"Oh, I doubt it," she said, tracing the pad of her thumb lightly over his hairline. "The firm I work for has taken quite good care of me in my time there, I owe them at least a few years out here, I imagine." She smiled slightly. "Besides, there are certainly worse places. The climate here is quite lovely."
She paused, considering his answer to her question earlier, having watched him as he'd responded. It made sense that city life wasn't his first choice, or perhaps even his second; his living space indicated that he preferred his own company to crowds. There was something else in her that insisted that she was right, though. Something deeper, something she couldn't quite put her finger on. The same thing, perhaps, that compelled her to stay when really she should go. This was a great deal of familiarity in a very short span of time, and that should be making her more uncomfortable than it was.
Even still, she remained, for now, working on unraveling the mystery of Elias Sandoa and what he was doing in Southern California. He was clearly a man of means; perhaps those means were what kept him nearby. She did wonder.
"And so what keeps you in this place that you don't seem to like very much yourself, Elias? And please, for the love of God, call me Cat. I feel like we're on a job interview, but I'm not sure who's the potential employer," she laughed.