CHAPTER ELEVEN

Ambrose took a deep breath as he watched Lennon twist the knob and open the door of her family home. “Mom?” she called. “Your door is unlocked again.” Her expression was perturbed as they both entered the foyer, and she began taking off her jacket. Ambrose followed her lead, hanging his coat beside hers on the coatrack just inside the door. It’d stopped raining as they drove here, and the heat in Lennon’s car had ensured they were dry enough that they weren’t dripping all over the floor. “Mom?” she called again, shutting the door and engaging the lock.

As with many homes in San Francisco, they had climbed a high set of steps to make it from the street to the front door, and there was another set in front of them that led from the small foyer up into the house. He followed Lennon upstairs, and as they reached the upper landing, an older woman in an apron came bustling down the hall. “Hello, sweetheart. Oh, hello. Ambrose. A strong name, and now I see it’s for a strong man. Welcome to our home. Happy Thanksgiving!”

“Hello, Mrs. Gray. Thank you for having me.”

“Oh, we’re thrilled to have you! And please call me Natalie.”

“Happy Thanksgiving. Mom, your door was unlocked,” Lennon said. She still looked at least a little distressed, and Ambrose sensed whatever was going on with her insistence on locking the door might not be about a door at all.

“Oh, was it? Oh dear. Sorry, honey. I told your father to be more careful about that, but you know how he is. His mind is always on a hundred different things. Follow me. I have drinks waiting in here.”

“Mom, you’ve gotta remind him. This neighborhood is safe, but you never know.”

“You’re right, sweetheart, of course. Believe me, I can’t even watch the news anymore or I’ll be so worried about you.” They entered a large open kitchen with a deck off the back that overlooked a tiny fenced-in yard featuring rows of raised planting boxes. Lights glowed throughout the space, and even in the brief glance Ambrose gave it, he saw the myriad of pinwheels and tall in-ground bird feeders and other garden decor placed in the corners of the boxes.

The kitchen itself wasn’t fancy, but it was warm and inviting, with tall oak cabinetry and a stove that looked like it was original to the Victorian house. “But,” Mrs. Gray said, “it’s wonderful what you both do for a living. I feel better and worse about it, because so many out there need you, and there you are.” She brought her hands together. “Saint Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan. He donated all of his land and gave his money to the poor. And because of it, he was widely beloved and had more political power than the emperor,” she stated.

“You looked up my name?” Ambrose asked, feeling charmed by the gesture—and the fact that she must have done it in the last twenty minutes, since Lennon called from the car and told her she was bringing a coworker to dinner at the last minute.

“Please have a seat,” she said. “I did look up your name.”

“Mom, really, you’re something,” Lennon said. Her cheeks had taken on a slight tinge of pink, but her eyes were warm, and she seemed more relaxed than he’d seen her thus far. Though that might not be surprising considering he’d mostly seen her standing at murder scenes and in rooms of hardened cops. Softness, playfulness even ... those traits seemed to come far easier to her than the stoic detachment she’d attempted—somewhat unconvincingly—amid crime and death. He had this feeling she considered it a weakness. But to Ambrose, it made her even more attractive than he’d found her to be before she’d even said a word.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Lennon’s mother said. “Names are very important. They’re our first story.”

“Ah. See, Ambrose. You have something in common. Ambrose likes stories too.” Lennon smiled at him, and his stomach dipped, then rose. He felt slightly shy as he smiled back at her. Her head tipped minutely as her gaze hung on him, and then she looked away.

“A widely beloved bishop who served his people well,” he repeated. Even he had never thought to look up his own name. Come to think of it, he had no idea where it’d come from. “Those are big shoes to fill.”

“Indeed they are.” Mrs. Gray smiled. “Your mother must have had big dreams for you.”

Doubtful. But he hardly wanted to discuss the mother who’d been absent most of his life. “Where does Lennon come from?” he asked.

Mrs. Gray turned, bringing her hands together and pulling in a breath, as though she was about to share her favorite story of all. “I named her after John Lennon, one of the great peacemakers of our time. So see, together you’re the peacemaker and the emperor.”

“Sorry,” Lennon mouthed to him, rolling her eyes. But Ambrose couldn’t help smiling. He was enthralled by this family, and he’d only met two members so far.

“Anyway, I’ve made a batch of sangria, and it’s quite lovely, if I do say so myself. I used the singular orange from my orange tree, so does that make it extra special?” She laughed. “I think so. I’ll call this batch ‘Lonely Orange.’ It has a ring to it.”

“‘ Only Orange’ would be better,” Lennon said.

