“I actually took a step back as each of their eyes met mine. Evan's was sympathetic; that scared me. Matt's was appraising; that concerned me. Griffins's was irritated; that...was really nothing new.”

“« What about tonight’s show?”Griffin immediately remembered where he was. “Fuck!” His eyes bored into mine. “You know our songs. You play for me.”“I can barely strum a guitar!”Griffin patted me on the back as he walked past me. “You’ll do fine. Good luck!”I watched him walk away, wondering if I’d really just become the replacement bassist for the D-Bags »”

“We can't leave the snow all bloody," I told the underside of his chin,shadowed with stubble. "It will scare the tourists.""The new snow will cover it up." He looked down at me."Shhh."Something in his Shhh tugged at my heart. He kept watchiing me,not examining m ear for medical emergencies but looking into my eyes,for a few more steps. I couldn't read his look.He was kind of blurry,for one thing,and I was kind of dizzy. I thought he looked..concerned. Sympathetic. Determined to rescue me from danger. I wished that was what he felt. But it couldn't have been.I was misreading him.”

“Giulio was against our meeting. He didn't want me getting mixed up in things that, in his opinion, were no concern of mine. For decades the respectable people here did nothing but repeat that the Mafia was no concern of theirs but only involved the people involved in it. But I used to teach my pupils that the see-nothing, know-nothing attitude is the most mortal of sins. So now that its my turn to tell what I saw, I'm supposed to take a step back?”

“Check it out. I got a new name tag today." He unclipped it and held it out toward me.I looked at it. "A. GUY."He grinned. "Someone actually asked me what the A stood for," he said, his hand brushing mine as he took the tag back, sliding it into his pocket. "I said Larry.”

“Julie marched over to Matt. She stood in front of him and crossed her arms. “Lift up your sweatshirt.”Matt rolled his eyes. “God, you really know how to turn a guy on.”Julie didn’t budge. “If I was trying to turn you on, I could do better than that. Now, lift up your sweatshirt.”Matt looked up at her and tried to look serious. “Julie, I’m completely offended that you have so little faith in my honesty. I thought at this point in our friendship that you would at least—”“Get up.” Julie leaned over and shut his laptop. “Get up!” she said again.“You’re being ridiculous,” Matt said laughing, but he stood up. “I trust you implicitly, and it wouldn’t kill you to show me the same respect.”“Show me!”Matt sidestepped the chair and took a few steps backward. “You have quite the attitude today. Suspicious and mean.”Julie took a step forward, causing Matt to continue backing away. “Lift up your shirt.”“Look, I appreciate an aggressive woman, but this is really getting weird.”Julie grabbed his sweatshirt by the waist cuff and lifted it up with one hand, as she pulled down his T-shirt with the other. Matt put his hands over hers, lightly protesting, but she refused to let go. “Aha!” She squinted at his shirt. “OK, I don’t even know what this is, but it’s definitely geeky.”