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He seems to pick a victim once a month, right?”
    “What? . . .”
    Monroe continued, “And he’s just killed somebody. So we can relax for a while.”
    “Is that . . . Are you making a joke, Charlie?”
    His voice rose. “Cathy, I really have to go. I don’t have time for this.”
    A businesswoman in the seat in front of him turned and gave him an angry glance.
    What’s her problem?
    Then he heard a voice. “Excuse me, sir?”
    The businessman sitting next to him—an accountant or lawyer, Monroe guessed—was smiling ruefully at him.
    “Yes?” Monroe asked.
    “I’m sorry,” he said, “but you’re speaking pretty loud. Some of us are trying to read.”
    Monroe glanced at several other commuters. Their irritated faces told him they felt the same.
    He was in no mood for lectures. Everybody used cell phones on the train. When one would ring, a dozen hands went for their own phones.
    “Yeah, well,” Monroe grumbled, “I was here first. You saw me on the phone and you sat down. Now, if you don’t mind . . .”
    The man blinked in surprise. “Well, I didn’t mean anything. I was just wondering if you could speak a little more softly.”
    Monroe exhaled a frustrated sigh and turned back to his conversation. “Cath, just don’t worry about it, okay? Now, listen, I need my monogrammed shirt for tomorrow.”
    The man gave him a piqued glance, sighed and gathered up his newspaper and briefcase. He moved to the seat behind Monroe. Good riddance.
    “Tomorrow?” Cathy asked.
    Monroe didn’t actually need the shirt but he was irritated at Cathy for calling and he was irritated at the man next to him for being so rude. So he said, more loudly than he needed to, “I just said I have to have it for tomorrow.”
    “It’s just kind of busy today. If you’d said something last night . . .”
    Silence.
    “Okay,” she continued, “I’ll do it. But, Charlie, promise you’ll be careful tonight coming home.”
    “Yeah. Okay. Gotta go.”
    “’Bye—”
    He hit disconnect.
    Great way to start the day, he thought. And punched in another number.
    “Carmen Foret, please,” he told the young woman who answered.
    More commuters were getting on the train. Monroetossed his briefcase on the seat next to him to discourage anybody else’s sitting there.
    A moment later the woman’s voice answered.
    “Hello?”
    “Hey, baby, it’s me.”
    A moment of silence.
    “You were going to call me last night,” the woman said coolly.
    He’d known Carmen for eight months. She was, he’d heard, a talented real estate broker and was also, he supposed, a wonderful, generous woman in many ways. But what he knew about her—all he really cared to know—was that she had a soft, buoyant body and long, cinnamon-colored hair that spread out on pillows like warm satin.
    “I’m sorry, sweetheart, the meeting went a lot later than I thought.”
    “Your secretary didn’t think it went all that late.”
    Hell. She’d called his office. She hardly ever did. Why last night?
    “We went out for drinks after we revised the deal letter. Then we ended up at the Four Seasons. You know.”
    “I know,” she said sourly.
    He asked, “What’re you doing at lunch today?”
    “I’m doing a tuna salad sandwich, Charlie. What’re you doing?”
    “Meet me at your place.”
    “No, Charlie. Not today. I’m mad at you.”
    “Mad at me? ’Cause I missed one phone call?”
    “No, ’cause you’ve missed about three hundred phone calls since we’ve been dating.”
    Dating? Where did she get that ? She was his mistress.They slept together. They didn’t date, they didn’t go out, they didn’t court and spark.
    “You know how much money I can make on this deal. I couldn’t mess up, honey.”
    Hell. Mistake.
    Carmen knew he called Cathy “honey.” She didn’t like it when he used the endearment with her.
    “Well,” she said frostily, “I’m busy at lunch. I may be busy for a lot of lunches. Maybe all the lunches for the