“Oh, you’re right. I do love a good alliteration. Can I make you a glass of Only Orange, Ambrose?”

“Uh, thank you, Mrs. Gray, but I don’t drink.”

“Oh! Well that’s lovely too. Water? I would have made some fresh-squeezed orange juice but, well, the one orange and all.”

Ambrose smiled. “I’ll take a water. Thank you.”

“Where’s Dad?” Lennon asked as she gestured to a chair on the other side of the large well-worn wood table. Ambrose sat down, and Lennon took a seat across from him.

Mrs. Gray set a glass of water in front of him, a thin slice of lemon on the rim. His eyes held on that lemon wedge, and his heart gave a knock for some unknown reason. No, he did know the reason. Not counting food servers, no one in his life had ever put a lemon wedge on his glass of water. And it ... touched him. Silly, maybe, but there it was. “Your dad’s fixing something on the telescope in the garage,” Lennon’s mom said. “He’ll be up in a few minutes.”

The sound of the front door opening and closing could be heard from downstairs, and then the clomping of feet as a male voice called out, “Hello? Anyone home?”

“In here,” Lennon called. She stood as a young man who looked a little like Lennon but had darker coloring entered the room. Ambrose assumed it was her brother.

“Hey, squirt.”

Lennon’s cheeks flushed, and she pushed at him when he rubbed his knuckle on her hair. “Are you kidding me?” she hissed. “Peter, this is my work colleague, Ambrose Mars, from the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” she said, enunciating the words. She looked at Ambrose and gave him a tight smile and then muttered under her breath, “I knew this was a bad idea.”

Peter, who had just handed his mother a bottle of wine and was now taking a beer from the fridge, stood straight and raised the bottle to Ambrose. “No shit? Man, do you want a—”

“Ambrose doesn’t drink,” Mrs. Gray said, turning from the sink with a colander of vegetables in her hand that she placed on the opposite counter. “Another lemon, dear? I do have plenty of those. And they flush toxins.”

“Why would you assume Ambrose needs to flush toxins?” Peter asked. “He doesn’t even drink.”

“In this world? Everyone needs to flush toxins,” Mrs. Gray said.

“Speak for yourself.” Peter plopped into the chair at the head of the table. “So, the FBI’s really getting a bad rap these days, huh?” Peter took a swig of his beer. “Rightly so, in my opinion. Nothing personal. The rot is at the top.”

“Peter!” Mrs. Gray said. “Stop causing controversy at the dinner table.”

“You love controversy at the dinner table,” he said. “And it’s not a dinner table at the moment. But in any case, you’ve always said mild-mannered conversations never get at the heart of a topic.”

She grinned. “It is true. But Ambrose might need to be broken in slowly.”

“It’s okay,” Ambrose said. “I don’t take it personally. The public should be able to trust institutions. Eventually most of them end up in service to themselves. It’s just the nature of the beast.”

“Damn, I actually might like this guy,” Peter said. “And agreed. So what should be done about that?”

“Outside checks and balances.”

“What if the checks and balances are captured by the institutions they’re supposed to be keeping accountable?”

Ambrose took a sip of his water. “Then you have to burn the whole system down and start again.”

Peter laughed. “Now I definitely know I like this guy.”

Ambrose smiled. “What do you do, Peter?”

“I assess the security posture of companies. Which basically means I monitor network vulnerabilities and gaps in security controls.”

“Which basically means he’s a supernerd,” Lennon offered, giving her brother a grin that held far more pride than the mocking Ambrose thought she’d shot for and missed by a country mile.

“Everyone makes fun of us supernerds until they need us,” Peter said. “And trust me, if you’re doing anything worthwhile, that day always comes.”

They heard feet ascending a set of steps somewhere, and then a man walked through a door at the back of the kitchen that Ambrose had thought might be to a pantry but must be to the steps to the garage. A pug-dog scampered in with him, beelining for Ambrose.

“We’re going to have to take turns with the telescope,” Lennon’s dad was saying. “I can’t get the other one to work. Oh! Lennon, you’re here. Peter. And this must be Ambrose, the FBI agent. Happy Thanksgiving. Thanks for joining us.”

“Happy Thanksgiving, sir. Thank you for having me.”

The dog started barking, trotting under the table, where he latched on to the side of Ambrose’s leg and began humping it with gusto.

“Hi, Dad—”

“Freddie, Jesus,” Peter said, tilting his head as he watched Ambrose trying to unlatch the dog. “Mom, your horny dog is humping the guest’s leg again.”

“Oh dear. Freddie! No!”

