He made a face, but I could tell he was pleased that I'd noticed. "I hate that quote. It's irritating as all h.e.l.l. Just because I don't write about drag queens getting dismembered with a hatchet doesn't mean I'm soft."

"I said softer."

"So I take it you're adequately impressed?"

"Oh, no, I haven't read anything you've written since Cross Creek," I a.s.sured him.

"Well, thank you for your support," he muttered.

"It's just that the crime books seem so macho, I guess," I said. "I thought about buying Karma Collects. But then I saw the cover and didn't know if I would like it."

"I knew it!" he cried. "I knew the puddle of blood shaped like a peace sign was too much. I told my editor I didn't like it, but, no, he said it fit the market."

"Sorry," I told him. "Loan me a copy and I'll read it, I promise."

He grumbled. "Now you're just humoring me."

"A little bit," I admitted. I grinned at him. He smiled back. Monroe wasn't really such a bad guy when you got to know him. He was actually very funny and helpful and ... Gah! No p.e.n.i.s policy. I had to remember the no p.e.n.i.s policy. I would think of something else. The ocean? Too subliminal. Wombats? Well, that's just weird. Johnny Depp? No, that won't help matters. Urn, Leslie Nielsen... He's not exactly my type. He was in, uh, Tammy and the Bachelor, Prom Night. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! Naked Monroe. d.a.m.n it!

Monroe was waving his hand in front of my face, trying to snap me out of my trance. "Not used to being up this late, huh?"

"Here, lately, I've had to get used to it. Why are you up at three am.?" I countered.

"Because I have a rare genius that works best when I'm the only person on the planet who's awake. Your being awake is obviously what's throwing me off. So what's your excuse?"

"Oh, that's easy - I'm insane," I said. "Every time I close my eyes, I'm afraid I'll fall asleep."

"That tends to happen when you close your eyes ... in bed ... at night."

"Yeah, but if I fall asleep, I'll dream," I told him. "And if I dream, I'll dream that I'm stuck in an unfulfilling, endless hamster wheel of a life with financial stability and security, but no love life to speak of, bad s.e.x, and an inability to trust men not to screw me over."

Monroe absorbed that with the stunned expression of a fish that had been dynamited out of the water. "Wow."

I laughed, running my hand over my face. "I've ruined your life. You had time to yourself, quiet. I wrecked your whole Fortress of Solitude thing."

"Oh, now you did it, there's nothing as s.e.xy as a woman who knows her Superman." He grinned. "I liked the solitude, don't get me wrong. It was easier to work when it was just me. I didn't have to worry about being sociable or answering questions. I didn't get distracted by bottomless ladies parading around on the front porch. But it's kind of nice to know there's someone more screwed up than me right outside my door."

"Well, you're not wrong about that," I said primly. 'But I didn't parade. I never parade."

"And you're not crazy," he said. "Your whole life's been turned upside down. And you've isolated yourself by coming up here. And you're just processing all this information. I went through the same thing after I got shot."

"In the a.s.s?" I just liked throwing that out there as much as possible.

He glared at me. "After I got shot, in the a.s.s," he conceded. "The administration couldn't clear me for street duty anymore. I was still walking around, but I couldn't sit in the car for long periods, couldn't pa.s.s the physical fitness exam. I was looking at early retirement or a permanent desk job. So I picked retirement, holed up in my apartment, and stared at the walls for days at a time. I didn't eat. I didn't sleep. I almost ordered something off a Tony Robbins infomercial, for G.o.d's sake. That was the low point. Eventually I got out my special doughnut pillow, turned on my computer and started writing."

"So you think I should order something from Tony Robbins?" There seemed to be a pregnant pause in there somewhere, "You think I should write a book?"

"You have a strong voice," he said. I arched my brow. "I read your e-mail on The Smoking Gun."

"Of course you did."

"You just need to find the right idea and run with it," he said.

"Just so you know, writing your first novel can also drive you crazy."

"So you're saying..

"If I see you typing, 'All work and no play makes Lacey a dull girl' over and over again, I'm running like h.e.l.l."

I snickered and sipped my beer. Writing a book was an idea I'd toyed with off and on for years, but I'd figured everybody thought they had the next Harry Potter bouncing around in their heads. I never got past the first few pages of any story. There was always some committee meeting, a fund-raiser, something else that needed to be done. Okay, those were excuses. I just didn't want to finish them and become another failed, frustrated novelist. But at this point I was already a failed, frustrated housewife, so what the heck?

I nodded. "That seems fair. So tell me something about yourself. Something not glib."

"I'm not glib."

"If glib were a country, you would be its king," I informed him.

He seemed to search through his ma.s.sive memory bank of secrets. "Okay, I was engaged once."

