17
The smells of tomato sauce and fresh cheese immediately made Laurie hungry when she walked through the revolving door at Otto. After running out to view that apartment on her midday break, she had never found time to eat lunch.
She was surprised to see Kendra already sitting at the restaurant’s bar, next to a man her own age. Kendra was still in her medical scrubs. Her companion wore a white shirt that appeared one size too small, a striped tie, and khakis. It was only three o’clock and the only other customers seated at the bar were a couple on the opposite end. Laurie wondered if perhaps Kendra’s habits hadn’t changed so much in the past five years after all.
Kendra made eye contact and appeared to sit up a bit straighter on her bar stool as Laurie approached. Once Laurie took the unoccupied seat next to Kendra, her fellow barfly reached across to offer a quick handshake. He had a lean, soft face dominated by piercing hazel eyes, thinning brown hair, and wide dark-rimmed glasses. “Sorry to crash your meeting, but I insisted after Kendra told me where she was going. I’m Steven Carter. I work with Kendra.”
“He means he’s my boss,” Kendra clarified. “And a very protective one at that.”
Laurie remembered the name from her last discussion with Kendra. Carter was the medical school friend who had hired Kendra as a physician’s assistant. Laurie wondered why Kendra would have mentioned this meeting to him. She had been adamant the previous night about not wanting her current employer identified in the production. Laurie offered only her name by way of introduction, with no mention of her show.
The bartender interrupted to ask if she would like some Prosecco. He was bald with a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard.
“Is that what you two are having?” Laurie asked.
Kendra shook her head. “I’m not much of a drinker, and it’s too early anyway. Sorry, that sounded so judgmental. We just ordered coffee and some gelato. They have the very best, on both counts. But Dennis here would be happy to get you whatever you’d like.”
“You bet,” the bartender named Dennis said heartily. His eyes squinted when he smiled. “And Kendra’s not kidding about Steven being protective. I’m under strict orders to shuffle away anyone who tries to bother her. Kendra’s good people. We like her.”
Laurie had a feeling she knew now why Kendra had chosen this place and had brought along her boss. She wanted Laurie to know that there were people who saw her in a different light than her former in-laws.
Laurie ordered a cappuccino and, at Steven’s urging, a mix of blood-orange and mocha gelatos.
“You can probably tell I’m a frequent customer,” Steven said emphatically.
“So, Kendra, maybe you and I can discuss that private matter once we’re done eating,” Laurie suggested.
“Kendra already told me who you are,” Steven said. “We’re very close. If things had worked out differently, we might even have gotten married. At least I’d like to think so.”
Kendra gave Laurie an awkward look. “Steven and I were on and off in medical school.” She hadn’t mentioned that fact when his name came up the previous night. “And then he remained such a good friend to me after everything that happened. So of course I told him that I had agreed to do the show.”
“And I need you to know that Kendra’s not crazy. It was Martin who was trying to make her seem that way. I saw it with my own eyes.”
“You knew Martin well?” Laurie asked.
Steven scoffed. “As if that arrogant, self-involved man would ever deign to fraternize with a riffraff dermatologist who didn’t come with a purebred pedigree.”
“Martin wasn’t always a kind man,” Kendra said, “but he did marry me. I’m not exactly a blue blood.”
“No, but you’re Kendra, which is better by any measure.”
Even after the gelato arrived—as delicious as promised—Laurie noticed that Steven could not take his worshiping eyes away from Kendra.
“I take it you weren’t a real fan of the departed Miracle Doctor,” Laurie said.
“Miracle Doctor, my . . . backside,” he said scornfully. “Kendra of all people is always trying to remind me of the good things about Martin Bell, but it burns me up how he walked on water from the afterlife while Kendra got dragged through the mud. Honestly, if he were still alive, he would have been exposed by now.”
“Exposed for what?”
“For being a cheat. And a fraud. And an all-around jerk of a human being.”
Kendra sighed. “Oh, Steven, please don’t make me regret bringing you here.”
To Laurie’s eye, Kendra seemed authentically distressed, but she knew by now that people were capable of feigning all kinds of emotion. She wondered if this performance by Steven was precisely what Kendra had planned on. Kendra was letting Steven be the one to speak ill of the dead so she didn’t have to.
“Kendra used to call me on the phone, absolutely distraught. People thought she was under the influence? No, she was just completely depressed and stressed out in that marriage. Martin swept her off of her feet like a fairy tale, but once she was locked away in his castle as a wife and mother, he treated her terribly. He was unfaithful. He was belittling. And he wasn’t even a good doctor. He was being sued left and right.”
Kendra flinched, and a look of surprise washed over her face. “Steven, how did you even know that?”
“You told me,” he said.
“I don’t even remember that,” Kendra said mournfully.
“Because you weren’t yourself back then. Anyway,” he said, finishing the last bite of his dessert, “I wanted you to know that this isn’t a case of Kendra making up accusations about Martin after his death. Everything she’s about to tell you? She told me all of it as it was happening. I saw her deteriorate within that marriage. I’ll leave you two alone now. You have a lot to talk about.”
Laurie couldn’t help but notice that when Steven hugged Kendra good-bye, he was in no rush to let go.