumably for more bedrooms. Marlo opened the farther door on the right and stood aside for us to enter.

It was a bedroom without a bed, furnished as a combination office and sitting room, with one window not quite floor-to-ceiling in its far wall and a filtration system that left the scent of roses in the air. A desk with a computer and a client chair beside it sat before the window. At a right angle to the desk and across from a mid-size flat screen on the wall were a flower-pattern loveseat and matching armchair. A lamp table between them had a few magazines, a clamshell ashtray, and a half-done needlepoint canvas in a circular frame. Bookshelves flanking the television held hardcovers and paperbacks, as well as legal volumes with thick spines. The narrow corner door past the books probably led to a bathroom shared with the adjacent bedroom.

“Not quite my sanctum sanctorum,” Marlo said. “But a good place to retreat when I’m tired. It’s also the only room I can smoke in, though I try to limit indoor cigarettes to winter. This time of year I use the terrace. Have a seat, anywhere you like.”

Drea sank into the loveseat near the table. Sensing Marlo wanted to sit beside her, I sat in the armchair, trying to reconcile what I knew of the judge with the needlepoint ring.

Marlo took the seat I expected but smiled at me instead of Drea. “Gideon, the look on your face when I opened the door made me sorry I didn’t have a camera. So let me answer the question you’re too much of a gentleman to ask. Yes, James Torrance and I are a couple. We’ve been together for three years and I’ve lived here for two. It’s not a secret relationship but we’re private people and don’t appear in public together often enough to make people care. We’re not a power couple like the mayor and Judge Chancellor.”

I nodded. Ophelia Green and State Supreme Court Justice Harold Chancellor had been together longer than Phoenix and I—how much longer I couldn’t say because their relationship came to light only after her re-election. Cameras followed them everywhere now. Everyone from ministers in pulpits to neighborhood weeklies to local news anchors mentioned what a striking couple the beautiful mayor and tall, handsome judge made. If they were anything like Bobby and Kayla, Marlo and James would hate such attention.

“By the way, they’ll be here tonight, along with the Gramms and the Zachritzes.”

“Buffalo’s unofficial first couple,” I said, wondering but not asking who the eleventh and twelfth diners would be. “A news item wherever they go.”

“Which is why tonight’s dinner party is private. No pictures for Facebook or other social media. If I may be frank, Jim and I are both widowed, with enough individual assets to complicate taxes and inheritances if we marry. I hope you can appreciate we don’t need the public speculating about us the way they do about Ophelia Green and Hal Chancellor. I’ve already been called a gold digger, even though I have enough money of my own that my daughter in Seattle can retire from teaching kindergarten whenever I punch my time card.” She chuckled. “The truth is, I wouldn’t know what to do with the kind of money Jim has.”

“Your privacy is safe with us,” I said. “But as long as we’re being frank, I imagine Randall’s happier with things as they are.”

“You imagine correctly,” she said after a long moment. “Randall’s a good son but never quite got over the loss of his mother. He’s had trouble with anyone his father dated. Still, we’ve made our peace with each other.”

Because outside of marriage you’re no threat to his inheritance, I thought.

Marlo looked at Drea. “But you’re the guest of honor tonight and I’ve neglected you too long.” She took Drea’s hands in hers. “Your book ends on an uncertain but hopeful note. If I’m not being too presumptuous, I’d love to know what your life has been like since its release.”

For the next ten minutes, Drea described a life of newfound privilege constrained by the loneliness of excessive caution. The book’s success and the sale of film rights to Hulu had enabled her to rent an expensive studio in a secure apartment building in Dupont Circle. Her precise address was unlisted anywhere. The building’s amenities included a gym, a pool, a clubhouse, yoga classes, and bicycle storage, but she never used anything other than the laundry service and had met none of her neighbors. All her finances she handled online. All her take-out was delivered to the doorman’s desk in the name of whichever doorman was on duty. All her mail went directly to her lawyer’s office, which sent an armed driver to pick her up for a biweekly office conference, groceries and other shopping, and a monthly luncheon with a few old friends who knew only her new email address and her burner phone number. Appearances and signings were arranged by her publishers, who still received death threats against her, though the number had declined in the past year. They provided security for local events and subcontracted coverage each time she left town. She had left the country once since her husband’s murder, to attend her daughter’s wedding in London. She had felt