“I can’t do it. This is so frustrating.” She throws her hands in the air. “I’ve been practicing for weeks!”
Her reaction is out of proportion, but since making lattes seems to be important to her, I decide to make an effort to calm her down. “It’s just some latte. Nobody cares that much.” I certainly don’t.
“It’s not the latte. It’s the art!”
I look down. Each cup has some kind of picture created with milk on top of the coffee. They seem fairly good. “Are you trying to put them on your social media account?” Last time I checked, she doesn’t have anything like that, but she could’ve made one. I’m not opposed to the idea; it’ll upset Roy Wilks. And the more upset he becomes, the more reckless he will be…which means it will be easier to dispose of him.
“No. I don’t do social media. I’m trying to…” She blows out a frustrated breath, then gestures at the cups. “What do you think?”
I study them with a focus worthy of Monet or Picasso.
“They’re excellent,” I say after a moment. “This…hamster is quite good. Superb facial features.”
Angelika buries her face in her hands and collapses bonelessly onto the countertop. She looks like one of Dali’s melting clocks.
I look at the hamster face again. Is it supposed to be a squirrel? The cheeks are fat… “Apologies. I meant squirrel.”
Her shoulders are shaking now. A low, pained sound tears from her throat.
She needs to quit making that sound. It’s…grating. “Chipmunk. I often get the animals mixed up.”
She finally lifts her fac
e, which is red. “No! It’s supposed to be a Doberman! Like them!” She gestures at my dogs.
“A Doberman?” I look at the smiling foam creature, then look at Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky and Stravinsky, then back at the latte.
“I thought it’d be cool to make one for you. You said you’d like it.”
I did? I don’t remember. I must’ve said it off-handedly at some point. But admitting that would upset her, since she went through all this trouble.
“Ah, a pup,” I say, since the animal’s nothing like one of my dogs. It looks too young and cute. Like some friendly Disney woodland creature. “Stravinsky was like this when he was small,” I say, looking at the wide, innocent eyes the little fawn has created in the foam. It’s a lie. Stravinsky was far too feisty, with a tendency to bite, when he was a puppy. Mussorgsky schooled that out of him.
She sighs. “Never mind. I know it doesn’t look anything like your dogs.” She turns the cup around and studies her creation. “You’re right. It does look sort of…rodentlike.”
Her distress is uncomfortable. I should shrug off the discomfiture and help myself to another vodka, but somehow my feet refuse to move.
After a moment of struggle, I say, “At least it’s cute.”
“You think?”
“If you hadn’t said anything, I would’ve never known it was a failed Doberman.”
Her shoulders sag as she cups her face in her hands and stares at the lattes. So much moroseness in her eyes. Perhaps I should have kept my mouth shut.
I puff my cigar, since that’s better than shoving my foot in deeper.
“Do you think it’s even possible to do a Doberman?” she asks after a second.
Do I look like a connoisseur of latte art? “Most certainly,” I say, patting her back gently. “Just practice some more.”
An abrupt thought stills my hand. I’m behaving like she’s more than convenient bait. The fact that I don’t want her hurt physically, I can accept. After all, she’s a nice young woman. Lovely and entirely too trusting. But not wanting her hurt emotionally? That’s a completely different level, and not something I signed up for when I took her in.
But what disturbs me more is that I don’t find this new wrinkle horrifying. The only thing I’m feeling is a tight squeeze in my chest, where my heart is beating.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Tolyan