I placed the bowl of cat food in front of the coffee table, and Mr. Katz cautiously inched out from underneath.

I gently stroked my cat's ruffled fur. "Maybe we should stay somewhere else for a while." But what good would staying somewhere else be? I would still have to go outside. And how long would I have to stay away from my home before it was safe? A week? A month? How would I know?

I used my index fingers to apply gentle pressure to my temples. There had to be a smart thing to do. I just had to figure out what it was.

The phone interrupted my thoughts. I put my hand on the receiver and let it ring again. I was actually leery about answering my own phone. I shook my head. I couldn't let them do this to me. I wouldn't. I picked it up on the fourth ring. "Hello?"

"I've got to get out of the house."

"Leah, this really isn't a good time." I collapsed onto the love seat. Ever since my sister had given birth to my nephew a year and a half ago, our contact had been reduced to frequent quasi-therapy sessions in which I listened patiently and pretended to empathize with her trials and tribulations as a stay-at-home mom. Normally I could rise to the occasion, but at the moment I was a bit too caught up in the trials and tribulations of being a potential homicide victim.

"I'm not kidding, Sophie. Jack is absolutely driving me nuts. I cannot spend another day following him around the house as he systematically tears the place apart. You're taking us out to lunch at Chevy's."

"I am? I hadn't realized. Am I paying?"

"Of course you're paying. It's your way of being supportive of me while I'm on the edge of a breakdown."

"How considerate of me. Where's your husband?"

"Bob had a golf game today."

"Is that his way of being supportive?"

I could practically hear Leah grimace.

"Are you going to meet me at Chevy's or not?"

I considered the alternatives. Go to lunch with my sister and her toddler son, or hang around my place and wait for someone to hack me up with an ax. It was a tough choice but the scale did seem to be tipping slightly in Leah's favor. "You'll have to pick me up-my car's out of commission."

"So now I have to drive across the city just to have lunch at Chevy's?"

I loved my sister. Really I did. "You don't have to drive anywhere, Leah, you could stay home. But if you want to have lunch with me, particularly if you want me to treat you, then yes, you'll have to come get me."

"Fine. We'll go to the Chevy's at the Embarcadero, then. I'll be there in forty-five minutes. Be ready, I don't want to have to wait long with Jack in the car."

"Well, I wouldn't want to inconvenience you. I'll see you in an hour."

"Forty-five minutes."

"Whatever." I hung up and went back to trying to massage my headache away.

An hour and a half later Leah buzzed the apartment. I gave Mr. Katz a goodbye pet. "I'm going out for a little while. If anyone tries to break in while I'm gone, I want you to meow really loud, okay?" Mr. Katz kneaded the rug in response.

I met my sister down at her car and slipped into the front passenger seat. "Have trouble getting out of the house?"

"You have no idea." Leah pushed her Volvo into Drive and headed toward the Embarcadero.

I twisted myself into a position so that I could see the back seat. "Hi, Jack! How are you today?"

"NO!"

"Jack's going through a 'no' phase," Leah said.

"A 'no' phase-got it." I didn't get it at all, but then again I didn't have to. All I had to do was remember to use contraceptives.

Leah pressed a button to crack open the moonroof. "Half the reason I'm late is that nitwit Cheryl."

I made a face at the mention of Leah's sister-in-law's name. She was a nitwit. Kind of like her brother.

"She called while I was trying to get Jack together and I simply could not get her off the phone. Can you believe she's still groaning about that whole Tolsky thing?"

"The Tolsky thing?" I pulled the sun visor down and checked my lipstick in the mirror. "Why, was she going to write a screenplay for him too?"

"No, she just thought she was going to get to meet him." Jack began to babble to himself as Leah carefully maneuvered around a cable car. "He made a reservation at the Ritz the morning before he killed himself. Cheryl had the pleasure of taking the reservation and canceling it."

I snapped the sun visor back up. "Wait a minute, you're telling me that Tolsky made a reservation at a San Francisco hotel less than twenty-four hours before he killed himself?"

"Apparently so. Can you imagine how impossible Cheryl would have been if she had met him? It's bad enough listening to her go on and on about the time she met Meg Ryan. I mean, she's a hotel clerk, not a Hollywood insider."

"Leah, doesn't that seem strange to you? Why would anyone make a hotel reservation shortly before committing suicide?"

"Who knows what he was thinking? The man was obviously sick. Did you see his movie Deathly Seduction? Ugh. Anyone who could produce and direct something so-"

Jack let out a scream at a pitch that would have damaged the hearing of a dog. Leah whipped her head back in his direction to chastise him.

"Leah, look out," I gasped.

She brought her attention back to the street just in time to miss a bicyclist, but in doing so almost slammed the car into a bus. The tires squealed against the pavement as she struggled to gain control. She hit the brakes and the car jerked to a stop as the traffic light turned red. I sat immobile, clinging to the door.

Leah cleared her throat. "Jack's going through a screaming phase too."

I'm never having kids.

For the rest of the ride Leah focused on driving and I focused on deep-breathing exercises. When we arrived at our destination Leah locked Jack into a high chair and collapsed into her own seat. "God, I'm tired. Jack had a bad night last night."

Well, he was having one hell of an afternoon. I flipped open the menu. "Have some coffee."

"That will just make me agitated."

"Then have a margarita."

"Sophie, you can't think that I would drink alcohol while watching Jack."