Everyone started scrambling around the table, Lennon’s chair grating over the floor as she practically jumped to her feet. Mrs. Gray bent and wrapped her hands around Freddie’s midsection and began pulling, Mr. Gray leaning under her and unwrapping the dog’s front legs. Freddie was barking and humping, and everyone was yelling at it, and Ambrose was trying hard to hold back the hilarity that threatened. Because it felt like just moments ago, he’d been standing in the rain trying unsuccessfully to get an Uber, and now he was in the middle of this unfamiliar kitchen, the entire family shouting and trying to pull their dog off his leg. It was ... surreal.

Mr. Gray finally managed to remove the dog, and he turned with it and headed toward the doors to the deck. “It’s just his instinct,” Mrs. Gray said. “You must smell good.” She leaned forward. “Oh, you do smell good.”

“Mom! Oh my God,” Lennon said, sinking back down into her chair and putting her face in her hands. “I’m so sorry.”

“What?” Mrs. Gray asked as she returned to the stove. “That’s a compliment. You don’t want to smell good?” Mr. Gray came back in after delivering Freddie down into the backyard to do his thing on whatever inanimate object he might find. “Honey,” Mrs. Gray said. “Come help me take the Tofurky out of the oven.”

Lennon looked up at him. “You didn’t think it could get worse, did you?”

But Ambrose only grinned.

The Tofurky turned out to be even worse than he’d thought it would be, but the sides were some of the best food he’d ever had. He watched the family interact with each other, and he could feel the affection in the room. These people not only loved each other; they genuinely enjoyed one another as well. He allowed himself to bask in it, even if it wasn’t his. It was how the world should be. It was what everyone should have. And though he had no real right to be here, he was glad he was, because it was a reminder of why he did the work he did. This was the point.

After he and Lennon helped clear the table and Mrs. Gray booted them out of the kitchen, Lennon led him out to the deck, where the sky was already dark. “I hope you don’t mind staying another half an hour,” she said. “My dad will be heartbroken if we don’t watch his comet.”

“I don’t mind.”

The rain had stopped, but this deck space had a fabric covering over it and so only the edge still held some evidence of the rain. He heard the other three Grays still inside having a robust debate about something and glanced at Lennon. “Bitcoin,” she explained with a roll of her eyes. He chuckled, and they both sat down on deck chairs situated near the back of the house.

“There’s a piano in the living room,” he said. “Who plays?”

“Oh. Me. I mean, I used to, but it’s been years. I’ve probably forgotten how to by now. They should get rid of it. It’s just collecting dust.”

Ambrose wasn’t the least bit surprised by the fact that she’d once played piano proficiently enough that her family had bought one. He also knew she hadn’t forgotten, but it confirmed for him that she didn’t realize she still played when she was deep in thought. So why had she convinced herself she no longer knew notes that were obviously muscle memory? He kept trying to form a picture of Lennon and then learned something else that threw off his assumptions.

She was a puzzle. But a good one, one he could tell by the outline he was going to like. But the vital parts remained mysterious. He kept wanting to go back and add pieces.

They’d put their jackets on to come out here, but the night was cold, and he crossed his arms against the chill. Lennon leaned over and opened the lid to a deck box and removed a couple of blankets and tossed one his way. She brought her legs up under her and wrapped the blanket around her, and he placed his over his lap. The wind chimes from the garden below tinkled in the slight breeze, and something pleasant met his nose from a nearby pot. “It’s peaceful out here,” he said. “And something smells good.”

“Rosemary,” she said, nodding to the potted plants. “And sage. My mom will burn some over you to drive out negative energy, if you want her to.”

He chuckled. “Negative energy? What is that exactly?”

She appeared to think about the question. “I don’t know. I was never given a definition.”

“Well, it doesn’t sound good, so I’m glad your mom has a remedy.”

She let out a breathy laugh. “Me too.” The wind chimes rang softly again. “But yes, this is a peaceful spot. I used to come out here in the mornings before high school and drink my coffee.” Something passed over her face that he couldn’t read in the dim light of the deck. Another one of those puzzle pieces that didn’t yet fit anywhere. “Of course, the world in general was more peaceful then. Ignorance is bliss and all that.”

He smiled. “It’s important for people who do jobs like ours to seek out moments of peace.” It was a sort of remedy, too, against getting sucked into the whirl of wickedness they confronted on a regular basis.

Her eyes held on him a moment before she let out an agreeable hum. “Those are hard to find.” She regarded him for a moment longer. “What was the last truly peaceful moment you can think of?” she asked.

