 
DEATH BY CHOCOLATE

Copyright ©2011 Sally Berneathy.

http://www.sallyberneathy.com

http://www.sallyberneathy.com

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or to actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental (except for Fred and King Henry).

DEATH BY CHOCOLATE

# Chapter One

I could tell the minute I woke that it was Sunday. For one thing, it was daylight and the alarm wasn't shrieking. But mostly because the songs of the birds and the September breezes coming through my open window had that _Sunday morning_ sound and feel to them.

I rolled over and snuggled up against Rick's warm body.

That's when it hit me.

Rick and I were getting a divorce. There shouldn't be a man in my bed.

I sat bolt upright, heart pounding. Who the hell was sleeping in my bed?

Good-looking, dark golden hair streaked from the sun and Lady Clairol, nice tan, complacent expression even when he was asleep.

Rick.

I suppressed a groan as I came fully awake and remembered his unexpected appearance on my front porch...and everything that followed...the night before. I had clearly lost my mind.

Not that my mind ever had much control where Rick was concerned.

When I'd opened the door to see him standing there yesterday evening, feet planted firmly on my doormat with its image of Taz shrieking in bright red letters, _Go away!_ , I'd been glad to see him. Right then I should have called 911 to request that I be declared mentally incompetent and hauled off in chains for my own protection. I couldn't possibly be glad to see Rick when I knew he'd already moved Muffy or Buffy or whatever her name was into _our_ house and _our_ bed.

Instead I'd just stood there looking at him, and he'd looked back at me with those eyes that were bluer than the Kansas City sky in the middle of summer. Of course, if that sky wore tinted contacts, it could be that blue too.

I did have enough presence of mind to snarl at him. "What do you want?" I attempted to sneer.

He smiled—the smile that made him top salesman at Rheims Commercial Real Estate for the past six years. Somebody at a party once asked Rick what he sold. He gave the person that same smile and said, "Myself."

And he did a damned good job of it.

So I snarled and sneered and he smiled. I knew he wanted to sell me something. Probably himself.

"Hi, babe," he said and waved a manila envelope. "We need to go over some more terms of the settlement agreement, so I thought I'd stop by in person."

Yeah, right. I knew—and he knew that I knew—there were no more terms of the divorce to go over. He'd demanded the lion's share and I'd agreed because all I wanted was for the whole thing to be finished. I was asking for four things: this house (not the big one where he and Muffy/Buffy lived but this small one that used to be one of our rental properties), the rental house next door where my friend Paula lived, my coffee/lunch/dessert shop, Death by Chocolate, and my old but fast, red Toyota Celica.

However, I'd been facing another Saturday night alone with a book or playing Scrabble with Paula, and it was one of those evenings when it's not summer anymore but not yet fall. The air was still warm though it had a nostalgic feel to it, as if remembering all the fun of the summer slowly fading into the past and dreading the cold winter on its way. Or maybe that was just how I was feeling.

Anyway, I let Rick in.

And when I wasn't looking, he ordered a pizza. Double pepperoni. My favorite.

Like I said, he's a damned good salesman.

One dumb thing led to another and then another...and now here he was, sleeping in my bed.

I slid out very carefully, trying not to wake him. I needed some caffeine and sugar pumping through my veins before I could deal with his inevitable leaving again. Every time was like another knife straight to the gut. A dull, rusty, serrated knife. The kind I should take to his throat right now...or maybe some portion of his anatomy a bit lower.

Nah, he'd just bleed all over my new sheets and I'd have to clean it up. In five years of marriage, he never cleaned up a single one of the messes he made.

I pulled on the T-shirt and cutoffs I'd been wearing when he came over last night then fastened my unruly red hair into a pony tail, moving quietly so I wouldn't wake him. As I started out of the room, I noticed his cell phone had fallen from his pants pockets, the pants he'd draped over my wooden rocking chair last night.

I told myself to move on, get out of that room as fast as I could, but the phone was blinking and a faint buzzing was coming from it. During the night I had been surprised and pleased that nobody...like, for instance, that Buffy person...had called him. Guess now I knew why. Creep had it on _vibrate_.

I picked up the phone. The display showed fifteen missed calls from "My Muffy."

He was cheating on her just like he'd cheated on me. Poor "My Muffy." I couldn't restrain an evil smile as I laid down the phone, gathered my dignity about me and tiptoed downstairs, through my house.

I loved the sound of that. _My_ house that held _my_ furniture, most of it vintage garage sale or early American attic, but everything chosen because I wanted it there, not because Rick approved of something and decided we would get it.

Well, everything except for Rick's elegant, expensive leather briefcase looking very out of place in my living room where it leaned incongruously against one end of my big, cushy sofa patterned with lots of brightly colored flowers.

I rushed past, hurrying outside with the excuse to myself of retrieving the paper from the front yard.

As I walked out barefoot, I savored the feel of the weathered wood of my porch, the rough, cracked texture of my sidewalk, the dew-damp, cool green of the grass, weeds and clover in my yard. I did not get the lawn service in the divorce, so I no longer had a golf-green lawn. The last tenants of this house were an older couple who either didn't care if the lawn wasn't perfect or couldn't see well enough to tell.

I could see just fine, but I didn't care. I'm not much into yard work. If it's green, let it grow. Green or white. Clover's pretty and smells good. And yellow dandelions are nice for contrast. Okay, the truth is, if a rock wants to sit in my yard and not even think about growing, that's okay too.

I kicked a puffy dandelion, sending the seeds scattering, and took a deep breath of the morning air. It was clear, clean, and cool with the promise of fall.

My house isn't really in Kansas City but in a small southeast suburb called Pleasant Grove. A few years ago when Rick was looking for some investment property, I checked out this one because I loved the name. Pleasant Grove. And it was pleasant. Too hilly for good farmland, it still had lots of trees and was far enough away from downtown and from the factories north of the city that the air was clean and, well, pleasant.

Renters who wanted to live in the area were pleasant too. Quiet people who paid on time, never wrote hot checks, and didn't have wild parties that ended with them in jail and our house a disaster. We'd subsequently bought the house next door, Paula's place, but this first one, a hundred years old, two-stories, a big front porch and lots of trees, was still my favorite.

I picked up the Sunday edition of the Kansas City Star then stopped as I caught a glimpse of the sun glinting off Rick's dark green Jeep Cherokee parked in my driveway.

For a millisecond I'd managed to put last night completely out of my mind. Well, at least I'd relegated it to the back of my mind.

But there the damned car sat, right in front of me, reminding me of what I had to deal with this morning. Rick in my bed. In the six weeks since we'd separated, I'd been working hard at getting on with my life and forgetting about him and Muffy/Buffy/Puffy. But last night swept away all the healing I'd done in those six weeks. The wound was raw, open and bleeding.

Something soft brushed my leg and I jumped.

A cat. A big cat, marked like a Siamese only gold where Siamese were brown.

He rubbed against my leg again and purred as if he knew I needed some affection right then.

I squatted to pet him. I was sure it was a _him_ by the self-assured stance and the certainty of acceptance that shone in those bright blue eyes. Yeah, I'm a sucker for blue eyes. This pair didn't even have tinted contacts. This pair didn't contain any deceit or hidden depths either.

He purred more loudly and arched into my hand as I stroked along his head and back. "You're a pretty thing, aren't you? Who do you belong to?"

"Lindsay!" For a second, I thought the cat had answered, claiming me as his owner. Like I said, I should have had myself committed the night before. Hearing a cat talk was nothing compared to letting Rick back into my bedroom and my life.

I looked up to see Paula retrieving her paper next door.

Her son Zach, wearing only a diaper, spotted me, grinned, and charged across the yards, shrieking, "Anlinny! Anlinny!"

I tossed the paper onto the porch then reached down and scooped up the kid. "Good morning, Hot Shot!" I brushed his hair back, not because it was long enough to be in his face but just because it was such sweet baby hair, the color and texture of corn silk, and I loved to touch it.

He gave me a noisy smack on the cheek then babbled happily in that almost-language of his, ending with "Kee!" as he twisted in my arms to point down at the cat.

"Yes, that's a kitty. A big one."

Paula strolled over to join us. As always, she looked immaculate and well-dressed in her uniform of nondescript, cover-up clothing that hid all evidence of her past. This morning it was a long sleeved white blouse and tan slacks. She's one of those tiny, petite little things that I, tall and gangly all my life, have always hated. But nobody could hate Paula. She's too nice.

The first time we met was over a year ago when Paula answered our ad for a tenant. She showed up to look at the house in an old, beat-up car that spit puffs of black smoke every few feet and, when she came to a stop, continued to rattle and shake for a full minute. Rick and I were waiting on the porch, and he shuddered right along with that car.

"I can tell you already, we don't want her," he'd said.

I admit, I had my doubts too. I could imagine our house ending up in the same condition as that car.

But then Paula got out carrying a tiny baby. At first I thought maybe she was a very young teenager who'd been sent away from home because of the baby. Okay, I've read too much Dickens. Her shoulders and head drooped a little, as if she was making an effort to keep them erect but wasn't quite succeeding.

Did the big sunglasses she wore hide a black eye?

When she got closer and took off the sunglasses, I saw that she wasn't a teenager and didn't have a black eye. What she did have were worry lines around her eyes and on her forehead, a scar that makeup couldn't quite hide on one cheekbone and a terror in the depths of her eyes and in the tentative set of her mouth that suggested the scar hadn't come from any fall down the stairs. Maybe my Dickensian guess wasn't that far off.

I knew immediately we were going to lease the house to her, that I'd never be able to live with myself if I sent her and that little baby back out into the world in that awful car. I also knew from the disdain on Rick's face that I'd have to fight him on that one. Well, it wouldn't be the first time.

When the four of us walked into the living room of the rental house and she asked if there was a back exit, Rick shot me a lifted-eyebrow glance suggesting he thought she was worried about escaping in case of a police raid or something.

"In the kitchen," I told her. "Good question. Of course you need another exit in case of fire." My last words were spoken to her but directed to Rick. He glared at me and his jaw firmed. But it's a weak jaw. I wasn't worried.

Paula filled out the rental application on the spot. Well, she filled in her name and Zachary's and left the rest blank. She told us she'd just moved from California, she didn't have a job, her husband was dead, her parents were dead, she was an only child and her parents had been only children. She didn't say, but I assumed her husband had been an only child too and that her son would also be an only child. The condition was probably hereditary.

Rick didn't buy it. He was ready to reject her on the spot, but I dragged him outside and persuaded him, after a few minutes of serious digging-in-of-the-heels, to rent to her on the spot instead. He may be a damn good salesman, but I've got the market cornered on obstinacy. He finally threw up his hands and said he expected a huge apology from me after she trashed the place and the cops raided it. I suspect he only agreed to let her rent the place in anticipation of being able to say, "I told you so."

So Paula gave Rick cash for the deposit and first month's rent, and she and Zach moved in with their two suitcases. She said her furniture would arrive later, but I suspected that furniture was as mythical as her deceased, unprolific family.

I'd peeked over her shoulder when she counted out the rent and deposit and noticed that the rest of her pile of cash was pretty thin. Rick started out the door but I turned back and offered her a job in my shop, Death by Chocolate, a small bakery in historic downtown Pleasant Grove. Even if she was an ax murderess, that baby needed to eat.

"Lindsay!" Rick exclaimed.

I elbowed Rick in the stomach to make him shut up.

"Business is booming and I need somebody to help wait tables," I said. "I've been thinking about putting an ad in the paper, but I don't have time to interview people." That was all true, but I'd probably have offered her a job if I was going into bankruptcy.

Over the past year I'd had more than one occasion to say, "I told you so," to Rick. Not only did Paula prove to be an ideal tenant, but, thanks to her expertise, Death by Chocolate expanded from a specialty bakery to a trendy breakfast and lunch place with a specialty bakery.

My single culinary skill is cooking with chocolate. I can take a basic brownie recipe, make it more or less according to directions, and it always turns out incredible. I used to share my recipes, but friends accused me of leaving out ingredients when their desserts didn't turn out like mine. Now I tell everybody my recipes are "secret" because I have no idea what I do to make them different. Magic, maybe. It's my one talent. I produce irresistible chocolate concoctions, swamp water coffee, concrete biscuits, leathery filet mignon...well, you get the picture.

So while Death by Chocolate had gained a certain reputation as a bakery, with Paula's cooking skills, we started to serve gourmet coffee and cinnamon rolls in the morning as well as my chocolate pastries, and at lunch we added sandwiches to my chocolate desserts. I offered to make her a partner, but the idea of having legal documents drawn up with her name on them made her really nervous. I just pay her a salary equal to half the net profits of the place. We both make a decent living.

Working with somebody all day will either make you best friends or worst enemies. Paula and I became best friends and I spilled my guts about everything in my life. Paula didn't reciprocate, refused to talk about her past. She had secrets.

I'd like to say I respected her privacy, but I fear lightning would strike me if I told such an outrageous lie. I was dying to know what those secrets were. However, she consistently ignored my gentle and not-so-gentle probing. Not only did my curiosity go unsatisfied, but it hurt that she didn't trust me with her secrets. However, when I left Rick and moved in next door to her, I became so totally selfish in my own pain that I was more than happy to spend our time together talking about me and my problems.

We had become even closer, and somehow we'd switched roles with her being the mother hen and me being the needy one.

That morning with Rick still sleeping in my bed, I was really glad to see her. I could use a little mothering.

"You know who this cat belongs to?" I asked her, reaching for any topic other than the one uppermost in my mind.

She shook her head. "I've never seen him before. He's beautiful, though." She extended her arms toward her son. "Come on, Zach. We need to go home. Aunt Lindsay has company."

Rick's Jeep in the driveway, an advertisement to the whole neighborhood.

"You don't have to go." I didn't want Paula or Zach or even the cat to leave. I couldn't trust me alone with Rick.

Paula settled Zach on her hip then looked at me with concern. "You okay?"

"Me? Sure. Oh, yeah. No problem. Everything's under control. See you later." I turned to walk back to the house.

"Want to come over? I've got some cold Cokes."

Since I don't like the taste of coffee, Coke is my caffeine of choice—morning, noon or night. Coke and friendship were at the top of my current list of needs. I whirled around so fast I stumbled over the cat. I regained my balance while he pretended nothing had happened. "I'd love to come over," I said. "Maybe Rick will leave before I get back."

As I followed Paula and Zach across our adjoining yards, I noticed she needed a dye job. The morning sunlight picked out the blond roots of her muddy brown hair, roots just a little darker than her son's hair, the same color as her lashes and brows when she wore no makeup. For some strange reason, while most women would kill for naturally blond hair, Paula colored hers a drab, medium brown. A nondescript brown. Add that to her nondescript clothing and reclusive lifestyle, and I deduced that she went out of her way not to be noticed.

Like I said, Paula had secrets.

We went into her house which was the same basic style as mine...two-story, white, front porch, high ceilings, hardwood floors. Hers was smaller and about twenty years newer so it was less gingerbready, but the major differences were inside. She had put shiny new deadbolt locks on the front and back doors and kept the windows closed and locked all the time. Her furniture was new and—guess what—nondescript, as if she felt the need to blend into the background even inside her own home.

Paula latched the screen door behind us, then closed and locked the wooden door and put on the chain. I bit my tongue and didn't comment that it seemed a shame to waste one of the half dozen days out of the year when the weather in the Kansas City area was suitable for humans, neither hot and sultry nor cold and windy.

Paula disappeared into the kitchen while Zach brought me a bright orange truck, jabbered, and made appropriate engine noises. I sat on the floor and we rolled the truck back and forth to each other across the area rug. Zach laughed and chattered, obviously enjoying this activity immensely. I can't say that I got a lot out of rolling that truck, but watching him have a good time definitely made my heart happy.

I revved the truck on the floor. "Vrroom! Vrroom! Here it comes!"

This time Zach grabbed it up and ran across the room, watching me over his shoulder. This was my cue to chase him. I scrambled to my feet. "I'm gonna get you!" I caught him just before he dove behind the beige chair.

Paula came back into the room as I lifted him over my head and blew on his soft tummy.

I sank onto the beige sofa with Zach in my lap and she set her tray on the coffee table. It held, among other things, a plate of fudge cookies left over from yesterday's inventory at the shop and a Coke. I must have looked as stressed as I felt. Usually Paula chided me about having Coke and chocolate for breakfast. Now she was offering it to me.

The tray also held her cup of coffee, a plate of non-chocolate cookies, and a red sippy cup, the last a gift from me. Zach wants to drink whatever his Aunt Lindsay is drinking. Since that usually means a red can, his Aunt Lindsay found him a red cup. He's happy and I'm proud that the kid wants to emulate me.

I picked up the Coke, popped the top and took a long, satisfying swallow, letting those little bubbles dance over my tongue and down my throat, making my mouth feel clean and awake.

Zach took a long swallow of milk from his red sippy cup then reached for the chocolate cookies.

"These are your cookies," Paula said, handing Zach one of the non-chocolate variety. "I made some bran muffins and baked part of the recipe as cookies," she explained to me.

Zach looked at the chocolate cookies then back to his. The boy was not dumb.

"Wow!" I enthused. "Look at all the chocolate chips in yours!" I pointed to the raisins.

He grinned and began to munch on it. I could just see him in a few years, at the movies, bringing his date a package of Raisinets and telling her they were chocolate covered chocolate chips.

Feeling a little guilty, I selected a cookie of the chocolate variety. Not so guilty I wouldn't eat it, of course. I needed sustenance to face the morning—and Rick in my bed.

"He ordered a pepperoni pizza," I said, as if I had to justify that car in my driveway. "Double pepperoni."

Paula only nodded and sipped her coffee. Nonjudgmental.

I drank more Coke and shoved more cookie into my mouth. I was feeling much better already. Paula's house was always immaculately clean and her paranoia about keeping the door locked and the windows closed made it feel isolated from the rest of the world. Sometimes that wasn't a bad feeling. Today was one of those times.

"I appreciate your not saying anything dumb like, _does this mean you're getting back together?_ " I said quietly, staring into the hole in my Coke can as though I expected to find some sort of answers in there. Some people look for answers in a bottle. I look for mine in a can.

"No." Paula's voice was unexpectedly firm and intense. "I'd never say that. He's not going to change. He'd hurt you again if you took him back."

Definitely an abusive husband or lover in her past, somebody she was scared would find her and hurt her again, put a scar on the other side of her face. I wondered how many she had on the rest of her body, how many she was hiding with her long-sleeved shirts, slacks and ankle-length skirts.

I looked at her, trying to see behind that mask she never let down, but I couldn't. Her spine was straight, her chin tilted upward defiantly.

"I know Rick will never change," I replied.

"Do you still love him?"

That was a tough one. I'd asked myself that question a lot of times over the past six weeks. I'd been in total shock at first, trying to figure out what I'd done wrong. We'd had a lot of good times in the early years, then we'd kind of drifted apart as we became busy making money and getting ahead.

Not so busy he hadn't been able to find time for Scruffy Buffy, of course.

I gritted my teeth and forced a smile. Paula's not the only one who can do masks. "I don't love him the way I love chocolate and Coke."

We all three laughed. I'm sure Zach didn't know what he was laughing at, but his mommy and his Aunt Lindsay were laughing, and that made him happy.

A knock on the front door stopped the laughter.

Paula's eyes went wide, and the blood drained from her face. Total terror. She used to do that regularly at work, freak out every time somebody came into our shop. Fortunately for our profit margin, many people come in every day, and she finally got used to it, but visitors at home were apparently still scary. Of course, she didn't normally have visitors at home except for the postman and me.

I was sitting on the sofa and the mail didn't come on Sunday.