When I made my own stunned face, he asked, "You don't think a woman would want to marry me?"

"No, once you stop cursing and scowling at a gal, I'm sure she's putty in your hands. So what happened, did she hook up with Uniball behind your back?"

His voice was flat, serious as he said, "No, she's dead."

I gasped. "Oh, my G.o.d, I'm so sorry."

He let me stew in my own embarra.s.sment before bursting out laughing. "I'm just kidding, Lacey."

"a.s.shole!" I yelled, slapping his arm.

"I'm sorry, you're just so gullible," he said, dodging the pummeling that rained down from my fists of fury.

"Yeah, it's a character flaw."

"Sarah was, is, a really nice girl. She was an emergency room nurse. We used to take a lot of crazies, drunk and disorderlies, to her hospital. I finally worked up the nerve to ask her out and that was it. There was n.o.body else for me. We were together for five years. We were about six months from the wedding when I got shot... and she just shut down. She thought she could cope with it. She was used to seeing people in crazy situations, seeing people hurt. But seeing me in her hospital, laid up with a bullet wound to the a.s.s, was more than she could handle. The idea of waiting up each night, wondering if I was coming home, freaked her out."

"She hadn't thought of this in the course of five years?"

"Some people need to be smacked in the face with reality before the possibility even occurs to them," he said, shrugging. "Had you thought Mike was capable of boffing the receptionist?"

"Point taken." I shook my head. "But let's not bring my ex into this. If we're going to refer to him, let's give him a code name like Satan or He Who Should Not Be Named. So, she gave you back the ring?"

He nodded. "And we parted as friends."

"Oh, come on," I whined. "She broke your heart, say something that lets me hate her a little bit."

"She was half Canadian," he offered. "She was a smoker. She had never seen a single episode of Sat.u.r.day Night Live."

"You suck at this," I told him.

"Well, pardon me for being able to let go of my hatred and bitterness."

"I don't hate my ex," I protested. "I just want him alone, broke, bald, impotent, toothless, fat, and wailing and twitching in a twisted tiny ball of spastic misery."

He shuddered. "Wow, that was visual."

"You seem fine now," I conceded. "Somewhat socially maladjusted, but fine."

He smiled cheekily. "I spent so many nights thinking how she did me wrong. But I grew strong. I'll learn how to get along."

"Fine. Make fun of me. In case you're wondering, this is why people don't like you."

"I'm not making fun," he insisted, though he couldn't cover his impulse to snicker. "But do you see how that d.a.m.n song gets into your head?"

16 * Creative Differences.

Nothing cements friendship like beer and eggs.

I ended up staying at Monroe's until the morning. The storm wasn't letting up. Monroe couldn't sleep either. We sat on his screened-in back porch and listened to it rain while we ate scrambled eggs and some of Mama's banana bread. We talked about our hometowns and our families, how Monroe got published, and why exactly I was willing to risk my neck for a rowboat that predated the Carter administration.

I learned that other than naming him Francis, Monroe came from a nice, normal family. He had two brothers, both of whom were doctors. He had loving parents, also doctors, who proudly purchased a police scanner when Monroe was hired by the Louisville department. And now his father walked around the hospital with a copy of Monroe's latest book under his arm, just waiting for someone to ask him about it.

I found out that Monroe's first crime novel, a story about a neo-hippie whose dark past catches up with him in the form of poisoned patchouli oil, stemmed from a writing exercise he did based on "the story you like to tell at parties." He was a newly graduated patrolman called to Mall St. Matthews on a disturbance call involving a man named Raintree Feldman who had chosen to "meditate against the war" in the middle of a city fountain.

"Well, that's not a capital offense, is it?"

"He preferred to meditate naked. Well, there was some liberally applied body paint. And some sort of yoga diaper thing."

I grimaced. "I hope they drained and bleached the fountain."

"That'll teach you to interrupt."

While I shuddered, Monroe told me that Mr. Feldman didn't appreciate being cited for trespa.s.sing, public indecency, and disturbing the peace. The whole time Monroe was filling out the citations, Mr. Feldman railed about how Monroe's karma would be ruined from that point on, that anything bad that happened to Monroe would be traced back to his persecution of Mr. Feldman.

"Over and over and over, karma karma karma," Monroe said, b.u.t.tering a toasted slab of banana bread and handing it to me before making one for him. "He actually filed a complaint against me with the local branch of the ACLU."

"That would be a rather sad ending to that story, but I can tell by the twinkle in your eye that there is more," I said solemnly, spearing fluffy scrambled eggs on my fork. I'd never had beer with breakfast before, but I have to say it was a nice complement to the fried potatoes. At this point, a little alcohol was the only thing that was going to help me sleep when I went home.

