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After his shift at the plant, he went to the daily meeting of the task force. He reported that there was still no love lost between him and Franklin Albright. Albright had punctured one of his tires. "Stupid thing to do since my car was in the parking lot of a tire plant, for crissake." He'd had the tire replaced in no time.
He couldn't be sure Albright was the culprit, but he didn't have any other enemies at the plant, and Albright had given him a smirking grin when he reclaimed Crystal as she and Dodge came through the exit together after their shift. And Dodge knew about Albright's fondness for his knife.
Playing nerdy whipping boy to the violent ex-con was getting real old, real quick, but this was the role he'd started with, so it was the one he had to stick to. In the meantime, Crystal was becoming more affectionate. Recently she'd stroked his hand and wistfully told him she wished she'd met him first.
Dodge had told her it was too bad she didn't know something about Franklin that would land him back in the penitentiary for a long, long time and save her the hassle of having to break up with him so she and he--Marvin--could be together.
Her smile had faltered, and she'd quickly changed the subject. Her reaction raised Dodge's suspicion that something about Albright definitely made her uneasy, but she was a long way from blurting out that he was planning an armed bank robbery.
Dodge felt like he was marking time while accomplishing nothing, but no one else on the task force had anything cooking, so he had to keep his janitorial job and continue putting the make on Crystal in the hope of either getting something on Albright that would identify him as their robber or eliminating him from the suspect roster. And in the process, to avoid getting murdered by Franklin Albright, jealous lover. Staying alive was now a top priority with Dodge. He really wanted to live.
With Caroline.
When he got home that first evening, he caught her napping on the sofa. Embarrassed, she sat up, clasping and unclasping her hands self-consciously, apologizing for her tousled hair and disheveled clothing. Her shy uncertainty made his heart do cartwheels.
"How was your day?" he asked.
"Lazy."
"Perfect."
He'd brought home a carton of rich, creamy tomato basil soup, a speciality of a cafe where he often had his meals. They sat at his kitchen table and ate the soup with hunks of French bread he tore off the loaf and buttered with a heavy hand.
When he gave Caroline a second piece of it, she asked, "Are you trying to make me fat?"
"I'm trying to get you to where I can see you in profile."
After their supper, which included vanilla ice cream and fudge sauce, they watched television for a while, but by ten o'clock, Caroline was yawning. "I'm sorry. It's not your company, I promise."
"No apology necessary. I'm beat, too."
As she had the day before, she put up an argument for giving him back his bed and sleeping on the sofa. "I'm smaller. I'm the interloper. I don't mind."
"But I do."
In the end, he wouldn't hear of relegating her to the sofa, and she relented. Dodge spent his second wretched night on the damn hard and unforgiving thing, but relishing every single minute of his torturous insomnia because Caroline was under his roof and snug in his bed.
That first day set the pattern for those that followed. She got up each morning in time to see him off and was there waiting when he returned. At her insistence, he'd stocked the pantry and fridge with more groceries than they'd ever had in them. She wanted foodstuffs and spices on hand so she could prepare dinner each night.
"It's the least I can do to repay your hospitality."
He permitted it, conditional upon h
er eating half of everything she cooked, and promising not to overexert herself.
He watched the bruise around her eye fade from eggplant to violet, then to avocado green. Natural color returned to her cheeks. Her tiny frame fleshed out a little more each day until she no longer looked dangerously underfed.
She groused about her idleness, but to Dodge she seemed industrious. Daily, she studied the real estate sections of newspapers. She lamented the listings she'd missed and strategized how she was going to make up for lost time when she returned to Jim Malone Realty.
She made endless notes in a spiral notebook she'd brought with her, jotting down ideas as they occurred to her. Her ambition was undiminished by this temporary setback. In fact, because of it, she was even more determined to make a name for herself. Dodge supposed she wanted to succeed in order to spite Roger Campton and his family of untouchables.
She discussed with Dodge the career path she had plotted, as though he could offer valuable advice on how she could achieve her goals in the time frame she'd set. He had little to offer, but she didn't seem to realize that. He was flattered that she often asked for his unlearned opinion.
She was more cultured than he was. She'd read more books, heard more symphonies, listened to more lectures, and toured more museums. Hell, in his whole life, he'd been inside one museum, and he'd gone then only because he'd heard it had an exhibition devoted entirely to paintings of naked women.
Caroline was way above him intellectually. But the way she listened when he talked made him feel smarter, like she thought anything he said was worth hearing.
"I bet you got straight A's in school," he teased one night.
