Dillon yawned and made a squeaky puppy sound.
“Stepdad. Whatever. Youknowit was my idea to adopt a dog to begin with, right?”
Dillon sneezed.
“Max dusted yesterday. You’re being dramatic.”
The bell chiming overhead warned that I needed to stop having a conversation with the dog and pretend to be a normal human. I straightened, knees sounding their tell-tale old-man crack before I leaned over the counter to see the customer. “Hello,” I called.
A man stepped forward, coming into focus as he neared the register, and raised a hand in greeting. Khakis, polo shirt, loafers—the most casual a white-collar worker dared to dress on a sweltering day. He had a bag slung over one shoulder, wore a pair of Clark Kent glasses, and had an undercut hairstyle paired with the manliest beard this side of being a professional lumberjack. The guy’s testosterone was practically a cologne.
“Hi. I’m looking for the owner?”
“That’s me,” I said, moving down the stairs and reaching a hand out. “Sebastian Snow.”
His paw encompassed my entire hand as we shook. “You’re younger than I expected.”
“Statistically, the old, balding men ofAntiques Roadshoware a dying breed. Women now outnumber men by nearly ten percent in this industry, dealers under forty make up fifty percent of the business, and fifteen percent of us are gay as hell. Sorry, I didn’t catch your name?”
He gave a hearty, if somewhat confused laugh, before saying, “Joe Sinclair.”
I felt my expression snuff out like someone had set a glass cup over a lit candle. “Oh.” I pulled my hand free, considered Sinclair for half a heartbeat, then made an instinctual decision to pretend I didn’t already know him by proxy. He’d been brash with Calvin, but I was curious if he’d try a different approach with me. And really, I sort of wanted to give him some rope to hang himself by, because the second he tried to get dirt on my personal life, I was going to enjoy tossing his ass to the curb.
Calvin was a public servant. They had rules and regulations to abide by, and he hadn’t been able to do more than ignore Sinclair’s repeated inquiries during the press conference. I, on the other hand, was an ornery private citizen who had absolutely zero issue partaking in a verbal smackdown. In fact, considering I’d had to bite my tongue with Ferguson that morning, the idea of ripping into this guy was practically intoxicating—like I had a buildup of assholery that needed an outlet before I exploded.
“I mean—oh, it’s nice to meet you,” I hastily corrected before my face could do any more of the talking for me. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“I sure hope so.” He retrieved a wallet from his back pocket, plucked out a business card, and offered it. “I’m a reporter forOut in NYC.”
“Okay.” I didn’t read the card.
“I’m always looking for members of the community to elevate and feature in our publication. I believe it’s important that readers see LGBTQ people existing in all professions and walks of life.”
I played along. “So were you already up to snuff on those industry statistics and figured there was a semidecent chance I wasn’t straight?”
Sinclair smiled. “You’re not exactly a secret to the city.”
“You’d be referring to the Gay Miss Marple thing.”
“Hence why I thought you’d be older.”
Sure. Definitely has nothing to do with you having already met my older husband, I thought.
“So what do you say?” Sinclair asked.
“I’d say that’s very dependent on your story’s intended angle.”
“What do you mean?”
“You said you knew me because of a name the media gave me, which was due to an amateur sleuth intent on making some questionable life choices. Youdidn’tknow of me because I’m a leading dealer and appraiser for a very niche interest within the antiquing world.”
I think Sinclair tried to stress some level of embarrassment at having his intentions found out, but it came off more as the cat that got the canary. He was very satisfied with himself. “Busted.”
“Why are you askingnow, when those events occurred nearly two years ago?”
Sinclair said, “I’ve been trying to write a piece on a gay or lesbian cop for months. They’re surprisingly difficult to talk to.”
“Probably because they’re cops.”
