He patted her hand. “I love it all, even that retro stuff you like to blast. Sherlock, the spaghetti and meatballs sure smell good. Thank you.”
“Nope, not me. Savich is the spaghetti impresario in this household.”
Davis grinned at Savich. “If the sauce and meatballs taste as good as they smell, Savich, you’ve got to give me your recipe. Here, Delsey, load up.” He passed her the meatballs and sauce and spooned Parmesan on top of his spaghetti. “I haven’t heard you play yet, Savich. Quinlan told me you sing country and western and play the guitar? And you write a lot of your own stuff?”
“He sure does,” Sherlock said as she forked up a bite of spinach salad. “We promise we’ll invite you next time he plays.”
Delsey took a bite of her spaghetti, closed her eyes, and murmured, “I’m having a spiritual moment here. Dillon, this is seriously excellent.”
Davis said, “That’s it, then, I gotta have the recipe, keep the cute girl here in my corner.”
The garlic toast was passed around, room made on everyone’s plate for a bite or two of spinach salad, the Chianti poured. Sherlock felt herself begin to relax. She hadn’t realized how tense she was. She took a deep breath, felt her shoulders ease. She watched Delsey and Davis argue and laugh, and they sounded pretty relaxed, too. Relaxed and relieved.
Davis raised his wineglass. “Here’s to the incredible drug bust in Maestro today. And no agents were seriously wounded.”
After everyone drank, Delsey said, “I’m still amazed it was really Professor Salazar. I don’t understand it. He’s a world-famous classical guitarist; he’s feted everywhere he goes. And he’s a drug lord? I still can’t get my brain around it. The gods blessed him with everything.”
Savich said, “I’ve learned that for some people family trumps everything. He’s a Lozano, don’t forget, weaned on the Lozano family business by his mother.”
Delsey said, “I’m going to punch Griffin out the next time I see him. I can’t believe he was crawling through that cave hours after he was shot in his leg. I was letting him have it when Anna grabbed the phone away and said the wound wasn’t bad at all, and not to feel sorry for him.” She grinned over her forkful of spaghetti. “Then they both laughed.”
One minute Delsey was chewing on the incredible garlic toast, and the next she was standing over the DEA agent dead in her bathtub, then hurled into the stark terror when the gang member was straddling her, holding the knife to her throat in her bed at the B&B. She’d be dead if not for Griffin. She hadn’t fallen apart, she’d controlled her fear, she’d handled things, she’d been ready to fight back, and now it was over.
She was alive, Griffin was alive, Anna was alive. She didn’t have to fight her fear anymore. She trembled suddenly, felt the shakes start deep in her belly, as cold as the snow falling steadily outside the dining room windows. She hated the thin-as-paper voice that came out of her mouth. “It’s all my fault, if I hadn’t drunk like an idiot Friday night, then—”
“Then what?” Sherlock said. “The DEA agent’s body wouldn’t have been in your bathtub?”
“Well, that’s true, but if I hadn’t gone home early from that dreadful party, I wouldn’t have never seen a body and I—you—all of us would never have been involved.”
Davis chewed a meatball and swallowed. He leaned into her until she looked at him. “Hang it up, Delsey. None of it is your fault. You’re blaming yourself for going home to your own place?”
He eyed her, saw that everything he had said was like blah, blah, blah in her ears. He put his arm around her and gave her a good shake. “Look at me.”
She looked.
“Your brother made it through this, and so did you. They broke up a huge drug-smuggling operation today, seized millions of dollars’ worth of drugs and weapons destined to be sold to kids on the streets. They captured or put an end to the people responsible. That’s as good as it gets for us. You helped with that. You should be proud of your brother, and of yourself.”
So stark, yet it worked. Delsey managed to nod and felt the ice in her belly begin to melt.
“That’s better. Now eat some more of Savich’s incredible spaghetti. The meatballs, Savich, they’re better than my mom’s, I swear.”
Delsey opted for a green bean on her plate and held it in front of her, frowning.
Sherlock said, “Go ahead, Delsey, you can eat the green bean and think at the same time.”