She set her cup on the table, her hand shaking so badly the coffee sloshed onto her fingers.

"I'll get it." I bounced up, handed Zach to her and was at the door before she could protest.

Not that I think she was capable of speech at that moment.

# Chapter Two

I opened the door to see two cops on the front porch—a Suit and a Uniform.

The Uniform looked like a nice guy...young, pleasant expression, a little apologetic as if he hated to interrupt somebody's Sunday morning. In contrast, the Suit's face was a study in sharp angles. He did have nice eyes even if they weren't blue. His were hazel, like trees in the early spring when they're ready to explode with leaves and even though they're still winter-brown, you can see a green shimmer.

The Suit flashed his badge. "Police," he said, as if I couldn't recognize the uniforms—both of them.

I lifted my chin and looked down my nose at him. "Chocolatier." I couldn't help myself. Blame it on the Coke and cookies. With all that sugar and caffeine, I was feeling ten feet tall and bullet proof.

The Uniform looked puzzled but one corner of the Suit's mouth quirked upward as if he wanted to smile but knew he shouldn't.

He looked me over from my messy hair to my bare feet, so I did the same to him—not that I could tell much from the blue suit, sedate tie and white shirt. Well, the tie was knotted a little crooked and the white shirt was kind of rumpled. Add all that to the trees-in-spring eyes, the way he'd almost smiled at my joke, and I was prepared to like him...unless he wanted to write me a speeding ticket.

"Are you Paula Walters?" he asked.

"No." I felt reluctant to volunteer any information, and not just because of my paranoia about traffic tickets. I could sense waves of fear emanating from Paula who remained on the sofa behind me. She was always a careful driver, so careful I sometimes wanted to lean out the passenger door and push off with one foot to make her go faster. This wasn't about a speeding ticket.

"Is Paula Walters here?" the Suit asked, exasperation evident in his voice. The angles of his face seemed to become even sharper.

"Yes," I answered.

He waited.

So did I.

"Could we speak to her?" He was practically gritting his teeth. Now I was the one who had to suppress a smile. It's not often I can frustrate a cop though I always make an effort.

Reluctantly, I turned back to my friend. She was standing now, holding Zach tightly, her knuckles white. I'd thought her face was pale before, but now she could have been an understudy for Casper the Friendly Ghost. Her eyes were wide, the pupils pinpoints.

I suddenly felt helpless, as though I were turning her over to the executioner. Damn it, I should have found some way to make her tell me those secrets so we could have fixed whatever was wrong.

Yeah, right, like I'd fixed my own life.

She marched bravely toward the door, handing Zach to me as she passed. Zach pointed at the men and smiled. "Pees man!"

"That's right," I said. "Policeman. Policemen are our friends." At that moment I didn't really believe that any more than I believed it when one of them stopped me on the highway, but I was trying to score some brownie points with them. I had a feeling Paula was going to need a few of those.

Paula moved directly in front of the door and straightened her spine. "I'm Paula Walters." She was standing tall but she sounded tiny and weak.

"Can we talk to you for a minute?" the Suit asked.

Paula darted a quick glance behind her as if looking for an escape route, and I remembered her question that first day about whether the house had another exit.

My heart sank. What was going on? Did her fear go beyond worry about an abusive husband? Had Rick been right? Was my friend a fugitive? Was she an ax murderer after all?

I couldn't imagine quiet, gentle Paula doing anything bad. Of course, _bad_ and _illegal_ are not necessarily synonymous. Take, for instance, an innocent person going a few miles over the arbitrarily-imposed speed limit.

Paula did not look innocent as she stood rigidly inside the screen door, her stare fixed on the cops on her front porch. She looked scared...and guilty.

"What do you want to talk to me about?" Her voice was a barely audible croak.

"Lester Mackey," the Suit replied. "Can we come in?"

Paula became even paler. She stood motionless like a soldier guarding the entrance to the fort.

I waited for her to refuse them entrance _,_ to charge onto the porch and chase them away. I considered doing it for her, telling them they couldn't come inside without a search warrant.

I fervently hoped they didn't have one of those.

The cops didn't say a word, just stood on the porch, watching and waiting. This didn't look good.

Suddenly Paula's shoulders sloped forward in a posture of defeat. She fumbled with the latch, releasing it and opening the door. Her movements robotic and forced, she stepped aside, allowing them to enter.

They moved past her, invading her house.

She stood stiffly, hands behind her back, her expression that of a woman being led to the guillotine—terrified, helpless, and resigned to her fate.

The uniform's gun belt creaked. Paula gasped and jerked backward.

The Suit pretended not to notice, but his eyes narrowed speculatively.

"I'm Detective Adam Trent," he said, "and this is Officer Donald Creighton." Trent was a big man, looming large in the high-ceilinged room. He was the kind who would have loomed large even if he'd been short. The Uniform wasn't quite so tall or quite so intimidating. I could see this pair doing the good cop/bad cop routine. The Suit would definitely be the bad cop.

"Like to ask you a few questions," he said.

Paula gave a jerky nod of permission.

"What do you know about Lester Mackey?"

She swayed slightly. "L-Lester."

"Yes, ma'am. Lester Mackey."

She blinked twice and straightened. "Lester _Mackey_?" Her voice was stronger. _Go, Paula_!

The cops exchanged glances.

"Yes, ma'am," Trent said, a little impatiently. "Lester Mackey. What can you tell us about him?"

She shook her head. "I don't know anybody by that name." She sounded as if she was on the verge of breaking into laughter, as if she'd just gotten a reprieve from that guillotine.

"We're only trying to locate Mr. Mackey," Trent said. "You're not going to cause him any trouble by telling us what you know." His words as well as the sharp edge to his voice indicated he thought Paula was lying and not doing a very good job of it.

I believed her. Her relief was too visible to doubt.

"I don't know anybody named Lester Mackey," she repeated firmly. She stood with her arms wrapped protectively, defensively, across her midriff.

"Take your time and think about it." Trent regarded her suspiciously.

"I don't have to think about it. I don't know anybody by that name." She was becoming indignant.

Good for you, Paula! Stand your ground!

"If you don't know Lester Mackey, why did he have your name and phone number on a piece of paper in his apartment?"

All her relief disappeared, and I could see her mentally mounting the steps to that guillotine again. I knew she had an unlisted number. She'd been reluctant to give it to me. For this Lester Mackey to have it must mean she knew him.

"My home phone number?" Her voice quavered.

"That's right."

"I don't know why he had it or where he got it."

"It's unlisted, so you must have given it to him."

" _I don't know!_ I swear to you, I've never heard of Lester Mackey."

"Where were you last night between the hours of eight and ten?" Trent demanded, taking advantage of her distress.

Nice eyes or not, I'd had enough of the man badgering my friend. I set Zach on the floor and stepped forward, moving up beside her, closer to Trent than she was.

"Does Ms. Walters need to call an attorney?" I demanded.

He folded his arms and rocked slightly backward, one eyebrow lifted. "That depends. Has Ms. Walters done something illegal?"

_How the hell should I know?_ But I didn't say that. "If you don't think she's done anything illegal, why are you grilling her?"

"I'm just checking out a missing persons report."

I scowled at him and he scowled at me. "Missing persons report? So this Lester Mackey is missing?"

"I wouldn't be trying to locate him if he was home in his apartment."

"Since you asked Paula where she was last night between the hours of eight and ten, does that mean he disappeared during that time? Don't you have to wait forty-eight hours or something before you check on missing people unless there's suspicion of foul play?" I watch all those cop shows. I know these things.

Creighton looked to Trent as if waiting for him to field the question.

"Usually," the detective said after a long moment. "Now, is it my turn to ask a question?"

"It's okay, Lindsay," Paula said quietly before I could respond to Trent's sarcasm. "I'll answer the question. I was at home all night. I left work a little after four, picked up Zach at the babysitter's and took him to the park. I've been right here since about six last night."

"Alone?"

"Yes, of course alone, except for my son."

"Why do you want to know?" I was feeling very defensive on Paula's behalf and, I admit it, very curious. "Who is this Lester Mackey person and what's happened to him? Why are you checking out his disappearance so fast?"

Trent scowled at me again. "Who are you?"

"I'm Lindsay Powell. I'm her sister."

"No, you're not. She doesn't have a sister."

Aha! So he'd checked into her background. This was getting deeper all the time.

"Well, I'm her best friend."

Trent and I did some more glaring and sizing each other up. I could tell he was thinking about asking me to leave and I was thinking about refusing.

"On that piece of paper in Lester Mackey's apartment," Creighton said, breaking the silence, "right beneath Ms. Walters' phone number was yesterday's date and a time, eight o'clock. Mr. Mackey left on an appointment and never returned home. His apartment manager was worried and called us."

"Failing to return home from an appointment equals suspicion of foul play?" I asked. Gee, all those nights I could have had the cops out looking for Rick.

Trent gave Creighton a warning glance. There was more to the story, but they weren't going to tell us.

Zach, tired of being ignored, ran across the floor, grabbed his favorite truck and charged over to the happening place. "Here!" Grinning happily, he clutched Creighton's pant leg in one sweaty little hand and held the toy up to him with the other.

"Hey, what you got there?" Gun belt creaking, Creighton squatted down to the kid's level and accepted the truck. "Cool wheels."

"Zach!" Paula stooped and lifted her son, snatching him away as though she thought the cop would harm him. "Don't bother the policeman." Her face was pale again, the panic back in her voice and her eyes. "He's working. Why don't you go to your room and play with your purple dinosaur? Mommy won't be much longer, and then I promise we'll go to the park." She set him down. "Go on now." He raised his arms for a hug. She hugged him then patted his diapered bottom and sent him from the room.

"Bye!" he called.

"Bye!" we all responded, even the cops. Creighton smiled, but Trent winced and his lips clenched as if he'd suddenly realized what he'd done...let his macho façade slip. Kind of cute. He'd probably clench his lips even harder if he knew I thought that. I considered telling him just to see him react.

Then Creighton stood, the movement making his gun belt creak again, and again Paula flinched at the sound.

But she braced herself, drew in a deep, shaky breath and faced the cops squarely. "I don't know Lester Mackey. I was here at home last night. I'm sorry, but I can't help you." She turned and walked toward the door.

Very classy, slick attempt to get rid of them. Maybe I'd try it next time I got caught going a little fast. _Nope, I wasn't speeding. Must have been somebody else. I'm sorry, officer, but I can't help you._ Then drive away.

"Can anybody verify that you were here all evening?" Trent asked, ignoring her efforts to get rid of him. It probably wouldn't work for me with the future traffic cop, either. He turned and looked at me. "How about you, best friend?"

As if I didn't already feel bad enough about spending the evening with Rick, now it meant I couldn't provide an alibi for Paula. If only I had come over to play Scrabble instead of letting him inside my house, both Paula and I would be a lot better off.

I thought about attempting another lie, but Paula had already admitted she'd been home alone.

"No," I said. "I can't verify that. I was...busy last night."

Trent's gaze flickered from Paula to me and back again, studying us in silence for a long moment. Those eyes were intense, almost totally brown, no hint of spring in them now. I'd seen enough cop movies. I knew he was waiting for us to crack. I had to give him credit. He was good at it. I found myself wanting to confess that I'd done eighty down I-70 yesterday evening and then I'd spent the night with my almost-ex-husband, thus letting my friend and myself down. But I didn't really think that was the kind of _cracking_ he was looking for.

Finally he withdrew a couple of cards from his wallet and handed one to Paula. "Call me if you remember anything."

Then he handed the other one to me. "You too." For just a second there my brain slipped a cog and I thought he was coming on to me. Good grief! Not even completely divorced yet, my almost-ex still asleep in my bed, and I was already reading things into men's glances and business cards.

Still, I couldn't stop myself from checking to see whether he was wearing a wedding ring. He wasn't.

I was glad I'd already taken mine off and tossed it into the Missouri River.

Okay, that's a lie. I told Rick I tossed it into the Missouri River, but the truth is, I sold it. I _wanted_ to toss it into the river, but it had a big diamond. Heck, I cringed when Rose made the grand gesture of throwing her necklace into the ocean at the end of _Titanic_. What a waste. She could have sold it, kept the money and lied about throwing it away like I did.

The cops started to leave, but Trent turned back at the door. "You don't sound like you're from around here, Ms. Walters," he said. "Do I detect a hint of Texas in that accent?"

She froze. "No," she said, her voice scarcely more than a whisper. "I'm from...Wyoming."

Interesting. She'd told me California when she leased the house.

Trent didn't believe her, but he nodded. "I see. Just thought I'd ask. Lester Mackey's from Dallas."

"I've never been to Dallas." Paula was doing a very poor job of lying. We both needed deceit lessons. I made a mental note to check at Longview College for night classes.

Trent gave me another quick glance. It couldn't be to see if I was lying. I hadn't said anything. I winked at him just to see what he'd do.

That man had stoicism down to an art. He didn't react at all.

Except I did see some green lights come back into those eyes.

When the cops were finally out the door, Paula turned the deadbolt lock and put on the chain with trembling fingers.

I collapsed onto the sofa, grabbed another cookie and swigged some more Coke. "What was that all about?" I asked.

"I don't know," she mumbled. "Zach!"

He charged into the living room, laughing and clutching a purple dinosaur that was almost as big as he was. She scooped him up and sank onto the sofa, holding him so tightly he protested and squirmed to be free.

She let him go. He sat down between us and helped himself to a chocolate cookie. Paula didn't say anything, and I wasn't about to spoil his fun. Heck, what harm could one do? Oh, I know what they say! You think you can try it and not get hooked, then before you know it, you're a chocoholic. Hey, at least the kid would have a constant source of the good stuff from his Aunt Lindsay, the Chocoholic Queen.

"Are you in some kind of trouble?" I asked Paula. "Tell me, damn it! I'm your friend. Let me help you."

She shook her head, chewed her thumbnail and looked across the room.

"Did your husband beat you?"

The crude question got her attention. Her head spun toward me so fast, I was afraid it would keep on going and we'd find ourselves in the middle of a scene from _The Exorcist_. Two pink spots stood out like clown makeup on her cheeks.

"Please don't do this, Lindsay," she said.

"Well, that answers that question. Since I already know he put that scar on your face and that you're hiding from him, you might as well tell me the rest."

Again she confirmed my speculation by failing to deny it. "You're the best friend I've ever had. I can't begin to tell you how grateful I am that you gave me a job and a place to live. You saved my life and Zach's. You've always been there for me, and I'll always be there for you. I'll do anything you ask me to do except tell you about my past."

"Okay, we've made some progress. This is the first time you've admitted you have a past and didn't spring, fully grown, from the front seat of that rolling wreck you drove up in."

Paula bit her lip as if she regretted saying that much. Her blue-gray eyes clouded, and I realized the subject was closed.

I pushed myself up from the sofa. "I guess I'll go see what I can do to get Rick out of the house with minimal damage to what's left of my emotions." I leaned over to Zach. "Give Aunt Lindsay a hug." He reached up and hugged my neck then planted a kiss on my cheek. A bonus.

"I want you to know I'm not mad at you," I told Paula, "just because you're supposed to be my friend but you won't even tell me the intimate details of your sex life."

She relaxed enough to smile.

I ruffled Zach's hair then crossed the room and unlocked the door. I turned back to say goodbye and wasn't surprised that Paula had followed me. She'd have that door locked again before I was across the porch. "Time to touch up those blond roots," I said, just to let her know I'd noticed. "And those blond brows and lashes are a dead giveaway."

Paula blanched, losing what little color she'd regained. "Do you think they noticed?" The question came out in a desperate whisper, and I immediately regretted adding to her fear.

"I don't know. Men can be pretty unobservant about stuff like that." But I didn't for one minute believe Trent had failed to notice. "Any time you need help, you know where I live," I said.

Paula nodded, that jerky motion again, and twisted her lips in an imitation smile. "Thanks."

I felt like a jerk for the blond roots remark. I ought to do something to help her, but I was clueless what that something might be.

I wasn't even sure I could help myself. I took my time going back toward my house. I wasn't in any hurry to face the task of dealing with the man that one part of me wanted gone from my life and the other part wanted back. In a different way, I was every bit as terrified of him as Paula was of the abusive man I was now certain she'd known in her past.

I slapped the fender of Rick's SUV as I went past, deliberately leaving fingerprints. He hated that.

I stepped up onto my porch and saw another problem. The cat was still there, lying on my door mat, draped over Taz, creating a perfect border for the _Go Away!_ part. Obviously he couldn't read.

But then, neither could Rick who had stood on that same mat last night and paid just as much attention to the message as the cat did.

"Go home," I ordered.

He stood up and stretched, arching his back.

I picked up the newspaper, opened the door, and he darted inside.

Yes, it was pretty obvious this cat was a male. He ignored me just like Rick did.

"What's that cat doing here?" Rick demanded as the feline leapt gracefully onto my faded rose-colored recliner. He was a big cat, completely filling the seat and draping his head and front paws over one arm of the chair. He looked up with those killer blue eyes and gave a contented meow before settling down, completely at home.

Rick sprawled on my sofa, making himself as much at home as the cat. I'd been gone long enough for him to shower, blow dry his hair with my dryer, shave with my razor, and slip back into his khaki slacks, Italian loafers and white Polo shirt that enhanced his tan. To top it all off, he was drinking from my favorite mug, the one that said "Life is uncertain. Eat chocolate now."

"Go home," I repeated.

"Yeah, cat, go home."

"I was talking to _you_. This is—" I looked at the regal creature in my chair— "this is King Henry, my new cat. He's staying and you're going."

# Chapter Three

Rick set _my_ cup down on _my_ coffee table, the one I found years ago at a garage sale and he would never let me use in our house where everything had to match. The table was wrought iron with a top of colorful mosaic tiles, most of which were intact and unchipped. It had character.

"You never liked that table," I snapped, tossing the newspaper down beside his cup. "Get away from it."

He lifted his arms toward me and smiled. Given enough time, I could learn to hate that smile. But not quite yet. Against all common sense, it still had the power to tickle the edges of my heart.

"C'mere, babe."

I took a step backward.

He rose and came after me. I reminded myself that he hadn't come after me the evening I left. In fact, instead of falling to his knees and begging my forgiveness after I'd caught him in our bed with that Fluffy person, he'd pointed out that this house was between tenants, empty and available, and maybe I should move in. He and Buffy the Erection Slayer would keep the one we'd been living in since it was too expensive for me. Real magnanimous of him.

The memory of that nightmare afternoon—the pain and the anger—washed over me. I turned and headed for the door. I'd go back outside. Hide in the bushes. Crawl down the storm sewer. Take up jogging and run to Oklahoma. Whatever it took to get away from him.

He wrapped his arms around me from behind and started nibbling the side of my neck.

Somebody moaned, somebody with no pride and no common sense. Me.

"We never used to have the paper delivered," he whispered. "Let's toss that one in Paula's yard, and I'll go out for another one, just like I used to do every Sunday. I'll bring back a paper and some of those chocolate doughnuts you love. We'll sit in bed and read the paper while we eat doughnuts." He nibbled the other side of my neck. "And you can read the comics out loud while I do some wicked things to your body." He ran his hands over my body and pulled it against his, reminding me of some of those wicked things he'd done as recently as last night.

Fortunately, the chocolate doughnuts also reminded me of some other wicked things he'd done.

I jerked away and faced him. "You chose that doughnut place across town so you'd have time to go see your girl-friend-of-the-week for a quickie before coming home. The doughnuts were to give you the energy to perform again with me."

He ducked his head and looked repentant. Well, as close to repentant as it was possible for him to look. "Lindsay, I'm sorry. I made a mistake, a lot of mistakes. I love you and I've missed you."

