Chapter 10: Morning, Brother

Hutch came down the last three steps and stood beside me.

He had pulled on jeans and nothing else.

He didn't try to stand in front of me, and I loved him a little for that.

"How'd you get in?" he said.

"I knocked," Graydon said. "Your bartender opened up. I told her I was family."

The bartender didn't uncross her arms.

"He said he'd call the bank if I didn't," she said. "I'm sorry, Hutch."

"Not your fault."

Graydon set his mug down and looked me over again, slow, from my wet jeans to his brother's T-shirt.

"Well," he said. "That answers that."

The lane mechanic came out of the back with a toolbox and stopped dead.

The cleaner with the floor buffer turned it off.

"You were very convincing at the house," Graydon said. "On his couch, you said. I almost believed you."

"It was true then."

"And now?"

"Now it isn't."

He laughed, soft, his board-dinner laugh.

"You know what's funny, Neve? I came here to make you an offer. I was going to be reasonable. Now I don't even need the painting."

"Then go home."

"A wife who sleeps with her husband's brother before the ink is dry. Under her own nude, I assume?"

He looked up at the ceiling.

"That's a little on the nose, even for you."

The mechanic set his toolbox down very quietly.

"The club is going to love this," Graydon said. "Mother is going to love this. The judge is going to love this."

"I filed before I slept with him," I said. "You were on top of your girlfriend in your own library while I was serving your guests dessert."

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