"Well, let's just say Mr. Feldman kept right on protesting around our fair hamlet. His next meditation exercise took place in the elephant enclosure at the zoo. He didn't think it was right that the recent addition to the elephant family was born into captivity when baby Raja deserved to be running free with all the other little elephants. Turns out mama elephants get downright cranky when strangers get too close to their babies."

"Well, they do carry them for two years..."

"Mr. Feldman found himself on the wrong end of pachyderm maternal rage. The business end, you might say."

I groaned. "The elephant sat on him?"

He nodded. "The vegan animal rights activist was smothered by elephant a.s.s cheeks. If that's not ironically bad karma, I don't know what is."

I was very glad I'd swallowed my banana toast because I would have choked on it when I busted out laughing. Monroe looked very pleased with himself. "And from all that, you got a book about an annoying eco-warrior who buys the farm in the middle of a corrupt natural foods store?"

"I thought the elephant story was a bit too grim. Didn't exactly paint the elephant in the best light. I killed Feldman's character in many horrible ways before I settled on patchouli poisoning," he said. "In my first draft, he choked on bulk-priced mung beans."

"Ouch." I scrunched my nose. The flickering of my porch light caught my attention. I watched as the lights of my cabin surged back to life. "Oh! I have power!"

"And you seem awfully excited about it," Monroe said drily.

"It takes several small appliances to keep me looking this good," I told him as I gathered the empty plates from the table. "I'm not going to lie; there's a belt sander involved."

"You don't have to do that," he said. I looked down at the dirty dishware. My cheeks flushed. I'd cleared the table without even thinking about it.

"You're going to do the dishes?" I asked.

Monroe chuckled, taking the plates from me. "Yeah, you're a guest. Didn't your mother teach you that guests don't do the dishes?"

"Yes, but she also taught me that you don't swim naked, alone, at night, less than thirty minutes after eating. Obviously, I'm a slow learner," I said as I carried dirty cutlery to the kitchen.

I couldn't remember the last time someone washed a dish for me. In fact, when I left town for an aunt's funeral, I came back after four days to find Mike had left me. a full sink. Somehow, the idea of Monroe up to his elbows in suds was even nicer than the whole wet shirt thing.

Dang it. I really did have crush-y feelings for him. That was a problem.

"Well, thanks for breakfast. Without your kindness, I'd probably still be swimming in the lake, trying to drag my boat to sh.o.r.e. Or possibly just eating cold cereal. The banana bread's all yours, by the way."

"Any chance of you making more of that, even if it requires you hitting me in the face with another door?"

"I didn't make the banana bread. My mother would have to hit you in the face in order for you to get more."

"I'm willing to consider it," he said, chewing his plump bottom lip in consideration. "This was good. I think my social skills needed some airing out. My agent says she can tell when I've been alone too long, I start responding to her e-mails within five minutes. Did you maybe want to do it again sometime?"

"Mmm, let's not start making plans, or developing routines, just yet," I said, in an exaggerated aloof tone. "I'd hate to wake up one morning to find that you'd had to move in the middle of the night."

Monroe grimaced. "SO, uh, how long will you be holding that against me?"

"For a while," I admitted as we walked to the door. "Thanks for breakfast."

"Yeah," he said, shaking his head. As I carefully negotiated Monroe's wet steps, he called out, "I meant what I said, Lacey. Start writing. It doesn't matter what you write or whether it's any good on your first try. Just start writing."

And since I was already awake and my laptop had a full charge, I did just that. After throwing my stiff, air-dried clothes into the washer and changing into some PJs, I fired up my computer and stared at the screen expectantly.

Nothing.

The problem was I didn't have any idea what I wanted to write now that I'd finished my divorce book report. I'd had daydreams, but most of them centered on Christian Bale in the Batman suit or revenge fantasies involving putting Mike's precious golf clubs in one of those machines that cubes cars.

Something that Monroe said came back to me. He'd killed Mr. Feldman in many horrible ways before choosing how to kill his character in Karma Collects. I didn't have any ideas for a book, but I did have several ideas for horrible fates I wished on Mike. I could kill him over and over again... in a totally hypothetical, nonbinding, legal manner. Of course, I would destroy said doc.u.ment so it wouldn't be used against me in court should anything happen to Mike. But not before I found the most painful, humiliating way to b.u.mp him off.

"Let's start with death by syphilis..." I said, opening a Word doc.u.ment and typing: Mike stumbled into his tiny, mildew-ridden bathroom, clutching at the elastic of his worn boxers. He gasped at his reflection, carefully prodding the itchy pulsating sores that had sprouted from his lips while he was sleeping...