_I'm sorry. I made a mistake, a lot of mistakes. I love you and I've missed you._ I knew they were just empty words, a sales spiel. I knew he wasn't going to change. Still, I'd been waiting six weeks to hear him say that...and he did know how to press all the right buttons. I knew I needed to shove him away, check out the storm sewer, run for my life and sanity. But I remained standing there, inches away from my tormentor.

He could see I was vacillating. He moved closer and put his arms around my waist, his forehead against mine. Affectionate and familiar rather than seductive. He was a very good salesman. "Remember when we first got married and we were so broke we had to sleep on the floor? The ironing board doubled as our table. A big night for us was a picnic in the park. I'd take that old guitar I got at a pawn shop and sing to you. For our first anniversary, I climbed a tree and sang _Mariah_." He began to sing softly in a voice that matched his smile.

This trip down Memory Lane was much more seductive than all the caresses of the night before.

Behind us something thudded and made a hideous _rowring_ noise.

We both whirled around. The cat stood on the coffee table, tail in the air, back arched, his blue eyes looking demonic with their black vertical slits. He opened his mouth to make that noise again, and his fangs looked half an inch long. He seemed twice as big as I remembered. I had one instant of panic, wondering if he was rabid or something, but his glare was focused solely on Rick.

"Something's wrong with that cat," Rick said, backing away. "We better call Animal Control."

The cat in question dipped his head and peered into the mug Rick had been drinking from then gave a cat sneeze or maybe a snort of disgust. He was acting strange, but he'd given me the diversion I needed to find some of my common sense and maybe a smidgen of pride. I pulled away from Rick and went over to the cat who now looked as docile as ever though he still had that _I am cat, I am superior_ expression.

I leaned down to pet him in order to give myself a few more seconds to recover from the Invasion of Rick. As I did, I peered idly at the dark liquid in the cup, curious as to what Rick might be drinking that the cat found so disgusting. The only drinks I had in the house were Coke, tea, water and milk.

Water is clear, milk is white, tea is amber, and Coke is brown and bubbly. This was dark with no bubbles. There was a remote possibility he could have made hot chocolate, but it didn't look like that either. What it _did_ look like was—

"What are you drinking?" I demanded. "I don't have any coffee in the house."

"I had a jar of instant in my briefcase."

He'd brought his own coffee.

I could feel the steam suddenly pouring from my ears, just like in one of those cartoons.

Obviously the arrogant man had intended to spend the night all along!

I looked around for a blunt weapon.

That's what comes from having a clean house. There wasn't a weapon in sight.

I stomped to the end of the sofa, grabbed his briefcase, and tossed it at him with as much force as I could muster.

It hit smack in his stomach, a bit higher than I'd been aiming. Too bad.

"Ow! That hurt!"

"Good. Now get out." I glared at him and pointed toward the door.

"Calm down, babe. I'll go get some chocolate doughnuts and we'll talk about this—"

That final reminder of his deception sent me over the edge. "If you call me _babe_ one more time or remain in my house one more minute, I'm going to get my brand new double-barreled shotgun and change you from a bull to a steer right here in my living room, and that's one mess I won't mind cleaning up!"

He grabbed the briefcase, held it in front of him and gave a nervous laugh. "I know you. You'd never buy a gun." But I could tell he wasn't sure. Sweat popped out on his forehead.

I fisted my hands on my hips. "Wouldn't I? Remember all those times when I questioned your late night appointments and the perfume on your shirts and you told me I was crazy? Well, guess what? You were right! I am crazy! I bought a gun and I'm going to shoot off your public-property penis and grind it up in the garbage disposal and they'll give me Prozac and therapy and I won't even have to go to jail because I'm crazy!" I moved to the coat closet and wrapped my hand around the doorknob.

"Now, babe—"

"Stop calling me _babe_!" I turned the knob and yanked the door open. I had so much stuff in there, I knew he couldn't tell if I was hiding a cannon. I pushed aside some coats and groped behind the vacuum cleaner.

"Uh, listen, ba—uh, Lindsay, I gotta go. I'll call you."

He dashed out the front door. I didn't watch him go. I just stood there beside the coat closet that held several coats, my snow boots, an ice bucket with no lid, a vacuum cleaner, a broom, and other odds and ends...but no shotgun.

I had successfully scammed Rick into leaving my house. I felt good, real good. The adrenaline was surging. I laughed and danced an uncoordinated little jig around my living room.

My empty living room.

Yep, I'd managed to get Rick to leave. Accomplished what I set out to do, what I needed to do. I'd done good.

When that adrenaline rush passed, it sure did leave a nasty residue behind.

Damn his sorry hide! I'd been doing okay. Maybe not great, but okay. Now I was pretty much back to that day I'd come home from the shop early with a stomach virus and caught him and Tuffy in my bed.

Between bouts of hanging my head over the commode, I'd packed a suitcase with my college scrapbook, two pairs of blue jeans, no shirts, a red silk scarf and other odds and ends chosen randomly since my brain wasn't functioning at that point, then walked out the door. With every article I put in that suitcase and every step toward that door, I'd repeated to myself that I'd just been through the worst, that it could only get better.

Well, this morning wasn't any worse than that day, but it wasn't much better either

I had only myself to blame for this setback. I should have sent him packing last night.

But I'd been a total idiot. I hadn't even asked where Huffy was. I guess I'd sort of hoped his visit meant they'd already split.

Considering his apology to me, his admission that he'd made a mistake, and the number of missed calls on his cell phone, maybe they had. Or maybe she'd gone to visit her sick mother for the night and he'd seized the opportunity but she'd returned home early.

It didn't matter. I wouldn't take him back even if he came crawling and begging my forgiveness. Oh, I'd like to see him crawl and beg, of course. So I could kick him in the teeth. Okay, truth...so I could put on my cowboy boots with the pointed, steel-reinforced toes and kick him in the testicles.

But I'd never take him back under any circumstances.

I was absolutely positive about that.

Well, almost absolutely positive.

The cat—King Henry, I'd called him, and that seemed to fit—came over to rub against my leg.

"Thanks, buddy. I appreciate the reassurance."

He purred and rubbed some more.

"Forget it," I admonished him. "I'm not a cat person and even if I were, you belong to somebody else. Unlike some people I could name, I don't mess with other people's husbands or cats. We're going to find your owner right now."

This would make a good Sunday project, get me out of the house and keep me occupied so I wouldn't think how empty this place had become now that Rick had appeared then left again. I'd sort of promised my mother I'd come by that afternoon, but that was pre-Rick. I just didn't feel up to facing my parents for a few days.

Mom was disappointed but very understanding when I called to cancel. She's always disappointed but very understanding when I'm undependable and irresponsible because she knows I'm an undependable, irresponsible person. She tells me really often just so neither of us will forget it.

I didn't mention Rick during our phone conversation, and neither did she. She and Dad were pretty upset about the divorce, and even though they never said, I knew they thought the problem was my tendency to be undependable and irresponsible.

This is not to say they had ever approved of the marriage. They'd adamantly opposed it. They'd been as taken in by his charm as I was, but they'd wanted me to follow in dad's footsteps and go to law school. I was just as determined not to go to law school as I was to marry Rick.

When I announced that I'd left him, however, they decided to become retroactively in favor of the marriage.

I think maybe I did something to please my parents when I was nine years old, but they could have been pretending that time.

After talking to my mother, I lifted Henry onto my shoulder where he lay happily purring and went to the house on the other side of me from Paula's. Though the blinds were still drawn, I knew Fred Sommers would be up. Fred's a computer nerd and old movie buff who lives alone with one bedroom allocated for him to sleep in, one for his computer and all the peripheral equipment that he uses in his work—I'm not sure what that work is—and the third for his collection of old movies. At this hour of the morning, he would be in the computer room. In the evenings, he visits his movies. Fred keeps a rigid schedule.

We met when Rick and I first bought the house next door. Fred and I bonded immediately, and he and Rick hated each other on sight. A good reference for Fred.

I rang the doorbell and waited on Fred's perpetually clean porch with King Henry draped over my shoulder.

Fred's house was at least as old if not older than mine, but his looked new. He kept everything in pristine order, including his lawn. His bushes wouldn't dare grow an irregular leaf, and he always had lots of colorful flowers with never a single dead or wilted bloom in sight. Either Fred snipped them in the middle of the night or the blossoms in his yard responded to his obsessive nature and didn't die like ordinary blossoms. When their life span was over, they immediately crumbled into dust and settled invisibly into the ground.

My yard gives him fits. I came home in the middle of the day one time shortly after I moved in and caught him mowing it. I pretended not to notice then took him a pan of brownies the next day, and our friendship was cemented in chocolate.

I rang the doorbell a second time and was beginning to wonder if Fred was busy destroying the evidence of midnight blossom raids when he finally opened the door.

Fred is tall and lanky with white hair immaculately cut and styled. He wore wire-framed glasses that always looked perfectly clear, no smudges or lint like normal people get on their glasses.

"Hi, Lindsay," he greeted, eyeing King Henry askance. "I'm sure the animal activists will applaud your using the live animal instead of just the fur, but you could run into problems in the coat room."

"You know everything that goes on around here. Who does this belong to?" I pointed to the cat.

"I've never seen him before, but he seems to think he belongs to you. I'm making chicken salad for lunch if you'd like to lose the fur and come back in an hour."

It gave me a much-needed boost that Fred wanted me to come for lunch. He believed politeness shouldn't involve doing anything he didn't want to do, so when he asked me over, I knew he really wanted to see me.

"Thanks. I'd like that."

I took King Henry back to my house. Since I had an hour to wait, I dragged a couple of still-packed boxes up from the basement. Yes, I know I should have been completely unpacked by that time, but unpacking everything was like an admission that I was there permanently, and some insane part of me—the same part that made love to Rick last night—wasn't quite ready to do that.

I dumped the boxes in the middle of the living room floor. So much for my clean house. Well, I'd always known it wouldn't last. In the mess I noticed, among other things, a rusty iron skillet, antique ice tongs, a chipped marble bookend, an old iron...all sorts of weapons I could have used earlier to scare Rick. Or to hurt him. Yeah, that clean house business was definitely overrated.

I got a knife from the kitchen—another potential weapon—and cut up the boxes then located a red magic marker and printed Henry's description and my phone number on half a dozen cardboard signs to put up around the neighborhood.

First stop was directly across the street from my house. The place had been vacant for over two months. The owner lived in Florida, so the odds were minimal that I'd get in trouble for using the tree in the front yard as a sign post. The chain link fence had, years ago, been totally consumed by a hedge about four feet high in front and back. A huge oak tree stood just on the other side in one corner. A perfect place to put my first sign.

I peered over the hedge and noticed with some satisfaction that the lawn was in worse shape than mine. Maybe I should follow this example and put up some kind of a fence around my house to hide the clover and dandelions.

Nah. Why deprive my neighbors of the opportunity to feel superior because their lawns looked better than mine?

Stretching on tiptoe and leaning over the hedge, I held one of my signs as high as I could up the trunk of the big oak, positioned a nail, drew back my hammer, smashed my thumb, and dropped the nail and hammer on the other side of the hedge.

Bending double with the pain, I clutched my thumb with my uninjured hand and ran through my entire vocabulary of swear words. Finally the pain subsided to a throbbing agony rather than a piercing agony, and I realized I might as well deal with it and get on with things. There wasn't anybody around to offer sympathy.

That empty, lonely feeling washed over me again, and I considered sitting on the curb, sucking my sore thumb and feeling sorry for myself.

Instead I decided to retrieve my hammer and hang that damned sign, then go home and make some peanut butter chocolate chip cookies to take to Fred's house. Chocolate was the next best thing to sympathy.

Or was sympathy the next best thing to chocolate?

I approached the gate tentatively. Last spring the elderly couple who'd lived there for twenty years had both died within a two month period and left it to their son in Florida who had professed himself unwilling to sell his childhood home but also unwilling to sink a lot of money into repairs. For a long time the parents hadn't been able to keep it up the way they should, and it hadn't improved since their death. The hedge and the gate had made a lot of progress toward uniting inextricably. I finally managed to get it open, breaking off a few twigs and leaves in the process.

I walked toward the tree tentatively, unsure what might be lurking in the ankle-high grass. As I neared the corner, I spotted my hammer in an area where the grass was pressed down as if a large animal had been sleeping there. Could be the big, friendly black dog who roamed the neighborhood. I'd always assumed he belonged to somebody, but maybe he didn't. Or maybe he just slept around.

When I bent down to retrieve my hammer, I caught a whiff of stale cigarette smoke from the grass. I might be uncertain as to where that dog lived, but I was relatively certain he didn't smoke.

Nevertheless, I knew I was right about the smell. I've never been a smoker. At the age of fourteen, my cousin Carolyn and I bought a pack, each took a couple of puffs and immediately regretted that we'd wasted money on something that didn't taste good when we could have bought chocolate. Consequently I'm pretty sensitive to the smell, and there was no doubt in my mind that somebody had recently emptied an ashtray or two in that spot even though I didn't see any butts.

_So what?_ I asked myself.

I picked up the hammer and stood.

Probably teenagers.

But we didn't have any teenagers in the immediate area.

Visiting teenagers, then.

Yeah, right, like any self-respecting, rebellious teenager would voluntarily hang out in Pleasant Grove.

I wasn't sure why, but the whole thing gave me a creepy feeling.

I told myself I was only being paranoid after the scene with the cops at Paula's house, but I've been known to lie to myself before...like all those months I told myself Rick was telling me the truth.

I pushed the grass aside with the toe of one sneaker and looked for cigarette butts.

I didn't see anything. Either I was imagining the smell or the ashes had sifted through the grass leaving the smell, and somebody had very tidily cleaned up every butt.

Tidy teenagers? I was pretty sure that was an oxymoron.

Then I spotted a bit of white. I squatted for a closer look. It was a portion of a filter that had been crushed into pieces. The tidy smoker must have found the other parts but missed this one. It was still white. We'd had rain on Wednesday, so this was fresh.

_So what?_ I asked myself again, aware of how absurd this whole thing was. I definitely needed to get a life if a bit of cigarette filter could fascinate me that way.

I started to rise then noticed a sort of tunnel angled through the hedge. The leaves had been clipped. This was not a natural phenomenon. Someone had deliberately created a tunnel that was bigger on this side and narrower as it went through a hole in the chain link fence then out to the other side. From that other side, it wouldn't be noticeable at all, though it gave anyone sitting on the grass and smoking cigarettes a perfect view of Paula's house.

# Chapter Four

An hour and a half later I was sitting in Fred's breakfast nook at his table of polished oak that never seemed to get dirty or smudged, overlooking his back yard where the trees didn't drop leaves and the birds never pooped.

I took a bite of his chicken salad on homemade bread, savoring the delicate flavors. If I could persuade Fred to come to work at Death by Chocolate, we'd all be rich, but he prefers to sit in front of that computer screen all day and do whatever it is he does.

"This bread is wonderful," I told him.

He studied the uneaten portion of his own sandwich and scowled. "The crust's not crisp enough."

"It's perfect."

"My oven temperature must be inaccurate."

"You're nuts."

"Maybe."

He spoke the last word with as much dignity and solemnity as he'd voiced his criticism of his bread.

I laughed and Fred smiled.

I knew that Fred knew Rick had spent the night even though my driveway was on the opposite side of my house with several trees in between. The man knew everything that went on. I've accused him of having a periscope leading from his computer up his chimney as well as _bugs_ in every house in the neighborhood. He acts surprised when I bring it up, claiming he lives in his own little world and sometimes doesn't even know what the weather's like outside.

Yeah, right, and Rick just happened to have that jar of instant coffee in his briefcase.

However, I really didn't want to think about Rick at that moment, and Fred would never bring it up if I didn't. So I chose another topic.

"Cops came to visit Paula this morning," I said.

He nodded.

"Now how could you possibly know that if you don't have a periscope?" I demanded.

"You just told me."

"You nodded, indicating you already knew."

"I nodded as a polite acknowledgement that I'm listening to what you're saying."

I lifted a skeptical eyebrow. Sometimes I'm not positive when he's teasing, but I never let him know that. As I finished my sandwich, savoring every crumb, I told him about the cops' visit.

"I've always wondered why any woman would want to color her blond hair brown," he said when I finished.

"You noticed that too? She didn't have any references when she moved in. Rick didn't want to accept her application to rent the house, but I insisted. I think she had an abusive husband and she's hiding from him. What do you think?"

He nodded slowly.

"Is that a nod of agreement or just a polite nod to show you heard me?"

"It's a contemplative nod. I'm considering the possibility. She is obsessive about keeping to herself, and she's extremely protective of the kid. Would you like more tea?"

"Yes, please."

While Fred poured tea, I peeled the plastic wrap off the plate of still-warm peanut butter chocolate chip cookies I'd brought.

"Well," he said, selecting the most evenly rounded cookie on the plate, "I guess it's none of our business. If Paula wants us to know what her problem is, she'll tell us."

"Unless she's too scared to make a rational decision. She may need our help." I told him about the hole through the hedge and the cigarette butt. "Have you noticed any activity over there? Anybody skulking around?"

For several moments he gazed out the window then finally shook his head. "I don't think the police would be watching her through a hole in the hedge. That's not really their style."

"I know that, but it might be her ex-husband or somebody he's hired to find her. Her unlisted phone number is listed somewhere or that Lester Mackey wouldn't have it on a piece of paper in his apartment."

"Have you told her about this suspected stake-out site?"

"Not yet. She's already terrified. I don't want to make it worse until I know for sure there's something to worry about."

"So we forget about it until we know for sure there's something to worry about."

"That's just like a man! Don't call the fire department until the house is burning."

"I think that's standard procedure, yes."

"Okay, that analogy didn't come out quite right, but you know what I meant. Why don't you run a check on your computer, see what you can find out about Paula?"

"Because that would be invading her privacy."

"It's for her own good."

"You don't know that."

"You don't know it isn't. She could be in danger. The fire could already be smoldering under the roof and any minute it's going to burst into flames and then it'll be too late."

He didn't answer. I hate it when he does that. If he'd keep arguing, I might have a chance of convincing him.

I took another cookie, more chocolate to inspire me to figure out what to do next.

"Okay, I'll run a check on her," he suddenly agreed, "if you'll promise not to do anything else."

"What else? What could I possibly do?"

"I'm not going to answer that. I don't want to give you any ideas. Do you have Paula's social security number and date of birth?"

"Sure, in my computer records at home."

"Call me with it and I'll see what I can find, but I'm not promising anything."

"Thank you." I pushed my chair back, stood and planted a kiss on his cheek, partly because I knew it would make him blush and partly because I really was grateful to him for being my friend.

When I walked in the front door of my house, King Henry rose regally from my recliner, stretched, rubbed against my legs, then ambled over to reach up and pat the door handle.

"You're right. It's time for you to go home. We had a nice visit, but you know what they say about cats and visitors." I didn't have a clue what "they" said about cats and visitors, but I was pretty sure he'd know. He had a wise, all-knowing air about him.

I opened the door, and he went out, moving gracefully and casually across the porch.

And suddenly I didn't want him to leave.

That was silly. Maybe I should get a dog, something little and fuzzy that would greet me at the door and be so thrilled to see me, he'd pee all over the rug then run in circles tracking it through the house...and then maybe that house wouldn't feel so empty.

King Henry sauntered out into the yard then dropped into a sudden crouch, his tail swishing slowly as he peered intently at something in the clover.

