Breach of Duty by J. A. Jance

increased patrols worked their magic. Most of the drug dealers and bums moved on. Businesses that once catered to a lowlife clientele gradually died out themselves, and a whole new set of entrepreneurs came flooding into the void. Within five blocks of Belltown Terrace there are now half a dozen trendy restaurants where Seattle's movers and shakers can go to see and be seen. A beneficial side effect of all the gentrification has been that a number of highly qualified chefs have moved into the Regrade as well. That makes it possible to get a decent meal at any number of places. Not cheap—like in the old Doghouse days—but good.
    Drawn by the irresistible magnetism of freshly made bread, I made my way up to Cafe Macrina on 1st and had a bowl of soup and a chunk of crusty, herb-laden bread. They close at six, but lately I've managed to become enough of a fixture around the place so that the staff lets me grab a light supper of soup and bread followed by a leisurely cup of coffee while they work at closing up for the evening.
    After dinner, I sat drinking my coffee, enjoying watching people go by outside on the sidewalk, and thinking. One of the things I like about eating in restaurants is the same thing I used to appreciate about bars—they're impersonal. Not entirely. People may know you by name. They may even know something about you, but they don't know you really. They can't push your buttons or tell the world where all the bodies are buried. Unlike friends and families, the people you find in places like that can't nail your hide with all the things you want to keep hidden. That makes them handy for hiding out from feelings, which is something I've been particularly good at all my life.
    On the surface, I was thinking about Mary Greengo's friend. What made some young woman want to become a stockbroker of all things? To do that, I supposed she had to be fairly tough and smart. Tough, smart, and aggressive. Even so, however, how had Cassandra Wolcott managed to retire from stock-brokering at the tender age of thirty-eight? Several possibilities presented themselves. For one Cassie might be a very slick operator. Maybe her exit from the stock-trading business had come about just the way Ralph had said—because she had made so damned much money at it that she could afford to walk away. That was the upside. The downside could have had something to do with corporate mergers or downsizing, or it could have been something altogether different. Maybe hers was an involuntary retirement that had come about as a result of some kind of financial skulduggery. The fact that the woman came with Ralph Ames' personal stamp of approval should have counted for something, but still…
    "More coffee?" the waiter asked.
    "Sure," I said, nodding and pushing my cup in his direction for the promised refill.
    Unfortunately, watching the coffee pour into my cup reminded me of a lunchtime conversation I'd shared with Ralph Ames in this very restaurant not three weeks earlier. We were just starting on our second cups of coffee when he had asked the tough question.
    "When are you going to get over her, Beau?" He might very well have been talking about Karen—my first wife—who had died of cancer a few months earlier, but I knew he wasn't. Ralph's "her" could only refer to Anne Corley, my second wife. Even though I hadn't added sugar or cream to my coffee, I picked up my spoon and stirred. It was a delaying tactic—a stall. Ralph wasn't deterred in the least.
    "Well?" he insisted.
    "Maybe never," I said, only half joking. "Isn't that how fatal attractions are supposed to work?"
    But Ralph didn't crack a smile. "You can't spend your whole life living with a legend, Beau. Remember, I knew Anne, too. She was fascinating and exasperating; troubled and troubling; smart and willful; sweet and deadly. She was all those things all at the same time."
    "So? What's the point?"
    "You've created this spun-glass cocoon around that tiny fragment of time you had