Mama immediately gasped in horror, ushered them to a table, and said, “You must sit. You must sit. I’ll bring food.” And she raced away, as if afraid that Kate would faint on the spot.
“You know I really don’t need this coddling, right?” Kate murmured to Simon.
“Well, you’re the one who didn’t eat today,” he noted. “So you’ll have to take the punishment as it comes.”
She groaned. “That sounds like blackmail.”
“Maybe,” he admitted. “On the other hand she comes from heart.”
“I know, and I appreciate that. I know you do too.”
He smiled. “I do. And it worries me when you get so involved in a case.”
“What? Do I get bitchy and miserable?”
“Well, the misery I understand—and even the bitchiness to a certain extent. When you don’t eat, it’s hard to maintain a decent mood,” he explained. “But you give so much of yourself, that it’s worrisome.”
“Not really,” she argued. “Sometimes it feels like I don’t give enough.”
“And I’m sure you don’t—in some totally human ways—but you’re doing the best you can.”
“And it’s not enough,” she cried out sadly.
He nodded. “To you, of course not,” he agreed, “and that’s half the problem. You just give everything you’ve got, and, when it isn’t enough, you don’t know what else to do.”
“There’s nothing worse than that sense of defeat.”
“And,” he replied, “you’re doing everything you can. So you need to cut yourself some slack.”
She lifted her head, looked at him, and retorted, “You first.”
He stared at her in surprise.
“Isn’t that why you’re out here?” she asked. “Isn’t it because you feel for this missing woman who’s out there, and you’re frustrated that we still can’t find her? Isn’t that why you’re out here because you won’t cut yourself some slack?”
A slow smile crossed his face. He nodded. “Touché.”
She shrugged. “It’s not even a competition between us. We both want the same thing,” she noted quietly. “And it’s hard to do anything else but push toward that end, even knowing that it may not be the one that we want to see.”
“No, but it will give us answers, and it will stop the search,” he replied. “I don’t want to see this woman on a slab, and yet I’m not sure what else I’m expected to do.”
“You can’t do anything other than be who you are,” she noted. “Isn’t that what you just told me?”
He laughed. “I did. You’re very good at turning the tables on me.”
“No.” She shook her head. “It was good advice, so I’m just reminding you to take it yourself.”
At that, Mama returned with two large platters, not even asking them about menus.
Kate stared down at the plate in front of her and gasped. “Enough food is here to feed four people.” When Mama was long gone, Kate whispered to Simon, “How am I supposed to eat all this?”
“I think she deliberately overloads us, so we have leftovers to take home to eat again later. I think, in her mind, the worst thing that could ever happen to anybody is to starve.”
Kate nodded. “It’ll never happen around here.”
He chuckled. “No, it won’t, and that’s a good thing.”
She reached for a fork, filled it with what looked like homemade ravioli, and took a bite. Almost instantly her stomach screamed for more. “Oh my God,” she whispered, “this is fantastic.”