I turned away and went upstairs to the bedroom designated as my home office. Unlike Fred's sophisticated equipment, however, my computer was so ancient, my word-processing program wrote documents with a quill. But it did everything I needed, everything I was capable of doing. I've never been very computer literate. I've always suspected a little green man lives in that computer and makes it run or not run, depending on his mood, and I'm good at pissing him off. For one thing, he really hates Coke in his keyboard.

Instead of a high tech modular work station, I have a huge wooden desk built in the early '50s that weighs somewhere around five tons. At least, that's what the movers said when they had to wrestle it up the stairs. Rick's office threw it away when they converted to high tech modular work stations about five years ago. I saved it, much to his dismay. It was a toss-up whether he was happier to see me or that desk leave his house.

I located Paula's records on my computer, called Fred, and gave him the information.

Then I went back downstairs and out on the porch, hoping to catch a last glimpse of King Henry, see what direction he was going. Maybe I could visit him occasionally. We could talk about our chance meeting and maybe even wax philosophical, chat of mice and men and the best ways to torture them.

He was still lying in that same spot, staring intently at something in the clover. I went out in the yard and checked it out, but didn't see anything. In fact, as I looked around me, I didn't see anyone or any activity anywhere. Ever notice how extra quiet it is on Sundays, like the whole world's a church?

I felt very much at loose ends. I could go back in and read or watch TV or wash my hair or arrange my toiletries in alphabetical order. Somehow none of that appealed to me.

I could go visit Paula, but I hated to do that while I was having Fred check her out. It just didn't seem right.

I strolled across the street, half aimlessly and half drawn to the hedge with the hole in it.

Henry came with me.

"We're trespassing, you know," I advised him as I shoved through the gate. Henry darted in as if to say that cats couldn't trespass because the entire world belonged to them.

I checked out the hole again, just to see if it was really as distinct as I remembered.

It was. Definitely man made. Definitely a hole. Definitely strange.

But this time I was looking through it from a different angle...and had a perfect view of _my_ house!

Had Rick hired a private investigator to get the goods on me?

Yeah, right. And what goods might those be, Lindsay the Boring? Anyway, that made no sense. He was already getting everything he wanted in the divorce.

So maybe Ms. Huffy Muffy had hired a private investigator to see if Rick was cheating on her. I smiled at that thought and suddenly felt much better about letting Rick spend the night. Perhaps it had served a good purpose after all.

I looked up at the big old house. Needed a lot of work, but it had potential, at least from the outside. A turret, big windows, fish scale siding, lots of gingerbread. It reminded me of an elegant, aging lady whose feather boa was molting.

I walked around the side of the house with no idea what I was looking for. Nothing, probably. Just killing time, avoiding a return to unpacking and such burning decisions as whether to store my hair spray under H or S or be really creative and put it under G for glue.

If I was looking for nothing in that yard, I found it. I didn't see any more cigarette butts or any body parts or even any footprints suggesting somebody other than Henry and I had been there lately. Of course, except for that squashed-down spot in the corner of the front yard, the grass was so high Big Foot could have been there five minutes before without leaving a sign.

The back yard had a gate that opened onto an alley. That gate wasn't quite as overgrown as the one in front and when I got closer, I could see fresh leaves and twigs broken off.

Okay, so those tidy teenagers who sat in the front yard to smoke and spy on either me, the Queen of Ennui, or Paula's closed and curtained house with no signs of life, had entered through the back gate. Maybe they even had wild parties in the old house. Well, not very wild or Fred would have noticed.

King Henry darted over to the porch and sprang up like a ballet dancer then sniffed the wood delicately, his nose not quite touching the surface. Suddenly he laid his ears back flat against his head and jumped down. Giving the porch a final scathing look, he disappeared around the house. Whatever had been on that porch wasn't something Henry wanted to meet.

So he didn't like tidy teenagers who smoked and watched the world through a hole in the hedge. Big deal. I didn't either.

If I really believed that was all that had been going on around the old house, I wouldn't have hurried so fast to follow Henry's lead out through the front gate.

Henry and I strolled around the neighborhood a bit, enjoying the nice weather. I kept expecting him to recognize his home and run up to the front door or that somebody would recognize him and run out to claim him.

When he followed me back inside my house, I realized it was time to buy cat food and a litter box. Henry obviously did not remember where he lived. Maybe he had feline amnesia.

I got the items at the grocery store, fed him, put his litter box in the basement then went back upstairs to clean the mess I'd created while making signs. I left the rusty skillet, the antique ice tongs and the ancient iron where they lay in case I needed to iron an ancient blouse, cook a rusty steak or haul in a fifty pound block of ice.

Or threaten Rick.

Or the teenagers peeping through that hole in the hedge.

I frowned as I thought again of that stupid hole. If the cops hadn't come around asking Paula questions, if she didn't dye her blond hair brown, if she wasn't so scared of something, I wouldn't have obsessed about that dumb hole.

I went outside to the porch. Evening was coming on. The shadows were growing long, and the old vacant house suddenly looked creepy rather than shabbily elegant.

The setting sun and the evening breeze did strange things with the light and shadows. Was that just leaves moving or had a curtain on the second floor moved? Was that glint of sunlight reflecting off the attic window or off a metal telescope? Or even a gun barrel?

"What are you doing, trying to see through that hole in the hedge from here?"

I jumped and let out a small _ack!_ at the unexpected sound of a voice.

"Fred! What are you doing, sneaking up on me?"

He shrugged and stepped onto the porch. "The entire Marine Corp band could sneak up on you when you're that intent on something."

I ignored his remark and looked at the file folder he carried. "Did you find anything about...?" I inclined my head toward Paula's house.

"Sort of."

I opened the screen door and we went inside.

"Okay, what did you find?" I asked.

He handed the file folder to me. "Paula Walters died twenty years ago at the age of two."

# Chapter Five

I sank onto the sofa. "Died?" I repeated. "Paula's dead? Of course she's not dead. What are you saying, that she's a ghost? You've been watching too many of those old horror movies. This is not a movie. Paula is not a ghost."

Fred sat beside me, heaved a long sigh, scrunched up his mouth and rolled his eyes. "I know she's not a ghost. But she's not Paula Walters either. My guess is, she stole the identity of somebody who died young."

"Wow. That's the kind of thing you see in the movies. Real people don't do that."

He sighed again. "Real people do it all the time. That's where they got the idea for the movies."

"I meant, people we know don't do that. Real people like Paula."

"Either she faked her own death at the age of two, she's a ghost, or she changed her identity. Take your pick."

"All right, I guess we have to go with option C." I opened the folder and flipped through it. Fred had printed out several sheets of documentation.

"Buying that old car she came here in was Paula's first appearance upon returning from the hereafter," he said. "Renting your house was the second."

I studied the documents and finally found one I could comprehend. "She bought the car in Kansas City."

"For cash from an individual. Then she applied for a driver's license, stating she'd never had one before."

"I guess not if she died at the age of two. She'd have been too short to reach the gas pedal."

"Probably have a little trouble passing the written test too, unless she was very precocious."

I thumbed through the papers. "I'm impressed with all the stuff you came up with. You ever thought about being a professional detective?" Might as well use the occasion to open the ongoing discussion of his mysterious occupation.

He shrugged. "You just have to know where to look. I'm not finished. I checked Texas, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, and the surrounding states and couldn't find a birth certificate for Zachary Walters."

"Why are you so secretive about what you do all day?"

"I work at the computer all day."

"I know, but what do you _do_ at the computer all day?"

"I spent this afternoon looking for Paula."

"Are you ever going to tell me what you do?"

"Maybe."

"But not today."

"There's nothing on TV tonight," he said, changing the subject. He does that a lot. "Want to come over and watch _The Day the Earth Stood Still?_ "

"Might as well. Hey, you know what we need to do? We need to go talk to that apartment manager where Lester Mackey lives, see what we can find out about him."

"We don't need to do any such thing."

I didn't argue. I recognized his stubborn tone. I'd either have to figure out a way to convince him or I'd have to go by myself. Unless Lester Mackey was listed in the phone book, I wasn't sure I could get the address without Fred's help, but I still had Detective Adam Trent's business card. I could probably figure some way to get the information out of him. I'd picked up a few things from Rick about being sneaky.

"I'll bring the Cokes and microwave popcorn," I offered.

"Orville Redenbacher's Pour-Over Movie Theater Butter?"

"Of course." I used to eat whatever was on sale, but Fred had me trained.

"I'll go set up the movie."

Fred left and I headed for the kitchen to grab the snacks.

As I walked by my recliner, King Henry, without lifting his head, lazily reached out one oversized paw and patted me as if in approval.

"You're right," I said. "Sunday night at the movies with a good friend beats the heck out of Saturday night with my cheating, con-artist, almost ex-husband."



I wasn't surprised when Paula showed up for work the next day with dark circles under her bloodshot eyes. She'd colored her hair, effectively hiding the blond roots. It was all a uniform, muddy brown. Nondescript.

She always brought Zach with her since the day care center wasn't open at four a.m., the hour we started work. He'd sleep on the sofa in the closet we facetiously called our office. Even after he woke, he was never a problem. We kept a small television and several of his toys in there, and he was good about entertaining himself. Heck, it was all the kid had ever known. When Paula started working with me, he stayed with us all day because she was too broke to afford child care.

Too broke and too scared to let him out of her sight.

Today she had that same frantic expression, and, as we rushed around making biscuits, doughnuts and other pastries, I noticed she'd resumed her old habit of checking on him every few minutes. I made up my mind that, before the day was over, I would have some answers from her.

Yeah, just like I'd forced Fred to tell me what he does all day.

But I was going to give it my best shot.

Cooking, especially on a tight schedule with no room for error such as leaving the baking powder out of a cake, requires intense concentration. Sometimes we had a few brief moments of calm before the rush of customers at breakfast and again at lunch, but not usually. Usually we were busy from the time we walked through that door until we finished cleaning up after lunch. Mondays were especially hectic, so I knew my questions would have to wait...and I'm not a patient person. Just watching her, sensing her tension, and not knowing what was going on was making me almost as stressed as Paula.

When the customers began to arrive, I noticed she'd resumed her old habit of jumping every time the door opened, keeping her head down and face averted and staying in the kitchen as much as possible. That had been okay when she'd first come to work with me and we weren't nearly as busy as now. Now we actually needed a third person to help. With the tables and the counter close to capacity, both Paula and I had to stay front row center most of the time. Today every time somebody came in, she darted into the kitchen then reluctantly returned, her steps wooden and her eyes darting around the room, scanning each person there.

After the breakfast crowd we closed to get lunch ready. That was when she normally left to take Zach to the nursery. I wasn't surprised when she told me she wasn't going to do that today, that he was running a slight fever. I doubted Zach was sick, but I did know his mother was sick with worry so I played along.

Half an hour later as I was spreading the cream cheese filling on a Chocolate Earthquake Cake and Paula was chopping scallions for a chicken pasta dish, the doorbell rang. Paula gasped and jumped. I went out front to answer the door.

A delivery boy stood there with a huge arrangement of yellow roses. They had to be from Rick. I should refuse them.

"Lindsay Kramer?" the boy asked.

I'm a twenty-first century kind of girl so I never legally gave up my birth name of Powell though I let friends and family call me Kramer for the sake of simplicity—until the infamous Muffy night.

However, in the interest of what looked like at least two dozen roses, I could be Lindsay Kramer one more time. I didn't see any reason to pass up something I enjoy just because the source was disgusting. I like hot dogs too.

I tipped the boy and accepted the bouquet.

Ignoring the card which probably said something really gooey that would only mess with my mind, I set the flowers on the counter, inhaled their sweet fragrance and admired them for a moment before I started back to the kitchen.

Paula stood in the doorway, arms wrapped tightly around herself, doing her impression of a terrified, anemic ghost.

"Who?" she choked out. "Who are they from?"

"Rick."

"Are you sure? You didn't read the card."

"Positive." Nevertheless, I plucked out the card and brought it to her. "You read it."

" _Before I knew Mariah's name.._.? That's a strange message."

I hadn't meant for her to read it out loud so I could hear it.

I sighed. "It's from a song about the wind. _Before I knew Mariah's name and heard her wailing whining, I had a girl and she had me, and the sun was always shining_. Rick used to sing it to me."

"Oh." Paula looked vastly relieved while I was starting to feel pretty stressed. I'd been right. The card was messing with my mind. That was Rick's specialty.

"Sitting in a tree in the park." I wasn't relating the incident to Paula so much as reliving the incident myself for the second time in just over twenty-four hours.

"Oh?"

I shrugged, tore the card in half and tossed it into the trash. "I guess you had to be there. Give the devil his due, he sure knows how to get to me. I knew I should have refused to accept those flowers. I need to get back to my cake."

But as soon as I got a chance, I was going to give Paula the third degree. I was going to find out why she'd faked her death at the age of two and why roses frightened her.



I didn't get the chance before we left work. Customers were around, Zach was around, and then she and Zach left to go home. When I pulled into my own driveway, there was no sign of either of them in the house next door. They could be inside behind those closed curtains, down at the park where she often took him to play, or they could have taken a fast plane to Mexico.

King Henry was waiting on my porch. I'd thought he might leave for his old home or even for someplace new while I was gone, but he was still there. He strolled to the edge of the porch to meet me and wound himself around my legs. Cats must have very flexible bones.

I set the flowers on the porch while I unlocked my door, and Henry sniffed them suspiciously.

"They're from the disgusting man who was here yesterday." I wasn't going to lie to him. "But we can pretend I picked them on the way home, if that's all right with you."

He looked disdainful. I could tell he wasn't into _pretend_.

I lay down for a nap. Going to work at four in the morning often leads to sleep deficit.

I woke a couple of hours later, went downstairs and poked through the pantry. My pickings were getting a bit slim. Opening a can of sardines would seriously compromise the fragrance of the roses, and I just didn't feel like another peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I found a coupon for buy one pizza, get one free. I could invite Paula and Zach to join me. Ply her with pepperoni then give her the third degree.

She didn't answer her phone until the fourth ring, and then it sounded like she dropped the receiver and fumbled with it before finally getting it to her mouth. "Hello?" Her voice was breathless and confused.

"Hi, it's me. You okay?"

"Who is this?" Her words were slightly slurred. Had Paula been drinking? She refused to even have a margarita with me, saying she had to be alert to take care of Zach. "Paula, it's Lindsay. What's wrong?"

"Lindsay." She drew in a loud, shaky breath. "I'm sorry. I must have fallen asleep on the sofa. My head's fuzzy."

"Well, wake up. I'm getting ready to order a pizza. It should be here in about thirty minutes. You and Zach want to come over?"

"Thanks, but I don't think so. I'm really tired. We went to the park after work, and now I think we'll stay in the rest of the night."

"Okay. I'll bring my pizza to your house."

There was a moment of silence, then she laughed. "Has anybody ever accused you of being _pushy_?" It was the first time I'd heard her laugh since before the visit from the cops.

"As in _pushy broad_? That's what they put under my picture in my high school annual, and I was just a novice in those days. I like to think I've perfected the art since then."

She laughed again. "You have. All right, we'll come over to your house as soon as I wash my face and get Zach up. He must be asleep too. He isn't trying to climb out of his playpen."

"See you in a few minutes."

I started to hang up when she screamed. "Lindsay!"

"What?"

"He's gone! Zach's not in his playpen!"

"So he's learned to climb out. He's probably been doing it a long time and just crawls back in so you'll think you have him corralled. Where's he going to go with that maximum security system you have on all the doors and windows?"

"The door's open!"

"I'll be right over."

# Chapter Six

While Paula dashed up and down the stairs and back and forth through the rooms, I shoved aside my own rising fears and methodically searched the house and yard. When I came in from the back, she ran to meet me, her eyes wide with terror, questions and hope.

I shook my head. "He's not out there."

She turned to charge away again, but I grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to stop and look at me. "You've got to calm down." I tried to convince myself at the same time. "There's no need to worry. Zach probably woke up, saw you were asleep and made good his escape. I don't see his orange truck anywhere. I'll bet he took it with him, wandered over to Fred's house and right now he's got Fred down on the floor rolling that truck around and making dumb noises."

She bit her lip, and I could see she really wanted to believe that scenario. "But Fred would have phoned me if Zach wandered over."

I knew she wanted me to find a logical refutation for that, but I couldn't. I had to settle for a diversionary tactic. "You call him while I go check my house to see if Zach's there."

She nodded and headed for the phone, so easily taking my directions, assuming I knew what I was talking about, that I knew what to do in this kind of a circumstance.

I didn't, and was, in fact, almost as panic-stricken as Paula. The situation had a bad feel to it.

I went home and searched my house. I didn't find Zach, but I did notice Adam Trent's card lying on my nightstand. I picked it up and slipped it into the pocket of my cutoffs.

I was outside on my hands and knees, peering under my porch, when Fred came over.

I looked up at him. His normally unreadable expression was readable. He was worried too. That made me more worried.

"Paula called," he said.

"What do you make of it?"

"I don't know. It's hard to believe she left the door open. I've seen maximum security prisons that weren't locked up the way she locks that house."

I nodded, filing away for later reference the fact that he'd seen maximum security prisons. "But there's no way Zach could have turned that deadbolt even if he could have reached it."

"No, he couldn't," Fred agreed. "Which means she must have left the door open."

"I suppose it's possible. She's been pretty stressed since that visit from the cops."

We hurried to Paula's house and, as we ran onto the porch, a sudden chill darted down my spine while a shadow seemed to fall over the place. I wondered if King Henry would treat Paula's porch with the same disdain and fear he'd had for the porch across the street yesterday. Would he sense that someone bad had been there?

And that thought recalled the hole through the hedge with the perfect view of Paula's house.

My own panic climbed another notch.

Paula burst through the door. "Did you find him? We need to search the neighborhood! He's got to be around somewhere!"

"We need to call 911," I said.

After yesterday's reaction to the cops, I wasn't surprised when her terror escalated. "No! He's just wandered off. He's only a little boy. He can't have gone far. We'll find him any minute. There's no reason to call the police!"

"They have people trained to search for missing kids."

Fred moved closer and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "We're going to find him. All kids like to play hide and seek." I looked at Fred in amazement at this purported knowledge of the activities of _all kids._ Before he met Zach, I'm quite certain he believed we were born as adults, and all those little people were an alien race. Sometimes he still acted like he wasn't quite sure.

He gave me a slight shrug and a helpless look, and I could tell he was winging it the same way I was.

He propelled Paula back into the house. I followed.

I went straight to the phone beside the sofa. "They'll want pictures of Zach," I said as I punched in 911. "Can you find some recent ones?"

Paula hesitated as if considering the possibility of telling me again not to call the cops but nodded and left the room.

I gave the operator the information, concluding by asking her to contact Adam Trent and relay everything to him.

"Why did you do that?" Paula demanded. She'd come back into the room clutching a photo album just in time to hear my request. "We don't need that detective back here. Zach doesn't have any connection to Lester Mackey. Why did you ask them to send that man?"

I wasn't completely sure why I'd done it...the hole through the hedge, the way Henry had acted on the back porch of that vacant house, that chill down my spine as I stepped onto Paula's porch.

"He already has an interest in you," I said. "He's met Zach. That should give us an edge. Anyway, the more cops we get over here to search, the sooner you'll have Zach back home with you."

Within ten minutes Paula's house and the entire neighborhood were swarming with our boys in blue. Like I said, Pleasant Grove's a quiet place. Apparently no one on the force was busy fighting crime or even issuing speeding tickets, so the entire department turned out to locate one little boy. I never thought I'd be happy to see cops.

Donald Creighton was among the first to arrive. I was even happier to see a familiar face, especially since I remembered how he'd stooped down to talk to Zach and admire his truck. Finding the boy would be more than just a job to him.

