Don't Believe a Word by Patricia MacDonald Page A

different. Eden parked her car on the busy, rundown block, and walked to the storefront with the striped awning which read Alfredo’s. She went in and was greeted by a pot-bellied man in a black T-shirt, wearing an apron stained with red gravy. The restaurant was filled with Formica topped tables. There were napkin dispensers and shaker jars of Parmesan on every table.
    ‘I’m meeting … um, Flynn Darby. He might have made a reservation,’ she said.
    But before the word was out of her mouth, the proprietor shook his head. ‘Sit anywhere,’ he said.
    Eden went to a table against the wall near the back. Along the wall was a painted mural of someone’s imagined version of the Amalfi coast, with stone buildings overlooking the sea from a verdant Italian hillside. That was about it for décor. The menus were laminated and almost as big as the tabletop. Eden picked one up and felt grease on her fingers.
    The bell jingled on the front door and Eden looked up to see Flynn Darby entering the restaurant, carrying a bottle in a brown paper bag. For a moment she was able to study him before he noticed her. She hoped to banish that image of a drunken lout at his wife and son’s funeral. But little had changed. He was undeniably good-looking, although his hair was, again, unkempt and his engineer boots were scuffed and unfastened. He was wearing a T-shirt that was frayed at the neck, under a battered leather jacket. He seemed lonely and forlorn, and he exuded a labile sexual energy. Eden immediately recalled that moment in his book when he first met her mother. He had described their encounter, from both their points of view. For his part, he had seen only Tara’s aging, but still intense beauty. But he said that her first instinct toward him seemed to be almost motherly. She saw a bad boy in him, who needed protecting. Looking at him now, Eden could imagine it. Her mother had always been attracted to outsiders, to rebels. Sometimes Tara seemed to chafe at her comfortable life with Hugh, as if it did not reflect her authentic self. And everything about this man seemed to fairly scream danger. Whatever the magnetism had been which drew them together, their meeting was an instant of soulful recognition which could not be denied. For either one of them.
    Flynn murmured to the proprietor, and then glanced to the back of the room and caught sight of Eden, seated beside the wall. He handed the paper bag to the proprietor, and came to join her.
    ‘You found it, I see,’ he said.
    Eden looked around and nodded. ‘You could have picked something a little more … luxurious. You do know the company’s paying for this,’ she said.
    Flynn looked at her through heavy-lidded eyes, bemused. ‘You don’t like this place?’ he asked, pulling out the chair across from her.
    ‘No, it’s fine,’ she said.
    ‘I like the food here,’ said Flynn, sitting down heavily. ‘Nothing pretentious.’
    Eden nodded. ‘Whatever you think.’
    ‘What do you want?’ he asked.
    ‘Excuse me?’ Eden asked, startled. ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘To eat. What do you want to eat?’
    Eden felt flustered. ‘I don’t know. What do you recommend?’
    ‘Everything’s good,’ said Flynn. He gestured to the proprietor, who arrived immediately at their table, holding the uncorked bottle of wine. Flynn looked over at Eden.
    Eden ordered pasta and a salad.
    ‘You’re being overly cautious. You’ve got that New York superiority thing going on. But you may be surprised.’
    Eden gazed back at him coolly. ‘I’m not that hungry,’ she said.
    Flynn tipped his chair back and looked at her through narrowed eyes. ‘I feel like I know you. From your mother,’ he said.
    Eden did not want to hear it. She decided to turn the tables. ‘Do you like living here in Cleveland?’ she said. ‘Are you going to stay?’
    ‘No,’ he said bluntly. ‘We only came here because of Dr Tanaka’s work on Katz-Ellison syndrome. At that point, your mother was willing to