"Okay, I'll have a margarita."

"Hello, ladies, would you like to order something to drink while you decide?" asked a young man with bright red hair and a smile that was only somewhat strained.

"I'll have the mango margarita," I said.

"My son will have a glass of milk and I'll have a glass of your sangria."

"Got it." The waiter scribbled our order down and left us to study the rest of the menu.

"I thought you couldn't drink while watching Jack."

"Wine doesn't count." Jack began to fuss, and Leah handed him a napkin. "Here, honey, why don't you tear this up?" Jack started happily ripping the paper to shreds.

"So what happened to your car?"

"Oh somebody fu-" I cast a quick glance at Jack. "Somebody messed with it."

"What do you mean they 'messed with it'?"

"They slashed up the seats, rug and spare tire. Probably the work of some strung-out kids." I had no intention of telling her about the events of that morning. Leah had a tendency to overreact, and I still hadn't gotten rid of my headache.

Leah frowned and tapped her nails against the table. The waiter came with our drinks and took our order before she voiced her thoughts. "I heard about the woman who was killed in your neighborhood."

"Yeah, pretty ugly, huh?"

"I hope you're being careful, Sophie." She twisted her wedding band around on her finger. "I worry about you living all by yourself."

"I don't live by myself. I live with Mr. Katz."

"You know most women don't start talking to their cats until they're eighty."

"Yes, well, I've always been precocious."

Leah sighed and gave Jack another napkin to destroy. "I don't suppose you're dating anyone."

"Actually, I am."

Leah nearly choked on a floating piece of fruit. "You are? Why in God's name didn't you tell me?"

"I did tell you, just now."

"But I had to ask. That doesn't count."

I took a much-needed sip of my margarita. "Okay, let's pretend you didn't ask. Leah, guess what? I'm dating someone."

"Ha, ha. All right, smarty, who is he? And don't leave out any details."

I gave her a brief rundown on Anatoly, including his physical description, career background and a list of his previous residences. By the time I'd finished, the waiter was back with our food.

Leah sliced up some quesadilla for Jack before he started systematically dropping each piece on the floor. "Well, he's Jewish. That'll make Mom happy."

"I have no intention of ever introducing him to Mom. And I don't want you talking to her about this, either-got it, Leah?"

"You're going to have to tell her about him if it gets serious."

"We've been on one date. It's not serious."

"But it could get serious. Honestly, Sophie, you can't be so cautious. You're not a kid anymore. Statistically speaking you're more likely to get hit by a truck than get married again."

"People get hit by trucks all the time."

"This isn't a joke. Now let's see, did you say you've only been on one date with him?"

"Well, it's more like one and a half. I went to an opening at a gallery with Marcus, and Anatoly was there. The two of us hung out and shared a cab home. Does that count as a date?"

"No."

"Oh." I tasted my drink again. "What counts as a date, then?"

"He has to ask you to go out at a specific time and date and you have to say yes. He has to come pick you up, then you engage in some activity together and you leave together."

"Huh. Okay, Anatoly and I did engage in an activity together and we left together so-"

"It doesn't count." Leah chewed on her enchilada. "You haven't slept with him, have you? You know you have to hold out until at least the third date, otherwise he'll think you're easy."

"I didn't sleep with him."

"Well, thank God you have some sense."

"I didn't have a chance. By the time things started getting really steamy between the two of us I had to get going to a surprise party. But next time I see him I'm definitely going to be wearing the good underwear."

"Sophie. You can't be serious. You know, this is Dena's influence. You spend all your time hanging out with her at her sex shop and now you've turned into a slut."

"Slut! Slut, slut, slut, slut, slut!" Jack was happily banging a spoon against his tray as he proudly yelled out his new word at the top of his voice.

Leah grabbed Jack's shoulders and desperately tried to defuse the situation as the neighboring tables shot us alarmed stares. "No, no, honey. You misheard mommy. I didn't call Auntie Sophie a slut, I called her a...a...a mutt! That's it, honey, Auntie Sophie is a mutt."

I slid down in my seat and considered asking the waiter to put another shot of tequila in my margarita. Obviously, I had made the wrong choice today; I should have waited for the ax murderer. When Jack finally quieted down, I threw out the one comment that I knew would distract Leah from her current line of questioning.

"God, Leah, you must be exhausted."

Leah brightened. "I am exhausted. Honestly, I don't know how I manage. Yesterday I put off doing errands because I was afraid that if I got in the car I might fall asleep at the wheel."

"Wow, that's tough."

"Tell me about it." She tossed her processed hair over her shoulder with a well-practiced dramatic touch. "The other day it took me fifty minutes to get him down for a nap. Fifty minutes, Sophie. I was so drained from the ordeal that I couldn't even use the hour that he was asleep productively. I actually sat on the couch and watched MTV News of all things. And while watching it I realized how completely out of it I am. I used to be hip, remember?"

Leah was never hip. "Of course I remember."

"Now I don't know half the singers they were talking about. I mean, who on earth is JJ Money or DC Smooth?"

I perked up. "Oh, were they talking about the charges against DC Smooth? You know it was an article about that case that first brought Anatoly and me together. It was the front page story in the New York Times the day that he tried to steal the paper from me. God, I find that whole messy situation so interesting. It has book potential written all over it. I don't think he did it, do you?"

"He tried to steal your newspaper?"