He took the pictures Paula gave him and passed them around to the officers then had her describe the clothes Zach was wearing and the orange truck.

I was pretty impressed with the way he handled things, but Paula became more agitated with every movement he made, every word out of his mouth. I expected her to burst into tears at any minute. I was close myself. At the same time, knowing her the way I did, I suspected she wouldn't, or couldn't, allow herself that loss of control.

When Creighton instructed the officers to search the house, I thought she'd implode. "I've been through the house a dozen times. Lindsay's been through the house. We can't waste time here! We need to be out looking for him!"

Creighton took her arm and gently guided her to the sofa. "We've got officers combing the neighborhood, but searching the house first is standard procedure. We know you did a thorough job, but we have to do it again so we can put it in our official report."

Fred and I, huddled together in one corner of the room in an effort to stay out of the way, exchanged glances. I wondered if he was thinking the same thing I was, that another standard procedure said parents were always the first suspects in the case of missing children.

We crossed the room to stand behind the sofa as if we could somehow support Paula by being behind her.

"Now," Creighton said, taking out a small notepad and a pen, "I want you to tell me every detail of what happened from the time you last saw your son until I walked in that door."

He had a soothing manner, but Paula wasn't soothed. She sat stoically rigid, her fingers pleating and unpleating the fabric of her long skirt, and repeated in a monotone what she'd already told me. "I was so sure I locked the door. I always lock the door."

"She does," I verified. "She's a fanatic about locking her doors."

Even as the words left my mouth, I realized I was probably making it sound as if Paula had something to fear.

"Very safety-conscious," I explained. "Always wears her seat belt. Checks the batteries in her smoke detector. Looks both ways twice before crossing the street."

Fred kicked my shin before I could make things any worse with my babbling.

"You're the next door neighbor, right?" Creighton asked.

"Right. I'm Lindsay Powell. And this is Fred Sommers. He's her neighbor too." I felt a bit like I was presiding at a tea, introducing everybody, but Creighton merely nodded. "I'll want to talk to you both in a few minutes."

About that time the door flew open and Adam Trent strode in wearing faded jeans with a denim shirt. He looked more like a human being and less like a cop. He was big and solid and exuded dependability and self-confidence. I admit, I was even happier to see him than I'd been to see Donald Creighton. Right now we could use somebody who was dependable and confident.

He looked around the room, those dark, woodsy eyes missing nothing. When he saw me, he lifted an eyebrow. "What's going on?" he asked Creighton.

"Missing boy," he said and filled him in on the details.

Trent nodded curtly when Creighton finished. "Any signs of forced entry?"

Forced entry?

"Nothing readily apparent on the front door. Fletcher's checking the back now."

He turned his attention to Paula, and she flinched visibly. If Creighton's soothing manner had failed to calm her, Trent's abrasive manner could only make things worse. "Could the boy's father have taken him?"

I was very interested in hearing the answer to that question.

"No," she answered immediately.

"How can you be so sure?"

"He doesn't live here."

"Where does he live?"

Paula hesitated too long, her eyes darting from side to side as if looking for an answer or a way to escape. Trent and Creighton exchanged significant glances. "He's dead," she finally said.

Trent folded his arms and looked to me as if for confirmation. I used the nod I'd learned from Fred, a polite acknowledgement that I was listening to what Trent was saying. If he misinterpreted it to mean _yes_ , that wasn't my fault.

Another officer came up. "We've searched the premises thoroughly. The child's not here."

"Of course he's not here!" Paula snapped. "I told you we already looked. I wouldn't need your help if he was safe at home!"

Fred, standing directly behind her, laid a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"Are there any places in the neighborhood where you take your son...to visit a friend, go to a park, anything like that?" Trent asked.

"He loves to go to the park on Maple and Twenty-first, but it's half a mile away, too far for him to walk, and he wouldn't know how to get there anyway. He's just a baby."

"Check it out," Trent told the officer who'd reported in regarding the search of the house.

Trent focused on Paula again. "How about somebody who takes care of your son, a babysitter who might have picked him up to go get ice cream and just neglected to tell you?"

"No. Nobody like that. I take him to Time for Kids Day Care Center when I work. Other than that, I'm always with him."

"Anybody at the center who's especially fond of him?"

"Everybody loves him. He's a wonderful little boy."

"What's the address for the day care place?"

She gave it to him, and he snagged a female officer just coming in from the kitchen. "Check this out," he instructed, tearing a sheet of paper out of his notebook and handing it to her. "The kid's day care. See if anybody's seen him, if any stranger's been around asking about him."

Paula emitted a strangled sound at that remark, but somehow managed to retain her stoic demeanor. "Nobody could have taken him! I'd have heard them come in!"

But she'd been sleeping awfully soundly when I called. I went cold all over at the thought of some pervert kidnapping Zach. I couldn't begin to imagine the torment those same thoughts must be causing Paula.

"What about boyfriends?" Trent asked her. "Somebody you're dating who really likes Zach?"

She shook her head. "I don't date."

He lifted a quizzical eyebrow at me, and I nodded, this nod confirming her statement, completely different from the previous one. Trent made a notation in his little book.

"You told Officer Creighton you hadn't intended to fall asleep, that one minute you were watching your son and the next thing you remembered was the phone ringing when Ms. Powell called you."

She drew a shaky hand across her forehead. "That's right. We went to the park after work, then when we got home I put Zach in his playpen and turned on cartoons. I had a headache, so I took a couple of aspirins and sat down for a few minutes before I started dinner. The next thing I knew was when Lindsay called me."

"Did you have a drink to help get rid of the headache, a glass of wine, maybe? Could that be why you fell asleep so easily?"

"She goes to work at four in the morning!" I didn't like the direction the questioning was headed. "Of course she was sleepy by that time! I took a nap myself."

He scowled at me. "Do you do this ventriloquist routine professionally or just to annoy people?"

Paula sprang to her feet. "Stop it! You're wasting time and it's going to get dark soon! If you're not going to look for my son, I will!"

Creighton rose beside her. "We've got over half the Pleasant Grove Police Department looking," he assured her. "We'll find your son."

She gave no indication that she'd heard him, but she did sit down again and pressed her fingertips against her temples. "I had two aspirins and a glass of water. That's all. I guess I was more tired than I realized."

"Are you always such a heavy sleeper?"

"No! I'm a very light sleeper. I don't know how I could have slept through Zach's leaving. Usually I hear him from my room if he coughs in the middle of the night."

"Could I see the bottle of aspirin?"

"Why?" I asked.

Trent's jaw clenched. "Because you're giving me a headache."

"I'll get it." Paula hurried from the room as if the faster she brought aspirin to Trent, the faster Zach would be found.

"What are you trying to do to her?" I demanded of Trent.

"I'm trying to find a missing kid. What are you trying to do?"

"I'm trying to take care of my friend."

"Why does she need taking care of?"

I glared at him. Why had I been glad to see him? Why had I asked the dispatcher to call him? As long as he was there, I might as well get some use out of him. "I need to talk to you about something that probably doesn't have anything to do with Zach, but it might."

"What?"

"Not now. Later."

Paula walked back into the room and handed Trent a small white bottle.

"This is a vitamin bottle," he said, turning it in his fingers.

"We buy aspirin in bulk at the shop and then we bring a few home with us when we need them," I explained and earned myself another glare.

"Do you mind if I take a couple of them with me?"

Her hands fluttered helplessly. "Take the whole bottle. I don't care."

"A couple will do."

"You want some water to take those with?" I asked as he slid the pills into a small envelope in his shirt pocket. "Or did you plan to absorb them through your shirt? I don't think aspirins work that way."

"Do you have any coffee made?" he asked Paula, ignoring me.

"What? Coffee? No. No, I don't."

"Would you mind making a pot?"

"I don't want to make coffee! I want to find my son! There's a convenience store over on Main Street. If you want something to drink, go down there."

"I know you don't want to make coffee, but I want you to. You need to make it and then you need to drink some as well as offer it to the others here."

Busy work, something for Paula to do to distract her from the problem at hand. Okay, I'd give Trent one point for that, but he was still about fifty points in the hole.

"I'll go with you," Creighton offered.

Paula didn't look too happy about that, but Fred jumped into the breach. "Me too. I could use a cup of coffee."

Fred only drank his own specially brewed coffee. He was pulling out all the stops in his effort to help Paula.

As soon as the three of them were out of the room, Trent turned to me. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

"Let's go out on the porch."

Trent nodded and I followed him outside.

I folded my arms and tried to look authoritative, not an easy task in cutoffs and sneakers. "First, I want to know what the deal is with the aspirin. You're going to have it analyzed, aren't you? It's aspirin, that's all! I bought it. I put the pills in that old vitamin bottle with my own hands and gave it to Paula."

"I thought you had something you wanted to talk to me about, something besides harassing me for doing my job."

"I do, but I'm not going to tell you until you tell me why you want to have those aspirins analyzed."

"Not going to tell me? I believe that's withholding evidence. You could get in a lot of trouble for that."

"Yeah, like you could get in trouble for taking evidence from the scene of the crime without proper judicial authorization." I've found if you throw in enough multi-syllabic words when you don't know what you're talking about, people usually assume you do.

Trent didn't. "Your friend voluntarily gave me the aspirin."

"She didn't say you could have it analyzed."

"She didn't say I couldn't."

"So you admit you're going to have it analyzed."

With a sigh, he pulled the tablets from his shirt pocket and held them in the palm of his hand. "Do these look like the pills in the aspirin bottle you have at work?"

I peered closely. "Well, they're small, white and round. I admit, I don't spend a lot of time looking at aspirins."

With the tip of his finger, he flipped over one tablet. "It doesn't say _aspirin_ on either side, and it's scored to break in half."

"Who knew when I was spending all that time in college studying the Pythagorean theorem and the influence of Puritanism on early American literature, I should have been studying the proper appearance of aspirin?"

Trent closed his fingers over the pills and stuck them back into his pocket. "The chances are very slim that these are aspirin," he snapped. "Now, if you don't have anything to tell me about this case, I need to get back in there."

"What are you insinuating? No way would Paula take drugs!" I protested.

"Is that all you wanted to tell me?"

"No." I sighed and pointed to the vacant house across the street, explaining about the hole in the hedge. I halfway expected him to tell me I was being silly, but he didn't.

Instead he peered intently at the house for a moment then said, "Show me."

We went over, and I indicated the flattened grass and the hole. "Somebody was smoking here," I added, poking in the grass with one foot. "I found a tiny bit of filter. I don't see it now, but it really was there."

Again he didn't dismiss my dubious findings. I was wearing shoes that day instead of being barefoot as I'd been when he'd seen me yesterday...dirty sneakers, but shoes nevertheless. Maybe shoes gave me more credibility.

"You might want to get your foot out of the evidence," he said, squatting down for a closer look.

Okay, he wasn't impressed with the shoes.

He rose and went up on the porch to try the door. It was locked. He walked slowly along the side of the house, inspecting every window. When we got to the back yard, I mentioned the broken twigs and leaves around the gate. I knew he'd find them, but I just wanted him to know that I'd noticed too. Credibility.

As I watched him climb the steps to the porch, I thought about Henry's reaction to that same spot, but I didn't think it was a good idea to tell Detective Trent that I had a visiting cat who was psychic.

He came down again with no change of expression. Obviously he wasn't as sensitive as the cat. Big surprise.

"Do you have the name of the owner?"

"I have his name, address, and phone number at home. You think this ties to Zach being missing? You think somebody kidnapped him?" I held my breath waiting for him to say _no_ , hoping he'd say _no._

He leaned against one of the porch posts, folded his arms and narrowed his eyes. "Why would anyone kidnap the kid?" he asked. I should have known he'd answer my question with another question.

"How would I know? Isn't that your job, to find out?"

"What do you know about the boy's father, what he was like, how he died?"

"Nothing." I leaned against another post and folded my arms too, but I'm sure I didn't look as intimidating as he did.

"This woman is your best friend, you live next door to her and work with her all day but you don't know anything about the father of her child?"

"Paula's not talkative."

"You ever seen her mistreat the kid?"

I jerked away from the post and stood upright at that absurd question. "Of course not! She adores him! And you've seen what a gentle person she is."

"A lot of people have problems with anger control, even people who seem to be very gentle when they're out in public."

"Well, Paula's not one of them. Like you said, I'm her best friend, I live next door to her and I work with her every day. I'd know something like that. What about your Lester Mackey who had her phone number in his apartment? What did you ever find out about him?"

"Nothing. He's still missing. The case is still open."

Another chill zig-zagged down my spine. "Did he—does he live close?"

Trent's head tilted slightly to one side as he studied me intently, considering his answer. Didn't the man ever do anything spontaneously? He was worse than Fred. "Yes," he finally said.

"You want to define _close_ or is his residence a secret?"

"Why do you want to know? Did you suddenly recover some buried memories of good old Lester?"

"I can't recover memories of something I didn't know in the first place. I'm thinking maybe the guy's some freako who's been watching Paula and Zach and decided to kidnap the kid. Don't you think you ought to check that out?"

"I will if we don't find the boy soon. Odds are he's just wandered off. It happens when mothers leave the door open and don't pay close enough attention to their kids."

"Paula's not like that," I protested.

"What is she like?"

I decided to leave out the part about her keeping her house locked up tighter than a maximum security prison and dying when she was two years old. "She loves her son. She goes out of her way to take care of him. She just..." Okay, better not tell him she'd had a bad night after his visit yesterday. "She had a hard day at work today and a headache and fell asleep. It could happen to anybody."

"She said she doesn't date, and you confirmed that. What about other friends? Anybody who comes to visit?"

"Paula keeps to herself. She's...introverted." That sounded much better than saying she was a paranoid recluse. "Fred and I are her only friends as far as I know."

"How well do you know this Fred?"

"Very well! What are you trying to say now?"

Before he could answer, we heard shouting from the street. Trent charged around the house to the front with me close behind.

To the accompaniment of cheers and applause from their fellow officers, one cop strode up the walk with Zach on his shoulders while another climbed out of the cruiser carrying the missing orange truck.

The screen door slammed open, and Paula rushed out to claim her son.

Trent and I ran across the street to join the happy crowd.

Paula laughed while tears streamed down her face as she held her son tightly. It was the first time I'd ever seen her cry. Zach waved his arms and chortled, apparently delighted with all the attention. "Where did you find him?" she asked.

"In the park playing with his truck. Having a good time, weren't you, Zach?"

Zach spotted me. "Anlinny!" He struggled to break free of his mother's hold, but she wasn't about to let that happen.

"Hi, Hot Shot. Been visiting, have we?"

"Paak! Pees man!"

"Yeah, you went to the park and managed to get the attention of a whole bunch of pees men."

The officer who'd carried him up the walk laughed. "That's what he said as soon as he saw us, didn't you, big guy? Kind of nice to meet somebody who's happy to see us."

"They've been teaching them at his nursery that policemen are their friends," Paula said. "Thank you all for finding him. Thank you so much! I just made coffee and I have plenty of Lindsay's wonderful cookies. Please come in and have some."

"That's real nice of you, but we gotta go," the officer said, shifting from one foot to the other in a proud but slightly embarrassed way as he hitched up his gun belt with that attendant leather-creaking noise.

And again Paula lost it. Her eyes widened, the pupils shrinking. Her face went seven shades paler. Every muscle in her body tensed, and she held Zach so tight he squirmed and pushed against her arms.

What the hell? Surely she wasn't afraid the officer was going to shoot her.

Come to think of it, Creighton's gun belt creaking had the same effect on her yesterday. She definitely didn't do well around police officers...which, added to her death at the age of two and subsequent reincarnation in Pleasant Grove over twenty years later, didn't speak well for her innocence.

"Seeing the boy back with his mother is enough thanks for us," the officer said, apparently oblivious to Paula's strange reaction. "You might want to make sure your door's always locked from now on. I don't want to scare you, but it's possible somebody took your son to that park."

"Somebody?" Paula repeated, her lips barely moving. "Who? Why?"

"Maybe Zach got out to the sidewalk, saw some older kid walking past, said _park,_ and the kid took him. That's a best-case scenario. You don't want to hear any of the worst-case-scenarios. Just keep a close eye on him and make sure you don't leave your door open again. He's a live wire, that one is. I've got one his age at home, and he keeps my wife hopping. You can't turn your head for a second."

Paula didn't speak, just nodded as if her throat had closed from terror at the possibilities the officer hinted of.

"Finish up here, Donald," Trent instructed Creighton. "I need to get something from Ms. Powell."

"You do?" I asked.

"I do." He took my arm and turned me toward my house.

"Why, Detective Trent, I had no idea you could be so impetuous," I teased.

He dropped my arm and glared at me, and I immediately regretted my smart mouth. I hadn't really minded his holding my arm.

"I want to get the name and address of the people who own that vacant house over there."

"What for? Zach's safe. Everything's over, isn't it?"

"Lester Mackey's still missing. That boy didn't get to the park by himself. You don't have any older kids wandering around, and somebody's been watching your friend from that house. This thing is far from over."

# Chapter Seven

"Nice place," Trent said when he walked into my house.

He didn't strike me as the type to say something nice just to be polite. I gave the man another point for having good taste.

"Thanks," I said. "I like it."

King Henry strolled over to wind around the detective's legs in that no-bones way of his. As I headed upstairs to get James Edwards' address, I turned back to see how Trent was dealing with Henry. The way a man deals with a cat says a lot about him.

He'd squatted to the cat's level and was stroking his back. I could hear Henry purring.

All right, that made a total of three points, but he was still in the hole big time because of the way he'd treated Paula. Besides, he was a cop and cops wrote speeding tickets. An automatic one hundred point deficit.

When I came back downstairs he was inspecting the antique Singer treadle sewing machine that I used to hold my nineteen-inch television set. I'm sure I don't have to mention that Rick got the big screen in the game room. No big deal. I don't even have a game room. He got that too.

"It originally belonged to my great-grandmother," I said. "The sewing machine, not the television."

To my surprise, he smiled. It wasn't the sunrise-in-the-desert kind of smile like Rick had, but a slow, easy smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes and made them sparkle. "I like antiques," he said. "They seem to hold something from everybody who owns them so it's sort of like you have a piece of furniture with a past."

"Yeah," I agreed. "My grandmother used to sew on this when I was a little girl. I rescued it from my parents' attic. The embroidered scarf was hers too. She died a couple of years ago. I miss her. That drop-leaf table with the Tiffany lamp on it belonged to her too." Suddenly I felt a little silly, talking about my furniture and my grandmother to Detective Adam Trent. "Here's that address you wanted." I walked closer and handed him a piece of paper.

"Thanks." He accepted the paper, glanced at what I'd written, then stuck it in his shirt pocket but made no move to leave. "Your friend Paula doesn't share your love of antiques. All her furniture's new."

Should have known he'd come back to that. Deduct all those points I'd just given him.

I shrugged. "Antiques have to start somewhere. That sewing machine was new when my great-grandmother was young. Zach's grandkids will probably think that coffee table of Paula's is really cool fifty years from now."

Trent lifted one eyebrow. "Her coffee table?"

"Okay, maybe not the coffee table." The boring piece of furniture probably wouldn't last fifty years and certainly wouldn't inspire somebody to call it _cool_ if it did. I searched my mind for another topic of conversation, anything to get away from Paula's lack of history. "You want a Coke?"

Oh, that was a great diversion! Offer him a drink, make him comfortable and give him a reason to hang around so he'd have plenty of time to quiz me about Paula.

On the other hand, I still needed to get Lester Mackey's address from him, and it wouldn't hurt to find out exactly what Trent knew about Paula, especially if it happened to be something I didn't know.

