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didn’t like Tony asking if I was married.  Either way, Cal scowled, obviously not impressed with my conversation with his buddy.
      “No, I’m not married anymore,” I said as I smiled at Cal.
      “Good to know.  When you dump Cal here—women always end up dumping him so that’s a given.  Maybe it’s a cop thing, or maybe he’s got bad breath.  I don’t know which, but you can tell me which when you two are over.  Anyway, when you’ve dumped him, come see me.  I’m single, employed and have my own teeth.”
      You know, when you hit almost forty, those were three qualities a woman wants in a man. 
      “I use Listerine every day and I’m not a cop,” Big G added.  “So whichever Cal’s problem is, it’s not mine.”
      Cal continued his very coppish scowling.
      It made me feel a bit better than I had all day.
      “Maybe I’ll just do that,” I said and I shot Big G my best smile. 
      I was flirting.  At least, I was pretty sure I was flirting.  It had been a long time, so I couldn’t be sure. 
      Cal growled that PMSy sort of growl again and I knew I must of been flirting to make him growl.
      Suddenly my dead-body-in-the-bedroom sort of day seemed a little brighter.
      “Help yourself to the office and I’ll bring you some food,” Tony said.
      Cal took my elbow again and pulled me further back into the kitchen.
      “Come on,” he said.
      “PMS,” I said softly.
      He must have heard me because he growled again.
      For some reason, that made my smile get big enough to make my face feel stretched—stretched in a good way.  If you’d asked me earlier, I’d have said not much could make me smile, given the day I’d had.  But here I was, grinning from ear to ear.
      Maybe Big G was good for me.
      Or maybe Cal was. 
      Cal wasn’t smiling.  He was tugging me along.
      “Fine,” I said.  “Let’s get this over with.”
      I let him lead me to Tony’s office.  And despite my brief bout of pleasure a minute before, I felt nervous.
      I’d never been grilled by the cops before, but I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like it.
      Not like it at all.
      He sat at the small round table in the corner of the office, and nodded at the other seat, then he dug in his jacket pocket and pulled out a small notebook. 
      “Start at the beginning and walk me through everything.”
      “Wait, aren’t you going to shine a light in my face?  Something nice and bright so I can’t see you?”
      “I know this is LA, but I’m not some Hollywood actor.  I’ve interviewed hundreds of suspects, and I’ve never shined a light on any of them.  I can’t see why I should start with you.”
      Suspect.  He’d called me a suspect.
      I felt sick.
      “You were going to take me through your day, step-by-step?” he prompted.
      “It seemed like a normal day.  Well, normal except the boys left yesterday with their father and stepmother, which meant I didn’t wake up this morning to the sound of fighting.  Their stepmother, Peri, is only a couple years older than my oldest.  I’m thinking of adopting her when Jerry divorces her.  I always wanted a daughter.”
      He ignored my comments about Peri and asked, “So, your day started well?”
      I took a deep breath and didn’t respond, because I probably should have thought it started well, but I’d missed the boys.  “I went to work and walked into my partner’s bridal bonanza and she told me we had someone—Theresa—call in sick.  It was my turn to cover, so I spent my day in the field cleaning.  Tiny and I, we take turns filling in when someone’s sick,” I added by way of explanation.
      “And when you got to the victim’s house?”
      “Mr. Banning’s was the last house of the day and the worst.  It was a wreck.  There were plates and glasses everywhere.  Underwear on the ceiling fan.  I didn’t realize there was a dead body in the bedroom...” Big G walked into the office