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She tossed a smile over her shoulder at him. “They don’t call you Mr. Computer Wiz for nothing.”
“No one calls me that. If they did, I’d kill them.”
“Which is why they don’t say it to your face, Wiz,” she countered with a wink, “but theydobehind your back.”
He eyed Batman. “I’m not discussing how I feel about what happened.”
She rolled her chair away from her desk to face him. “I didn’t ask you to.”
“Sure you did. You’re buttering me up so I’ll spill my guts.”
“What do you need to spill your guts about? Unless this tripped a trigger? I thought we’d covered everything in therapy.”
And there it was—that backdoor way of hers to slip in and get him talking. “We could have sessions for the next hundred years and never cover all of my failures and faults.”
“Hmm.” She shrugged and scooted back to her keyboard.
That was it? He frowned at his screen, finding it hard to concentrate now. She’d let him off too easily. “What I need is an idea for dinner.”
“We have a cafeteria.”
“Amelia has called in her raincheck. I need something nicer than a microwave meal.”
Spinning again, she faced him but stayed at the desk, delight clear on her face. “That’s great! It’s probably better if she doesn’t go anywhere right now, though, don’t you think?”
He started a new search. This one for delivery places. “She’s not up for going out. I mean, what should I orderinfor us? Should I stick with Italian?”
Amusement lit her eyes. “Why don’t you make something?”
He snorted. “I can’t cook.”
“All those years on your own and you never learned to put a meal together?”
“Is there some underlying diagnosis you want to throw out about that?”
Her laughter was infectious. He had to school his features not to smile. “You’re a trip, Rory. I don’t spend every minute of every day analyzing what you tell me, you know.”
Sure she did. Just like analyzing situations was second-nature to him, scrutinizing, probing, and dissecting every habit, belief, and personality trait was to her.
His coffee was lukewarm. He finished off the last of it and rubbed his eyes. He needed sleep, but at least the throbbing in his knee would keep that at bay. He didn’t want to order from the same restaurant, so he scanned a list of others in the neighborhood. All claimed they would deliver.
But…that was a bad idea. Beatrice didn’t like outsiders showing up at the front entrance. Maybe he could bribe Connor or Moe to pick something up?
He shot off texts to each, crossing his fingers that one would do him a solid.
“Beatrice has Moe and Parker working on this,” Vivi volunteered, “but if there’s anything I can do specifically for you? Take you somewhere, investigate for you? I’m game.”
“You need to stay in your comfy office and let those of us who are qualified handle it.”
She blew a raspberry. He sensed her desire to argue, but she didn’t, surprising him once again. “What time is your dinner?”
He checked the clock. “An hour.”
“It’s Saturday night, Rory. No one is going to be able to put together a meal for pickup or delivery that fast.”
Shit. He hadn’t thought of that. Running a hand through his hair, he swore under his breath. “Maybe she’ll be too tired to eat.”
Vivi stood, shut down her monitor and waved for him to follow. “Come on.”