"You got anything that's not diet?" he asked. "I can't drink that diet stuff."

"Nothing diet, nothing caffeine-free. Just the hard stuff."

I went to the kitchen and got cold cans for both of us. It was only when I handed him his that I thought to ask if he wanted a glass with ice. I consume my Cokes straight from the can, full strength. Pouring a Coke into a glass wasn't something I ordinarily did.

"Would you like a glass with ice?" I asked.

"I like it straight out of the can," he said.

"Me too. Ice dilutes it, makes it watery."

"And flat."

We looked at each other in shock.

Oh, God. I'd just had a bonding experience with a cop.

"Did you want something besides trashing my friend?" I asked, moving away to sit on the sofa.

He joined me on the opposite end, seemingly unperturbed by my attempted rudeness. They probably teach that at the academy, Stoicism 101. "Yeah," he said. "I want some information about your friend."

"I already told you. She's kind, honest, a good mother."

"Don't know much more about her than I do, huh?"

I shrugged and sipped my Coke.

"Did you know Paula Walters isn't even her real name? She stole the identity of someone who died twenty-three years ago."

Damn! I was hoping he wouldn't find out about that. "Of course I know." I'd only known it for twenty-four hours, but he hadn't asked how long I'd known.

"Then you probably know why she did it."

I tried to think of an answer that would sound innocent but couldn't come up with one. "Maybe she has an abusive ex-husband, and she's afraid of him." When creativity fails, I sometimes have to rely on the truth.

"Could be. He could have found her and taken the kid today, but it's not likely he'd have left him at the park for us to find."

"Besides, she said he's dead."

"She said her name's Paula Walters."

We sipped our Cokes in silence for a few moments, then I decided to grill him. Worst he could do was refuse to answer, and I've always been amazed how much people will tell you if you only ask. "Where do you figure Lester Mackey comes in?"

"We don't know at this point. Could be he found out her true identity and he's blackmailing her for whatever it is in her past that she's hiding from."

Ouch. I hadn't thought about that. "So why did you start investigating his disappearance so soon, before the twenty-four or forty-eight or whatever that hour thing is?"

His lips compressed slightly. "I can't tell you that."

"How come I'm supposed to answer all your questions but you won't answer any of mine?"

"Because I'm the cop and those are the rules."

"Your rules, not mine. I don't play by other people's rules."

"That doesn't surprise me. Do you have any of those aspirins that came from that bottle at work?"

"Why? Is your shirt pocket having another headache?"

"No, the pain's a lot lower and on the back side of my body."

I got up to go find the aspirin I'd brought home. I didn't want him to see me grin at that remark. He really was kind of cute. For a cop.

My recycled bottle that held aspirin was so old, the label was long gone. I handed it to Trent, and he dumped a couple of tablets into his palm.

I didn't have to ask what he was looking for.

He found it. These tablets were larger than Paula's, weren't scored, and had the word _aspirin_ carved into one side.

He handed the bottle back to me, keeping the two in his palm. "These come from the same community bottle at your shop?"

"Yes."

He took another small envelope from his shirt pocket and slid my aspirins into it.

"Damn it," I said, "I don't know what those tablets are, but I do know Paula would never take drugs! Maybe somebody came in when the door was unlocked and put something else in her bottle."

"She'd already taken the pills before she left the door unlocked."

I glared at him. It was the only response I could come up with.

He stood. "Thanks for the Coke."

"You're welcome," I said automatically, then wished my mother hadn't trained me so well in manners. He wasn't welcome. I regretted being nice to someone who was going to cause problems for my friend.

He walked out the door onto my porch then turned back. "I'm probably going to regret this, but that apartment you asked about earlier is approximately three miles from here, over on Sycamore. Pretty close."

Before I could get past my shock and press my advantage by asking more questions, he strode down the walk to his car.

At least I had a start. Not a specific address, but Sycamore was a short street. There couldn't be many apartments on it.

I chug-a-lugged the rest of my Coke and was on the way to the kitchen for a shot of chocolate when someone knocked on the front door.

Fred.

"Come on in," I invited. "We need to talk." And I needed to figure out a way to convince him to come with me to locate and talk to Lester Mackey's landlord.

What an interesting coincidence that the first three letters of _convince_ are _con_.



I convinced Fred (or conned him; whatever) to go with me the following evening, and I was sleeping the sound sleep of the happily guilty when Henry, making horrible, jungle-cat noises, woke me at two a.m.

From the first night, he'd insisted on sleeping curled around my feet. I let him. It was kind of nice, having a male in bed who didn't give me any flack and only wanted to keep my feet warm. But it wasn't nice to be awakened at two a.m. by a racket like that.

I turned on the light and saw him standing with his paws on the window sill looking out the open window, his tail erect and the hair on his back standing up.

That certainly made the hair on the back of my neck stand up and my mouth go dry.

I barreled out of bed and charged over to the window, my gaze going straight to the vacant house across the street. It was quiet and dark in the moonless night, but the red tail lights on the car disappearing up the street caught my attention.

The tail lights of an SUV.

I'm pretty night-blind and the street lamp had apparently burned out, but I didn't need to be able to see clearly to know that the color of that SUV was hunter green, and the license plate belonged to Rick.

I sat down on the bed and put my head in my hands. I could only speculate as to what he was doing at my house at that hour. Had Muffy kicked him out? Had he slipped her some ersatz aspirin like Paula had taken then sneaked out when she went to sleep, hoping for another illicit rendezvous with me?

Surely if he'd knocked, I'd have heard him. Or maybe not. Maybe I was sleeping so soundly, I didn't hear him and he gave up and left.

A good thing too, because who knows if I would have had sense enough to send him away? I'd like to think I would have, but two in the morning is a lonely time of the night. People do crazy things at that hour.

I said virtually the same thing about Saturday evening, didn't I?

Okay, so some of us are capable of doing crazy things at any time.

"Let's go back to bed, Henry. We've got another hour." I turned off the light and lay down.

Henry continued his caterwauling, becoming more agitated instead of less. I hadn't really expected to be able to go back to sleep, but I wouldn't even be able to relax if he kept up that noise.

"Give it a rest, buddy! Rick's gone. I saw him drive away."

I tried to convince myself I was grateful I had a watch cat.

A visiting watch cat. I had phoned in an ad to the Pleasant Grove newspaper as well as the Kansas City Star. His owner would come to claim him any day. I needed to remember that, especially since I was becoming kind of attached to him. He was good company, warm and fuzzy, undemanding (even feeding him is a snap—just open a bag), listened well and would never cheat on me since he had only testicular remnants. Now he'd shown himself to be a good watch cat. I wasn't at all sure I wanted his owner to find him.

After a few minutes, he finally gave up and came back to bed, as calm as though nothing had happened. If scientists could just figure out the chemical make-up of cats, Prozac would be out of business.

Of course, we might all be chasing mice and coughing up fur balls, but no drug is without side effects.

In the meantime, I stared into the quiet darkness until the alarm shrieked in evil triumph at three a.m.

I showered, dressed, and trudged downstairs. As I crossed the living room, the light scent of the yellow roses drifted to greet me. My first response was a warm glow at the familiar fragrance and what it meant. But immediately memory kicked in and reminded me how things had changed. I should have pitched the damned flowers.

I went to the kitchen and got a cold Coke from the refrigerator, popped the top and took my first drink of the day, savoring the feel of the bubbles dancing over my tongue and down my throat. That helped my mood a little.

However, opening the front door to find a large basket holding three Easter eggs set my mood back to black. I knew they were from Rick and it was a really neat thing to do and I hated that it gave me a little warm spot in my heart. He used to do that a lot...give me "unbirthday presents," send me a Valentine in the middle of June, put up the Christmas tree and sing carols in August.

Henry sniffed the basket and its contents then stepped away disdainfully and sniffed or sneezed or whatever that thing was that he did. Obviously he hadn't forgotten the instant-coffee-in-the-briefcase caper.

Neither had I.

Nevertheless, knowing I shouldn't, I picked up one of the eggs and studied it in the light from the street lamp. It had a picture of a house. Another showed two people holding hands, the man with blond hair and the woman with red curls. The third was an intricate heart with our names inside. The pictures were small and sketchy but recognizable. Rick was artistic and painting on canvas or eggs had, like everything in his life, always come easily to him. Even so, he must have spent quite a bit of time working on those eggs.

The basket was much larger than necessary to hold those eggs and I wondered if Rick had planned to leave something else but Henry had frightened him away.

I considered taking the over-sized basket with me as I drove to work, pitching the eggs into the street one at a time, then entertaining myself all day with thoughts of hundreds of cars running over them, squishing Rick's art work into the pavement.

As I headed toward my garage, Henry strolled over to inspect a dark object lying on Paula's sidewalk. His posture and tail carriage indicated he had the same opinion of the object as he'd had of our visitor last night. Had Rick left another present after all, a present that somehow ended up on Paula's walk?

I walked over to check it out, and about that time Paula's door opened. She and Zach came outside. Zach was doing a pretty fair imitation of a kid awakened at three thirty in the morning who's still half asleep, but he managed a wave and a sleepy, "Anlinny."

"Morning, Hot Shot."

Henry stepped back from the object as I approached, and it occurred to me that his attitude last night and just now was pretty much the same as it had been on the porch of the house across the street. Surely Rick hadn't been skulking around that house, leaving his scent to freak out Henry.

Nah. He preferred to do his skulking in hotel rooms and his own bedroom.

Maybe cats had a limited range of reactions...sleepy, happy and totally freaked.

I stooped and lifted the object, a teddy bear. A mangled teddy bear with a red-streaked hole in his chest as if someone had carelessly ripped out his heart.

"Lester!"

I looked up to see Paula standing beside me with Zach in her arms. Her eyes were wide and her face pale. I wondered how many times her body could do that routine before it became permanent. Kind of like when I was young and my mother told me not to cross my eyes because they might stay that way. Actually, I wasn't completely convinced that Paula's fright mask hadn't already become permanent. Teddy bears, even wounded ones, don't usually terrify people.

"This bear's name is Lester? How do you know that?" I asked. I can only plead the ridiculous hour of the morning that it took me a couple of seconds to grasp the full impact of what she'd said. "Are we talking about Lester Mackey? I thought you didn't know the man."

She shook her head. "I don't."

"Then what—"

"Lindsay, you can't ask me. You can't know."

I threw my hands into the air. "Do you have any idea how crazy this is? Okay, you've got secrets about your past that you don't want to share. Fine. Far be it from me to pry. But this is the present and you're my friend and I live right next door to you and work with you all day! Sooner or later, I'm bound to find out what's going on. Do you think you could at least give me a clue as to what possible significance a stuffed bear can have in all this?"

She looked chagrined but determined to keep her secrets. And I'd always thought I had the market cornered on obstinacy.

I studied the mutilated bear. "It's the chest thing, isn't it? You think somebody's threatening to cut a hole in your heart?" I lifted the basket of eggs. "It's not you. I had a visit from a demented un-Easter bunny last night about two o'clock. I'm sure the bear was supposed to be a part of this package. Rick either got scared and tossed the bear when Henry started making a horrible racket or else some animal, maybe a possum or a raccoon, dragged it from the basket over to your walk."

She shook her head. "No. It was meant for me."

"Paula, you're being paranoid! Look. Big basket with only three eggs. The bear's heart has been ripped out. That's what Rick's trying to say I'm doing to him."

"There's blood everywhere."

_Everywhere_? There were only a few streaks of red on his chest. I filed her comment in the same folder as Fred's knowledge of maximum security prisons. Someday I'd figure out my friends' secrets.

"It's not blood. It's..." I hesitated, sniffed the bear and could feel myself blushing. "It's raspberry syrup."

That got her attention. I was afraid it would. "Raspberry syrup?"

"That's right. Come on, we need to get to the shop."

I plopped the bear into the basket of eggs and started back toward my garage, but her voice stopped me. "Why would anybody pour raspberry syrup around a hole in a stuffed bear's chest?"

"Trust me. Rick would. Let's go. Time's wasting. We've got biscuits and cinnamon rolls to make and coffee to brew."

She didn't budge. "Why would Rick put raspberry syrup on this bear?"

I heaved a martyred sigh. "You won't tell me anything about your past life and Fred won't tell me what he does all day, but the two of you expect to know every detail of my life!"

Paula waited. What the hell. I only had a few remaining shreds of privacy. I might as well sacrifice them to reassure my friend. "Rick always said my—" I gestured vaguely toward my breasts and could feel my face getting hotter, probably lighting up the night like a neon sign. "He thought...well, you know, raspberries. And then he found this raspberry syrup and he'd pour it—" I gestured again and Paula burst into laughter. At least my humiliation had lightened her mood.

"Okay, I get the picture!"

"Good. Then let's go to work." I took a couple more steps toward my garage.

"Lindsay?"

I turned back.

"Thanks. For everything."

I shrugged and grinned. "Don't you dare smirk the next time I make my Chocolate Cake to Die for with Raspberry Sauce."

She went to her car which stayed parked in her driveway in good weather because the garage door was so hard to open, and I lifted my own garage door. It seemed especially recalcitrant that morning which didn't help my disposition. I cursed Rick softly but fervently as I entered the garage. Embarrassment, anger, loss of sleep...none of those things quite managed to override the sentimental feelings he'd stirred with those stupid eggs and that mangled bear. Okay, the bear verged on macabre, but it was clever.

I tried to revive my post-leaving fantasies of the various ways I could kill Rick...strangulation, stabbing, gunshot, trauma to the head with a rusty iron skillet...

I noticed a length of nylon cord lying on the garage floor and added hanging to my list.

In fact, what I should do was hang the bear and give it back to him. Maybe then he'd get the message and leave me alone.

I scooped up the cord, fashioned it into a reasonable facsimile of a hangman's noose, and put it around the bear's neck. "It's just for show," I told the innocent stuffed animal. "I won't tighten it. Anyway, Rick already murdered you with that slash to the heart."

I got in my car and started the engine. If I hurried, I could run by his house, hang the bear and still make it to the shop in time to get everything done. Surely the traffic cops wouldn't be looking for speeders at that hour.

They weren't, and I managed to leave the bear dangling from a limb of the tree outside Rick and Muffy's front door, get to work, and have everything ready by the time the first customer arrived.

I considered leaving the eggs at his house too. But that would have been a waste of good eggs. Instead I peeled them, ground the pretty shells in the garbage disposal, and Zach and I ate the hard-boiled eggs for breakfast.

Everything was going well and I was feeling quite proud of myself until Rick called.

We were just starting lunch, and I was up to my elbows in chocolate cheesecake. Paula had left to take Zach to day care, so I dashed into our pseudo-office and snatched up the receiver. "Death by Chocolate. This is Lindsay Powell."

"That was pretty crass, Lindsay," Rick said.

I assumed he wasn't talking about my phone greeting. " _I'm_ crass? You're the one who cut out the poor little bear's heart."

" _I_ cut out his heart? I did no such thing. _You_ cut out his heart and then hung him! Muffy was very upset! Do you know what it's like to look out your window and see a bear hanging from a tree, a bear you gave as a present to someone you care about?"

"Do you know what it's like to leave your house before dawn, half asleep, and find a bear with a gaping hole in his chest?"

There was a moment of silence. Then in a quieter, slightly confused voice— "He really had that hole when you found him? Lindsay, I drew a heart on that bear with raspberry syrup. I didn't cut that hole."

"You didn't?"

"No, I didn't. You didn't?"

"Well, I guess some animal likes raspberry syrup and nibbled a little too deep."

"That's disgusting!"

"Crass," I agreed.

"I'm sorry, babe. I wanted it to be a fun surprise for you, not something to shock your sensibilities. I'll just have to bring you another bear. I have plenty of raspberry syrup." Rick's voice dropped into a low, intimate tone.

"Do not bring me another bear or send more flowers!"

"Did you enjoy the roses? Were they fresh?"

"They were beautiful. I enjoyed them, but I'd rather you didn't send me any more. Why are you doing this? Did you and Tuffy have a fight?"

"Muffy. No, we didn't have a fight. It's just that she's not you. I miss you. Can't we try to work things out?"

I ordered my lips to say the word _No!_ in an emphatic tone, but my throat and vocal chords ignored me.

"How about dinner tonight?" he asked, correctly interpreting my hesitation.

"I already have plans."

"Tomorrow night."

"I'll call you. I have to go now. A buzzer just went off in the kitchen."

"Did you like the eggs?" He couldn't resist tossing in one last tug at the old heartstrings.

"They were okay. A little overcooked."

" _A little overcooked?_ You _ate_ them?"

"Yep. You know how crass I am. Gotta run. Bye."

I hung up the phone, shoved some of Zach's colorful plastic toys off the desk chair and sank down, trying to sort out the kaleidoscope spinning in my head. Rick's persistence and my weakness were a part of that mass confusion, but not the major part.

The hole in that bear's heart had been cleanly cut as if with a knife or scissors. There were no irregular rips and no evidence of sharp animal teeth. If Rick hadn't done it, who had...and why? Did it have something to do with Paula's secret? With Lester Mackey?

# Chapter Eight

I went straight home from work and changed into pantyhose, white blouse, black skirt and blazer for my visit to Lester Mackey's apartment. I had some sort of illusion that I should look official, a female version of _Men in Black_. I actually looked more like I was going to a funeral, which was what I'd bought the outfit for in the first place. However, it was all I had that even remotely qualified as _official_ looking.

When I rang Fred's door bell, I was loaded for bear, prepared to do battle if he tried to back out of going. As soon as he opened the door, I launched into a hurried account of the murdered teddy bear.

When I stopped to take a breath, he asked, "Do you know what you're getting into?"

"Of course I do," I lied.

He stepped outside and I noticed he was wearing a dark suit too. I hadn't even realized he owned one. Probably bought his for funerals too. Whose funerals? Who did he know besides Paula and me?

"We're taking my car," he said adamantly, indicating his 1968 mint-condition Mercedes. White and gleaming like a toothpaste ad, it sat in his driveway, ready to roll. "Your driving sends me into cardiac arrest."

That was fine with me. Not only would this be my first ride in his pampered vehicle, but if we'd taken my Celica, I'd have had to clean out my front seat for him to sit there. That task would take a while and possibly uncover a few Coke cans old enough to qualify as antiques.

Nevertheless I couldn't let him get off that easy. "You don't need to worry about riding with me in the future," I assured him. "I bought a special set of electric paddles that plug into the cigarette lighter so I'll be able to restart your heart."

"Unnecessary. Your car's so messy, I'd have to take a tranquilizer before I could get in."

He'd believe the electric paddles story before he'd believe I'd planned to clean out my car, so I let it go.

His car in the driveway told me he'd had no plans to protest our mission. Other than coming out to be polished and taken to the grocery store, that vehicle pretty much lives in the garage so the paint wouldn't fade and flies couldn't leave their footprints.

Fred's easy acquiescence made it obvious that he grasped the seriousness of the situation with Paula and Lester Mackey. That meant it was really serious.

He opened the passenger door. Courteous or just making sure I didn't smudge the handle?

"I don't suppose you found out exactly where this apartment building is," I asked as I slid onto the cool leather seat.

"Yes, I did." He went around to the driver's side and got in.

Yeah, things were serious.

"How'd you find out?" I asked as we drove down the street at precisely the speed limit.

"Do I ask you for your secret recipes?"

"I'd give them to you if you did."

"A secret's not a secret if you tell."

I interpreted that to mean, no matter how big a blabbermouth I might be, he wasn't going to reciprocate.



Sycamore Street was in an area no older than our neighborhood—possibly a few years newer—but it hadn't aged as graciously. The homes and small apartment buildings hovered between picturesque and rundown.