She seemed to be hanging on his answer, and so he took a moment to really think about that. Then he blew a small gust of air, his breath appearing in front of him in a ring of white vapor. “About a year ago, on a cold morning in South America,” he said, “I watched a songbird’s breath whirl and rise in front of him as he sang. It was the most beautiful thing I ever saw.” He’d not only heard the melody being sung by that bird; he’d seen it, too, dancing through the air and then dissipating along with the notes. In his house, religion had been drummed into him from birth, used to shame and punish, but he’d never once felt the grace of God until that moment in an Argentine dawn. And when he doubted the underlying goodness of the universe—which was more often than he wished it were—he brought that ephemeral yet deeply poignant moment to mind.

Lennon had leaned her head back on the chair and was watching him, her expression soft. “South America,” she murmured. “Why were you there?”

He looked away. Damn. He kept telling these stories that set him up to lie to her, and he regretted it. He had to lie often in his line of work, and he usually did it with ease, because he knew well the end justified the means. But with Lennon ... well, he didn’t like furthering falsehoods. Especially sitting on her family’s deck after being welcomed for dinner in their home. It made him feel low. “Just traveling,” he said.

“Where else have you been?”

“All over. I like to travel when I have time. What about you?”

“Me?” She played with the edge of her blanket. “I’ve never been out of the country.” He detected an almost imperceptible cringe. “But someday ... I’d like to see the pyramids.” She smiled, and their eyes met, and he allowed his gaze to linger on her expression, dreamy and soft, so different from the pinched way she sometimes held her face at work. She’d opened her mouth to say something, when the sliding glass door opened, bringing Ambrose from his reverie.

They both looked up as her dad came through the doors, a telescope under one arm and a bowl of popcorn in his hand. “We should be able to see the comet any minute,” he said. “You two check if you can see anything while I get the drinks.” He set the bowl of popcorn down and handed the telescope to Lennon.

Lennon smiled over at Ambrose and then got up and extended her hand. He grasped it, and she pulled him up. “Let’s see if this comet has anything at all on that songbird,” she said.

She set the telescope on the wide deck railing and then leaned forward, squinting through the lens. “I don’t see a comet, but the stars look pretty fantastic through this,” she murmured. “Check it out.”

Ambrose did, squinting like she’d done and gazing through the eyepiece. The sky opened up in front of him, the stars glittery and plentiful, and for a brief moment, he felt like he was floating among them. “Wow,” he said, turning his head slightly to look at her. She was so close, and again, their eyes held. It was slightly awkward, but he also didn’t want it to end.

“You do smell good,” she said, giving him a teasing smile.

He laughed, and they both stood straight. Ambrose tipped his head and looked up at the stars he’d just been up close and personal with, thinking how much wonder there was in the world. How much beauty and how much cruelty.

When he looked over at Lennon, she was gazing up at the night sky too. “I can’t see the stars very well from my apartment,” she said. “But I have a pretty decent view of the city. Sometimes I sit out there and think about how beautiful it looks from far away, all sparkly and still. And then I remember what’s actually happening in those little pockets of darkness.”

Little pockets of darkness. She looked at him, and he nodded. She was right, and he’d been thinking about that darkness too. But he’d also been thinking about the pockets of hope, and tonight was one. It had been such a simple, beautiful night surrounded by the chatter and laughter of a close-knit family. He’d had so few of those, and though it wasn’t his to keep, he knew he’d hold the memory close forever, the same way he did that cold January morning in a country where he’d gone to hunt down a predator.

Later, after he’d said goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Gray and Peter, Lennon drove him to the hotel where he’d told her he was staying and pulled up in front. “Thanks for tonight,” he said.

She smiled. “My family, they’re a special case.”

“They are. In a good way. I ... had a really good time. Surprisingly.”

She tilted her head. “You didn’t expect to have a good time?”

“Not that good a time.”

She laughed softly. “Okay. Well then, my utter humiliation was worth it.”

He glanced out the window, up at the building next to them, and then back at her. “You’re lucky.” He wondered if she knew just how fortunate she was and thought she probably did. They were characters, but the love in that room was so bright, it’d practically blinded him.

“They’re good for some comic relief anyway. Kind of a little break from murder and mayhem.”

“A break is good. It keeps you sane.”

“It does.”

He paused, and there was a short moment of awkwardness before he said goodbye one last time and got out of her car. He watched as she waved and drove away, waiting until her car disappeared out of sight. And then Ambrose turned away from the hotel that he’d lied to Lennon about staying at and began walking in the opposite direction.