Something Different/Pepper's Way by Kay Hooper

introduced Gypsy to his fiancée, Sarah Foxx. Chase she obviously knew, since she stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek lightly.
    “You write mysteries?” Sarah asked in surprise, studying Gypsy. “You—”
    “—don’t look like it,” the other three chorused.
    “I seem to be redundant,” Sarah observed wryly.
    “That’s all right,” Gypsy told her. “I’m getting used to it.”
    “I’ll bet.” Sarah gave her a friendly grin. “That’s the price you and I pay for looking as if we can’t string two words together.”
    Gypsy looked interested. “What do you do?”
    “I’m a psychologist.”
    Gypsy felt an immediate affinity for the other woman. “Isn’t it terrible? That nature played this awful trick and made us look dumb, I mean?”
    “Yes, but it has its advantages. People are always bending over backward to do things for us because we look so helpless.”
    “There is that,” Gypsy agreed thoughtfully.
    Chase sighed in manful long-suffering. “Don’t you two start talking about the failings of mankind, or Jake and I won’t get to dance.”
    Sarah looked solemnly at him and said, totally deadpan, “You and Jake can dance if you like. It might look a little odd, but if
you
don’t mind…”
    “Cute, that’s cute.” Chase took a giggling Gypsy firmly by the arm. “Dance with me, Gypsy mine, before Sarah puts us both on her couch.”
    The musicians had struck up a waltz, and he swept her regally out onto the floor. One
ouch!
and two muffled
dammit
’s followed them.
    “Chase, you’re going to have to take off that sword.”
    “Zorro without his sword? Don’t be ridiculous.”
    “They’ll throw us out.”
    “They can’t afford to refund our money.”
    “You’re making enemies.”
    “We’re supposed to be dancing in romantic silence here.”
    “How can we dance in romantic silence with curses following us all around the floor? See? You just stuck Louis again.”
    “He’ll learn to keep out of my way.”
    “Chase—”
    “All right, shrew! I’ll take it off and let the cloakroom attendant keep an eye on it. But you’re coming with me. I don’t want anyone stealing you away from me.”
    “Who’d want to do that?”
    “Louis. Revenge.”
    “Thanks a lot.”
    “You’re welcome.”

six
    LOUIS OBVIOUSLY WASN’T IN THE MARKET for revenge that night. As a matter of fact, he kept a respectful distance from Gypsy and Chase—sword or no sword. A couple of braver souls attempted to cut in on Chase, but retreated in some confusion when Zorro sneered at them.
    Between dances Gypsy and Chase stood talking to Jake and Sarah. The two couples were apparently on the same wavelength; there was none of the normal awkwardness or guard-edness of new acquaintances. By evening’s end Gypsy knew that she had two new friends.
    She was also a bit unnerved to realize that her response to Chase during the evening had been very much like Sarah’s to Jake; teasing, playful, bantering. It shouldn’t have surprised her, since the same type of thing had gone on since the day she’d met him. But it did surprise her.
    It surprised her because she had never looked at their relationship objectively—from the outside, so to speak. But in comparing them to the other couple, the similarities were startling. It was as though she and Chase were lovers of long standing. Companionable, playful, teasing, they reacted toeach other with the certain knowledge of two people who were very close.
    It gave Gypsy food for thought.
    The party broke up around midnight, with invitations extended and accepted for a barbecue at Chase’s house on Sunday afternoon, and the two couples went their separate ways: Sarah and Jake to the apartment they shared in Portland, and Gypsy and Chase toward the coast.
    It was silent in the car for most of the trip, a companionable silence that neither chose to break. Gypsy was occupied by various thoughts and by the rumbling in her stomach; she had eaten nothing since breakfast, and was