Fred pulled over in front of a red brick building in the middle of the block, and we looked at each other.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Sure," I lied again. "Uh, do you think we ought to discuss how we're going to handle this? What we're going to say to the manager?"

"Follow my lead."

If anybody else had told me that, I'd have protested long and loud, but I figured Fred must have every syllable carefully planned out and I wouldn't have to say a word. Surely he didn't trust me to improvise.

He took off his glasses and put on a dark hat.

"Hey, you didn't tell me we should come disguised!" I protested.

"You're disguised. You're wearing real clothes. Anyway, you don't have to. I do."

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

He didn't answer. I didn't expect him to.

We got out and started up the walk, stepping over the upheavals of concrete and tree roots. The building was in even worse shape than it appeared from the street. Chunks of mortar had fallen from between the bricks at odd intervals, and a long, jagged crack ran all the way down one side. The mesh on the screen door was rusty and had come loose at one corner.

"I think we can assume Lester Mackey was not a wealthy man," I whispered.

Fred scowled at me. Apparently I wasn't following his lead.

We went inside and were immediately engulfed by a musty smell. I couldn't imagine what it would be like in the winter when the place was closed up with no fresh air coming in.

Faded letters on the door to our right told us it was _Apt. A, Manager._ Fred knocked.

The overweight, under-washed man opened it so fast, he must have been watching out the window and seen us come up. He glared at us from beady eyes set deep in his puffy face, and his rubbery lips stretched into a frown with the corners reaching almost to his chin. A television game show blared from inside his apartment. We'd interrupted his routine.

"Whaddaya want?"

"Robert Anderson and Julia Crawley." Fred responded so easily I had to stop myself from turning around to see if those people were standing behind us. "We're with Guaranteed Heir Finders, and we're trying to locate Lester Mackey."

"I don't know where he is." The man started to close the door, but Fred was faster. He grabbed the edge while I added my contribution by stepping halfway inside and smiling at him. Smiling or sneering. It was hard to know how the effort came out.

"Whoever helps us locate Mr. Mackey gets the ten percent finder's fee," Fred said. "Ten percent of five million dollars."

I sidled closer into the place even though the smells of well-aged fast food and dirty clothes were kind of overpowering. I might never eat another burger.

The manager studied us for a minute. "You got any proof who you are?" He wasn't as dumb as he looked.

Fred took a card from his shirt pocket and handed it to the man.

He'd even printed up cards for the occasion. I was quite impressed with this display of sneakiness.

The manager relaxed and rolled his lips into a gross caricature of a greedy smile. "Ten percent of five million dollars? What is that, about a hundred thousand dollars?" Okay, he was as dumb as he looked.

"Five hundred thousand," I corrected.

His smile got bigger and grosser. "I didn't mean to be rude, but I get a lot of salesmen, you know. Name's George Stinson. I'm the manager." He extended a puffy, sweaty hand.

Fred's lips pinched, but that was the only indication of the distaste I knew he was feeling as he grasped that creep's hand and shook it. I was impressed. Fred was good at this acting business.

"So what can you tell us about Lester Mackey's whereabouts?" Fred asked, retrieving his hand and holding it at his side with the fingers spread as if airing it.

"He rents apartment C upstairs, but he's not there. Come on in and make yourselves comfortable." George Stinson opened the door wide and indicated a room littered with dirty dishes, fast-food wrappers, clothes and beer cans. "You want a beer?"

"We appreciate your offer of hospitality, but we can't drink while we're on duty," I improvised. "Or sit down." No matter how good an actor Fred might be, I didn't think he could survive that assault on his fastidiousness. I wasn't sure I could either, and I'm not all that fastidious.

"If Mr. Mackey isn't in his apartment, where is he?" Fred prompted.

"He's gone for a few days, but he's coming back. All his stuff's still here."

"Gone where?"

Stinson looked a little uneasy. "I'm not real sure."

"Could we see his apartment? Maybe there'll be something there to tell us where we can find him. These bequests expire so fast, we really need to get right on it."

_These bequests expire so fast?_ I'd never realized Fred had such a line of BS...and Stinson was buying every word of it.

"Sure, just let me get my keys." The manager reached behind the door and produced a rusty ring of keys. "All set." He started up the stairs and we followed.

"How long has Mr. Mackey lived here?" Fred asked.

"He come in three weeks ago needing a furnished place for a month." Stinson paused every couple of steps to take a rattling breath. Obviously the combined acts of climbing stairs and talking created an unaccustomed and strenuous set of activities. Sitting while watching television game shows probably strained his repertoire of simultaneous physical and mental activities. "I don't usually rent furnished, but this guy had the cash to pay extra and said when he closed his big business deal at the end of the month, he'd have a nice bonus for me." He turned back to Fred. "That won't interfere with the ten percent from this inheritance, will it?"

Fred shook his head. "Of course not. All you have to do is help us find Mackey, and you'll get ten percent of whatever he gets. Did he tell you what his big deal involved?"

"Nah. Pretty tight-mouthed guy. Lot of people are. Long as they pay their rent, I don't care. I mind my own business. Whatever he was doing, looked like he was working pretty hard at it. Left out of here a little after noon every day and didn't get back till late at night, sometimes dawn." Stinson sounded pompous with importance in this real-life game show he thought he could win.

"When was the last time you saw him?"

Stinson heaved himself onto the third floor landing and turned toward Fred. His red face and the way he was wheezing combined with his melodramatically intent expression made him look as if he was intently considering having a stroke. "Last Saturday night. He come to my door a little before eight o'clock, right in the middle of the football game. It was kinda strange to see him there. He kept to hisself ever since he moved in. Anyway, he said his sink was stopped up. I told him I'd take a look at it and tried to close the door, but he held it open. He was real excited, talking fast and couldn't stand still. Said he was leaving to meet somebody and he'd sure appreciate it if I could have the problem took care of by the time he got back in two hours. I guess he could tell I wasn't real happy about having to miss the rest of that ball game, so he smiled and said this was the big meeting he'd come to town for and that when he got back, he'd have that bonus he promised me."

"But he didn't come back?"

Stinson turned his key in the door of apartment C, and I thought for a minute he wasn't going to answer Fred's question. Then he straightened and seemed to come to a decision. "About an hour after he left, I got a phone call. The game was still on, so I wasn't listening real close at first and whoever it was on the other end was mumbling like he was drunk. I just caught a few words, like _bitch_ and _no money_ and _dying_. I asked, _Who is this?_ and he kinda moaned and said, _Mackey. Help. Call cops._ Something like that. He wasn't talking real clear."

"Did you call the police?" Fred asked.

Stinson shrugged. "Not right away. I thought maybe it was some of my friends being funny, trying to get me in trouble, making me call the cops when nothing was wrong. But then this Mackey guy didn't come home and I started to get worried. Told me when he rented the place that he was what you call a creature of habit, and he was till Saturday night. I knew something was wrong after that phone call. So Sunday morning I called the cops."

"What do you think happened to Mackey?" Fred asked.

I could almost hear those rusty wheels turning in Stinson's sweaty head. "I don't know. If he's dead, do I still get the money?"

"Maybe, if you help us find the body," I said. Well, it wasn't any more outrageous than Fred's assertion that an inheritance expired fast.

Stinson opened the apartment door and stepped inside. We followed him.

The room had nothing personal anywhere. The cheap, mismatched furniture smelled like mildew and stale cigarette smoke. No T-shirts had been tossed onto the sofa, no shoes and socks dribbled around the green carpet...no sign of male habitation.

"Can you give us a description of Mackey?" Fred asked.

"Tall, but not as tall as you are. Big chest, like he worked out in one of them gyms all the time. Good shape for an old guy. Gray hair cut short. Wore them little gold wire glasses. Had a big, ugly mole right here." He touched his left cheek with a pudgy finger. "Every time I saw him, he had on a suit and tie. Looked like a banker except for that mole."

Bankers couldn't have moles?

"And you haven't heard from him or seen him since? No more mysterious phone calls?"

"Nope. All his stuff's still here. His razor, his clothes. Even if you figure he's trying to get out of paying me that bonus, it don't seem right, leaving everything he owns. He's got some expensive suits in there."

"What about family?" Fred continued. "Did he list anybody on his rental application?"

"He paid cash. I didn't get a rental app on him."

"I see. What kind of car was he driving?"

"A blue Oldsmobile. Big and old. The paint was faded, and it made a lot of noise. That's how I could always tell when he was coming or going."

"Do you have a license number of this vehicle?"

"Yeah, sure, downstairs."

"Would you mind getting it while we look around a little more for anything that would give us a clue as to his whereabouts?" Fred sounded official. That suit he was wearing seemed to have transformed him.

"Sure."

Stinson started to leave, but Fred stopped him with another question. "Did you get his sink fixed?"

"Yeah. Had a rag in the drain. People don't take care of things."

He left, and I turned to Fred. "You're good at this."

He put on his glasses then pulled two pairs of rubber gloves from his pocket and handed one to me. "Put these on."

"Oh, come on! It's not that filthy in here!"

"We don't want to leave fingerprints. Put them on."

Fred continued to amaze me. Maybe he was a burglar in his spare time.

He headed toward the kitchen and I followed. Like the living room and Mother Hubbard's cupboard, it was pretty bare. No dishes, not even a water glass, no beer in the refrigerator, no peanut butter in the pantry, no dishtowels.

"I wonder where the rag that got stuck in the drain came from," I said.

"Just what I was thinking." Fred peered under the sink.

"Either this Mackey guy is as obsessively tidy as you are, or he eats all his meals and drinks all his water at restaurants."

"Let's check the bedroom."

At least that room showed signs of habitation. The bed was unmade, the rumpled sheets thrown back, and white T-shirts, boxer shorts and navy blue socks littered the bed and the floor.

Fred examined a scrap of paper on the nightstand. "Paula's name and number, Saturday's date and eight o'clock p.m. Must be what the police found. Interesting they left it here. Apparently they don't consider this a crime yet."

I moved over beside him to look and picked up a matchbook, the only other thing on the nightstand except the lamp. "Last Chance Watering Hole, Dallas, Texas. Guess that explains why the cops asked Paula if she was from Dallas."

"Interesting, especially since there aren't any ashtrays around."

"No matches used. Somebody's been smoking in here, but I suppose it could have been a previous tenant. I doubt if the place got aired in between."

"Maybe." He laid down the paper and began picking up the clothing, studying each piece. I wasn't sure what we were looking for but I followed his lead.

All were a large size, all well worn, but the brands were different. "This is strange," I said.

"What?"

"Well, a woman may own several brands of underwear. We buy for style or color or sale price or because we're depressed. But you men, when your underwear has so many holes in it, you can't tell which are the ones your arms and legs go through, you buy a dozen of the same brand, same size, all at once."

"I never wear clothes with holes in them. But you are correct about the rest."

"Unless he's so broke he buys from garage sales and thrift stores."

"That's a possibility." He strode to the closet.

I looked over his shoulder. Two suits, half a dozen white shirts, and a couple of conservative, out of style ties pretty much filled the tiny space. A suitcase that looked as if it had been dragged behind a car all the way from Dallas to Kansas City sat on the floor.

Fred took out one suit and held it up to examine it. "If Stinson thinks these are expensive, I'd hate to see what he considers _cheap_ suits." He put the garment back and flipped through the closet. "Different labels. Same thing with the shirts and ties."

"Well, we knew he wasn't rich or he wouldn't be living here, so maybe he did shop at thrift stores."

"But he was planning to come into some money."

"And not from an inheritance," I said.

Fred shrugged. "It got us in here."

I couldn't argue with success. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking about the source of this expected money?"

"For once, I think you and I are on the same track. Doesn't look too good for Paula since she's obviously got something to hide, something she could be blackmailed for."

"But on the plus side, she doesn't have any money to pay a blackmailer." The ramifications of that hit me like a brick upside the head. I could tell by Fred's expression he'd already thought of the fact that Paula would have had to find another way to deal with a blackmailer. "Maybe that's not a point on the plus side after all. But it doesn't matter! We know she'd never hurt anybody."

"Let's check the bathroom." He headed toward that door.

"Is that a male euphemism for saying you need to go potty?" I called after him.

He turned back. "The bathroom is where you find out the most about a person."

We went down the hall and found the small bathroom even messier than the bedroom. Stinson was right about one thing. Mackey had planned to come back. His soap, toothpaste, toothbrush, razor, comb...all his personal items were still in the bathroom.

Using just the tips of his gloved fingers, Fred picked up and examined a black comb with short gray hairs in it. More hairs littered the sink, and there were several pieces of toilet paper with dried blood on them as if he'd cut himself shaving. Lester Mackey was not a tidy person. Even so, I didn't think I liked him.

I pushed the shower curtain aside. "No hairs in the bathtub. Either Mackey's tidier in the shower than everywhere else or he wears a hairpiece."

Fred peered over my shoulder. "He wore a hair piece."

"That's my guess too. Slobs in the bedroom are slobs in the shower."

"I meant because the hairs in the comb aren't natural. They're from a hair piece."

"Oh."

Fred moved away and opened the medicine cabinet. "This is interesting."

I stepped over to look, half expecting to see a bottle of aspirin-sized pills that were scored in half.

Fred lifted out a paper cup that held a tangle of longer, darker hairs with blond roots.

"Damn."

I expected Fred to say something about my language but he didn't. "My sentiments exactly."

"That looks like it was pulled out of a brush, like maybe—" I hesitated, not wanting to use Paula's name and make this real— "like maybe somebody cleaned her brush and tossed the hairs in the trash and then some slimeball came along, dug through somebody's private trash, found these hairs and saved them. What kind of a sicko would do that?"

"A sicko collecting evidence that somebody really has blond hair, not brown, and she really is the person he's looking for and he has proof of her true identity in order to blackmail her."

"Damn," I said again. My vocabulary's really not limited. I just couldn't come up with any other word that fit the occasion quite so well. "Maybe Mackey had a girl friend who dyed her hair."

Fred didn't bother to dignify that absurdity with a response.

"I got that license number!" Stinson called from downstairs.

"He probably couldn't make it up here twice in the same day," I speculated. "Just as well. I'm not about to give him mouth-to-mouth if he has a heart attack."

Fred stuck the paper cup of hairs back in the medicine cabinet and closed the door. "Let's go."

"You go on," I said. "I need to use the facilities."

He looked at me suspiciously. "You want to use _these_ facilities?"

"When you gotta go, you gotta go."

"You can't wait until you get home?"

"No, I can't. It's a female thing." That always sends men running.

It worked with Fred.

I closed the door behind him, opened the medicine cabinet, took out the paper cup, dumped the hairs into the filthy toilet and flushed it. Yes, I admit it. I destroyed evidence. Possible evidence. We didn't even know a crime had been committed. But I was certain of one thing. If a crime had been committed, Paula didn't do it.

And if she did, she had a damn good reason.

# Chapter Nine

We went downstairs. Stinson offered Fred a dirty slip of paper with Mackey's license plate number written on it. Fred had removed his gloves when we left Mackey's apartment and had to take the paper tentatively between the tips of his thumb and index finger.

Outside in the fresh air I drew in a deep breath and tried to get all the smelly ugliness of that place out of my lungs. Fred waved the paper in the air a few times as if shaking off Stinson's touch then folded it and put it in his shirt pocket.

I felt as if I needed to take a shower before getting back into the immaculate, air-conditioned cleanness of Fred's car. But I wasn't about to be left behind at that place so I scooted in anyway.

I'd been pretty quiet after the flushing episode, but as soon as we pulled away from the curb, my mouth kicked in again. "It could be a garden variety nutcase who's been stalking Paula," I said. "Went through her trash and collected some of her hair. Somehow found her unlisted phone number."

"Maybe. A garden variety nutcase who came to town to blackmail somebody else and along the way just happened to decide to stalk Paula until he went to collect the blackmail money and never returned."

"It could have happened that way," I muttered.

Fred didn't say anything.

"Can you think of a better scenario?" I carefully avoided the use of the word _logical._ I was only too well aware of the more logical scenario, and I wasn't ready to go there.

"No."

Apparently Fred wasn't ready to go there either.

When we pulled into Fred's driveway, I saw Rick's car parked in mine and Rick sitting on my porch.

Fred spotted him too. "Want to come in for a while?"

I shook my head, took a deep breath and headed for home. I had a right to be there. Rick was the intruder, and I wasn't going to let him keep me out of my own home.

But it wasn't quite that simple. I couldn't decide if I was glad or upset to see him. A little of both, to be completely honest. Henry appeared from nowhere and fell into step beside me. For some weird reason, that made it easier to approach my almost-ex.

"What are you doing here?" I snarled, but my heart wasn't in it, and I could tell he knew that.

He smiled. "Waiting for you to come home."

Henry and I marched disdainfully past him. I unlocked my door and we went in. Rick followed.

I tossed my jacket on the back of the sofa and turned to him. "I don't remember inviting you to come into my home." Okay, I didn't have to be so rude, but I was pretty stressed about that visit to Mackey's apartment and that damn tangle of dark hairs with blond roots. The last thing I needed was to have to deal with my ambivalent feelings about Rick Kramer.

He smiled again. "May I come in?"

I shrugged. "I guess so." I turned away and headed straight for the kitchen to get a Coke. Maybe two. One for each hand.

"Would you like something to drink?" I called to Rick. Unfortunately, despite appearances to the contrary, I am my mother's daughter. While I can be quite rude when the occasion calls for it, there are a few manners I can't ignore like offering a guest something to drink.

"Yes, thank you," he replied. What a polite guest. "A Coke would be great." He didn't really like Coke. He just wanted an excuse to hang around.

When I returned to the living room with our drinks, he'd already made himself comfortable on one end of my sofa.

To my surprise, Henry had stretched out on the remainder of the sofa rather than in my recliner. Was it possible Henry had decided to accept Rick?

Considering his tail was the end nearest Rick, probably not.

The next question was whether Henry was smart enough to know that he was thus preventing me from sitting beside Rick and possibly making a total fool out of myself.

Of course not. It was just a coincidence. Cats weren't that smart.

Henry lifted his head and I could have sworn he was grinning.

Maybe they were that smart.

I headed for the recliner, but Rick protested. "Come sit beside me." He tried to give Henry's rear a shove, but Henry lifted his head, bared his teeth and hissed. They were quite large teeth. I wasn't surprised that Rick gave in.

He leaned back and withdrew a small gift-wrapped box from his jacket pocket. "I brought you something."

Probably jewelry, judging from the size of the box. Rick knew I wasn't really into jewelry, so he gave me sentimental stuff like a ring with two hearts entwined featuring both our birthstones. "I wish you hadn't," I said. Then more firmly, "I can't accept it."

He set it on the coffee table. "It's yours. Do whatever you want with it. Throw it in the trash unopened if that's what you want."

He knew I'd never do that. My curiosity would get the better of me and I'd have to open it sooner or later. Then I might toss it into the trash or the Missouri River. Or sell it.

I decided to resort to my party manners mode, thank-you-mother-for-all-the-training-you-thought-didn't-take. "That's very nice of you to bring me a gift. I'm pleased that all the emotional upheaval has died down and you and I can be friends after the divorce." It was a huge lie, but it sounded good.

"Lindsay, you and I both know after Saturday night that the emotional ties between us are still strong."

Henry's huge tail swung up to slap Rick's chest. Rick glared at him, but Henry appeared to be sound asleep.

"Cat dream," I said.

"Can't you get your cat off the sofa?"

"He's not my cat. He's a guest cat. Asking him to move would be rude." Maybe this manners thing could work in my favor after all.

"Fine. Look, Lindsay, we need to talk about you and me."

"No!" I bit my lip and ordered myself to return to the party manners mode. "Rick, this isn't a good time. I just got back from a very disturbing incident. In fact, the last few days have been very disturbing. I've got a lot on my mind right now."

Sympathy and understanding...or a reasonable facsimile thereof...softened his features. He came over to stand behind me, loosened the top buttons of my blouse, and began to massage my neck and shoulders. His fingers were warm and firm and familiar, and it felt wonderful. Sure, I should have told him to stop, but it was kind of like the flowers. Why give up something I enjoyed just because the source was questionable?

"If you want to tell me what's bothering you, maybe I can help," Rick offered.

That massage loosened my tongue as well as my muscles, and I soon found myself babbling about everything that had happened with Paula and the house across the street while Rick kneaded away my tension and murmured soothing nothings. I did leave out the part about Detective Trent's almost-spring hazel eyes and our almost-bonding experience.

When I got to the business about the smooth edges of the hole in the stuffed bear's chest, Rick became a little tense. "You're right, babe. I should have noticed that. Somebody saw me deliver your basket, came up and took it, then mutilated it and put it on Paula's walk. Somebody's watching you. Why aren't the police doing anything?"

"They're doing all they can. Anyway, it's not me this creep is watching. It's Paula."

I told him about talking to Stinson. However, I did not include the details of Fred's charade or of the flushing incident.

It felt good to be able to share my problems with Rick again the way I'd done for five years, to feel that old familiar closeness.

"I can't believe Fred let you go into that apartment building," he protested. "Please promise me you won't do anything like that again. I'll be worried sick about you."

His tone was so soothing, so cajoling, I almost agreed, almost let myself slip back into a former life where somebody cared about my welfare and worried about me. But I couldn't quite make that promise, couldn't quite tell such an outrageous lie.

"Don't worry about me." I didn't want to argue or, worse, stop the great massage, and that was the best avoidance I could come up with on short notice.

"I do worry about you. I care about you." Did I mention he's a damn good salesman? I'm positive the Sirens of mythology who lured all those sailors to their deaths with their irresistible songs were Rick's ancestors.

"Ummm," I said, long past fighting the lure.

"Your parents are worried about you too."

That broke the spell. "My parents? When did you talk to my parents?"

"I talk to them regularly. They're the only family I have."

_They're not your family, they're mine,_ I wanted to say, but that seemed cruel. He had no family, and maybe he was feeling vulnerable and alone because of the divorce.

"Don't mention any of this to Mom or Dad," I said instead.

"Your mother told me you cancelled dinner with them on Sunday."

"Big deal. She was relieved." And I was starting to feel stressed again.

"She was concerned. She thinks your behavior since we separated has become even more erratic than normal." Rick's fingers suddenly felt like soft, warm steel traps.

"Are you saying my mother used the word _normal_ in a sentence about me? I must be improving!"

"There's no need for sarcasm. Your parents and I just want to take care of you."

The phone rang, interrupting more potential sarcasm about my desire to be taken care of. I jumped up, pulling away from Rick and feeling like Ulysses must have felt when his ship finally sailed out of hearing range of the Sirens.

I snatched up the receiver. "Hello?" Friend, telemarketer or wrong number, I was going to talk to the person on the other end until Rick left.

"Lindsay, this is Fred. Did you know there's a police car parked in front of Paula's house?"

"No!" I leaned around to peer out the window and saw the black and white. "I'm on my way."

"I'm in the middle of running down this license plate we got from Stinson. Are you okay to go by yourself?"

"Sure."

"Call me if you need me, and I'll be right there."

"I know you will."

I hung up and started for the door but Rick grabbed my arm. "What's going on?" he demanded.

I glared at the hand restraining me. "If you'll let go of my arm, I can find out."

He looked outside and frowned. "You don't need to go over there. Let the police handle it."

I jerked my arm free. "Paula's my friend. I'm going."

"Do you remember when you insisted we let her move in and I warned you she'd be trouble? I hate to say it, but I told you so."

"You don't hate to say it! You love to say it! We had a marriage built on _I told you so_! In five years I never did anything right, so you can pretty much figure I'm not going to start now!"

"Calm down, Lindsay."

"Don't tell me to calm down! This is my house and I can be whatever I like in my own home and I like being uncalm and irrational and out of control!" I stormed out of my house and slammed my door.

Rick followed behind as I ran to Paula's house. In spite of my protests, he'd somehow managed to make me feel like an incompetent clod, just the way he did every time we got into an argument. I guess that's why I didn't confront him about his night-time absences when we were married. I knew I'd end up the loser no matter what.

Paula's door was open. I didn't wait to be invited in. Neither did Rick.

Paula sat on one end of the sofa with Creighton on the other and Zach in between. Trent loomed over the three of them.

They all looked up when I charged in. Paula's eyes were bright with tears and terror. Zach grinned and pointed. "Anlinny!"

"What's going on?" I demanded.

"Have you ever considered minding your own business?" Trent snapped.

That was all it took. I was already furious and ready to strike out at somebody. I strode over and got in his face. "Never, and I don't expect to do so in the future either, so deal with it!"

His greenish eyes narrowed and flared into full, hot summer. "I'm here on official police business. You're not. Are you going to leave the premises voluntarily or am I going to have to handcuff you and forcibly evict you?"

"You better drag out the handcuffs." I knew I was being ridiculous, but I couldn't seem to stop.

"Hold on!" In my peripheral vision I saw Rick move up beside me. "We own this property. You can't evict us."

"Who are you?" Trent asked.

I whirled on Rick. " _We_ don't own this property. _I_ own this property. At least I will in three weeks. And this man can evict me if he wants to! You stay out of this!"

"I'm her husband." Rick spoke to Trent in a proprietary tone.

"My ex-husband."

"Not for three weeks."

"You're going to be my deceased husband if you keep pushing it!" I spun back toward Trent and held out my hands. "Cuff me!"

He looked at me for a minute as though he thought I was totally insane, then he turned to Rick and back to me again. "Do you think you two could take your domestic squabbles somewhere else and stop interfering with police business?"

I was humiliated, which only made me twice as angry. I stalked over to a chair, sat down, crossed my legs and folded my arms. Zach scooted off the sofa and came to sit in my lap.

Trent threw up his hands.

"Boo boo," Zach said, pointing to a bruise on the side of his leg.

"You sure do have a boo boo. How did that happen?"

Zach gave me an earnest though almost completely incoherent description of how his injury came about. The only word I recognized was "paak." Evidently he'd fallen in the park.

The room seemed awfully quiet when Zach finished speaking. I looked up to see everybody watching us. Rick was obviously frustrated and angry, the way he always was when he lost control of a situation, but the others seemed uncomfortable too.

"What?" I asked, then an awful thought crossed my mind. "Did something happen to Zach? Did somebody hit him? What's going on?"

"Someone called the police and told them I was abusing Zach, that his life is in danger," Paula said softly.

"What?! That's ridiculous!" I set Zach on the floor. "Go get your truck, okay?" He toddled off, and I marched over to invade Detective Trent's space again. "That is absolutely the most absurd thing I've ever heard. Paula would never hurt Zach. Paula would never hurt anybody."

Rick moved up beside me and put his arm around my waist. "Lindsay, I think you should stay out of this."

"I, on the other hand," I said without even glancing in his direction, "will hurt my ex-husband right here in front of two police officers if he doesn't take his hands off me this minute."

Rick took his arm from around my waist but didn't move away. "Lindsay, these people don't want to hear about our marital problems." He smiled. Even though I wasn't looking at him, I could feel that smile. I could see it too in Trent's expression. His face closed up as if he'd seen something he wanted no part of.

"Will a character witness help Paula's case?" I asked in as sane and rational a voice as I could muster.

Trent didn't answer immediately. He was probably trying to decide if having me as a character witness would hurt or help Paula's case.

"Not with us," Creighton said, "but because of the complaint and the added complication of the way the boy disappeared yesterday, Social Services will be investigating in a few days. It probably wouldn't hurt for you to talk to them."

Zach charged back into the room carrying his orange truck. I sat on the floor to play with him.

"Whoever called the police said I'd beaten Zach on the porch then dragged him inside and they could hear him screaming." Paula's voice was strained, almost at the breaking point.

"He does have a bruise—" Creighton began.

Paula interrupted him. "He fell off a swing in the park."

"But we don't believe he's in immediate danger," Creighton finished.

"If he's in any kind of danger, it's not from Paula," I snapped.

"There seem to be a lot of strange things going on," Rick said, and I cringed. Why had I told him everything? Anything, for that matter! Please, God, he wasn't going to repeat the things I'd said. The man has been known to do that just to prove he's in the know.

"What strange things?" Trent asked, taking a seat on the coffee table next to where I sat on the floor.

"The mutilated bear is the only thing you don't already know about," I said hurriedly, then proceeded to tell him that story. Well, not all of that story. Not the raspberry syrup part.

Rick insisted on inserting comments like how the un-Easter basket had special meaning for us as did the bear. Trent and I had another bonding moment as we both strove to ignore Rick. You know what they say about divorce making for strange bedfellows. Not literally, of course. Certainly I wasn't thinking of Trent in that context. Most of the time I didn't even like him. But he did have his moments. If he weren't a cop, we might get along. Some of the time, anyway.

"Do you still have this bear?" Trent asked.

"Nope. I hung him from a tree in Rick's front yard. Mr. Kramer has custody of the deceased bear."

Trent looked up at Rick. "I'd like to have a look if you don't mind."

"I'm afraid it went out in the trash," Rick said smoothly.

"Scared Buffy," I explained.

"Muffy," Rick corrected automatically, then clenched his lips as if he'd like to take back the word that put a different slant on his portrayal of the mistreated almost-ex-husband.

"His roomie. She's very sensitive."

Trent nodded. "Has your trash been picked up yet, Mr. Kramer?"

"I don't know."

"When I lived there six weeks ago it was picked up on Wednesday mornings. If you hurry, you can probably drag out the bear, dust off the coffee grounds, and fingerprint him."

"Is that true, Mr. Kramer? Your trash doesn't go out until Wednesday?"

Rick smiled. "Lindsay has a terrific memory. She's right, as usual."

Trent stood. "Great. Then let's go. Where do you live?"

Rick's smile faltered. "Right now? You want to go get it right now?"

Trent checked his watch. "I got off work an hour ago. I'd really like to get this wrapped up as quickly as possible."

It was an interesting test of wills. For a moment the two men stood with gazes locked, then Trent started toward the door with Rick in tow.

"I'll be back later, Lindsay," Rick called over his shoulder.

"That wouldn't be a very good idea! I didn't get my nap this afternoon so I'll be going to bed as soon as I get home, and you know what a raving bitch I am when you wake me up."

I breathed a sigh of relief when the cops and Rick were gone.

"You might as well lock up," I told Paula. "I'm not going anywhere until we have a talk."

She didn't protest. I sensed she was completely drained. A good time to finally break through her defenses.

While she locked the door, I extricated myself from Zach. "Okay, Hot Shot, you're going to have to play by yourself for a little while. Aunt Lindsay needs to talk to your mommy."

I sat on the sofa, and he climbed up beside me, trying to entice me with the orange truck and incoherent promises of how much fun we could have. I smoothed back his soft hair and kissed his nose. "You little charmer. Don't you dare grow up to be like your Uncle Rick."

"Uck-ick!" he mimicked happily.

"You got that right." I looked at Paula. "Maybe he ought to play in the other room for a while. I'm not sure he needs to hear some of this."

Paula hesitated then nodded. "He's already heard a lot more than he should have. People think kids don't understand just because they can't talk."

"Kids and animals understand a lot more than we give them credit for," I agreed, recalling how King Henry took over one end of the sofa and kept me away from Rick.

Paula lifted Zach. "Come on, sweetie. It's close to your bedtime."

Zach protested. He didn't want to leave the place where all the action was.

"I'll let you watch Toy Story again, okay?" She disappeared upstairs with Zach still protesting. In a few seconds I heard the low sound of a television, then Paula returned and sat beside me, hands clasped in her lap, gaze focused on her hands.

I started to tell her about the hole in the hedge, but she interrupted to say Trent had already told her. When I brought up her false identity, she looked a little surprised that I knew, but admitted that Trent had also confronted her about that.

"And?" I encouraged.

"And what?"

"How did you explain that you changed your name and your hair color?"

"I told him I just wanted to start a new life and he couldn't arrest me for using an assumed name as long as I didn't use it for illegal activities." She sounded as if she was quoting the last part.

"Not even if that identity is somebody else's?"

She didn't answer. I gave up for the moment. "Okay," I said. "We've already covered the bear thing, so let's move straight to Fred's and my search of Lester Mackey's apartment."

That got her attention.

By the time I concluded with the hair-flushing incident, she was twisting her skirt and looking agitated and anxious.

"Lindsay, you broke the law!"

"Ah, what are friends for?"

She gave me a weak smile. "You are my friend. You really are."

"I am. And friends trust each other. I have trusted you not only with my raspberry syrup secret but now the secret of my illegal activities. I'll do everything I can to help you through this, but you've got to trust me with the truth."

She lowered her gaze to her lap and resumed the skirt-twisting activity. She was well on her way to turning that cotton skirt into a broomstick skirt.

"Is Lester Mackey your ex-husband?" I know she said her ex was dead, but I wasn't sure that was the truth and thought I could bluff her into admitting something.

She shook her head.

"Is he somebody hired by your ex-husband?"

She shook her head again. "I don't have an ex-husband. I told you, my husband is dead."

"Do you have any idea who Lester Mackey is?"

This time, reluctantly, she nodded. "Maybe." The word was a barely audible whisper.

"I feel like I'm playing twenty questions! Can you give me a clue? Who is Lester Mackey?"

She didn't answer, and for once I didn't say anything to fill the void. In the silence, I could hear the faint sounds of Zach's television upstairs and a clock ticking. I'd never noticed that clock before, but tonight it sounded very loud.

"Did the apartment manager say what Lester Mackey looks like?" she asked.

I nodded. "He said Mackey's an older guy with short gray hair and gold wire glasses, a little shorter than Fred, looks like he works out regularly, and he has a mole on his left cheek. Fred thinks the hair is probably phony."

There was another long moment of silence. Paula's skirt-twisting had changed to clenching. Her knuckles were white. "That's a perfect description of my father-in-law, right down to that mole and the hair piece. His name is Lester."

"Your father-in-law. So this _is_ connected to your ex-husband."

"I'm not divorced."

"That's right. You said your husband died."

"No, I said he's dead. There's a difference." She unclenched her hands, looked me squarely in the face and drew in a deep breath. "I killed my husband."

# Chapter Ten

Flashbulb memory.

When I'm ninety-seven years old and in a nursing home with no memory of my own name, I will remember the moment Paula told me she killed her husband.

I don't know how long I sat there &&staring at her in total shock. A hurricane roared through my head, making so much noise I couldn't hear Zach's television or even that manic clock ticking.

Paula returned my stare unflinchingly, not taking back what she'd just said or admitting it had been a bad joke.

The room started to blur, and I suddenly realized I'd forgotten to breathe. I figured it would be a good idea to start again.

"Do you have any chocolate?" I asked. I needed a fix to help me deal with this.

She nodded and left the room then returned immediately with a piece of Brownie Nut Fudge Pie and a Coke.

I took a couple of big bites of the pie and tossed down half the soda really fast. Thus fortified, I turned to Paula who once again sat beside me with her hands in her lap. But this time her hands weren't twisting or clenching. She was strangely calm as if the worst was over. As far as I was concerned, it had just begun.

"Okay," I said, "so I guess we're not talking _killing_ as in _Killing me Softly with His Song,_ or _that joke just kills me_ or any of that kind of killing?"

"No. We're talking killing as in shooting someone in the heart with a gun, killing as in that person lying on the floor bleeding and not moving."

I had another bite of pie. "That's one heck of an ending. I'd sure like to hear the beginning and middle of that story."

She began to talk, quietly but without faltering. The words spilled out, as if she'd held them inside too long.

"I was born Paula Roberts," she said. "My dad was the pastor at a small church in Ft. Worth. He was kind and gentle, and he always had a smile. My mother took care of him so he could take care of everybody else. They were the only family I had, and it was enough. I was happy. I grew up thinking the world was a beautiful place."

She wrapped her arms tightly around her knees, and her eyes took on a faraway look. "After high school, I started college at the University of North Texas in Denton. It was close enough I could come home every weekend. But then during my junior year, my parents went on a missionary trip to South America. I was lost without them and counted the days until they'd come back."

She paused as if gathering the courage to continue, and I found myself leaning forward, anticipating what I knew must be coming. "They never came home. Their small plane crashed somewhere in the jungle. I was alone." Those last three words, _I was alone_ , held a hollow echo.

I tried to imagine losing both my parents. They drove me crazy sometimes. Most times. But I didn't want to think about not having them around. I was devastated when my grandmother died.

Paula drew in a deep breath and went on with her story. "I wandered around in a fog for the next two years, but I managed to graduate with a degree in art history. I had no idea what I was going to do with the rest of my life. I got a job at a museum in Dallas, and that's where I met David Bennett. He was a Dallas police officer, working a second job as security for the museum." She gave a wry smile. "I thought I'd found somebody to belong to. I thought he was like my father. He was strong. I could lean on him. He took charge of my life, and I let him. We got married two months later, and I was part of a family again. I wasn't alone."

Was this knight in shining armor the husband she killed? "So you were happily married?"

She shook her head slowly. "He asked me to quit my job as soon as we got married. He worked irregular hours, alternating shifts from month to month. If I worked, we'd never see each other. That sounded logical. Mother never worked outside the home, and I saw this as a sign that I was going to have the same kind of happy marriage my parents had."

I wanted to have another bite of pie, more chocolate to get through Paula's story, but I didn't move. I was afraid if I distracted her, she'd realize what she was saying and clam up again.

"I thought I'd be a part of David's family, but his mother barely spoke, and it wasn't just me. She sat around all the time with her eyes on the floor, only spoke when spoken to. His father, an over-the-road trucker, either ignored me or criticized me. He never had a kind word to say to me or to his wife. And David changed." She sat straighter and looked me in the eye. "Or maybe he just stopped pretending to be somebody he wasn't."

I knew only too well how the things you once loved in a man could turn into the things you hated about him.

"Nothing I did pleased David. The house was never clean enough, the meals were never good enough, I didn't iron his shirts right, I wore too much makeup, I didn't wear enough makeup. He shouted at me, called me names, accused me of horrible things. He said I had a lover, that I was talking about him to my friends behind his back, that I was plotting to leave him. When he dressed for work, his anger was worse, as if that uniform gave him the right to abuse me. The sound of his gun belt creaking became a warning."

That explained why she'd freaked out when Officer Creighton's gun belt made a noise. I sneaked another bite of chocolate, fortifying myself for the part where she killed him.

"David never apologized or admitted he'd done anything to apologize for, but after the biggest explosions, he sent me roses—yellow roses. He said I was his _yellow rose of Texas."_

And that explained why my roses had terrified her.

"After an explosion he'd be his old self for a while, treating me like a delicate, treasured child. But he was like a volcano with the pressure building and building until it finally exploded. We never had more than a few days of peace. I tried to do everything right. I tried to make him happy. My mother used to comfort my father when he'd feel overwhelmed by the troubles of the church congregation." A single tear slid down Paula's cheek. She made no effort to wipe it away.

"I tried so hard to be like my mother, but it seemed the harder I tried, the more angry David became. It was all my fault, he said. If I was a better wife, he wouldn't have to blow up." She touched the scar on her cheekbone. "One day one of the women I'd worked with at the museum called to invite me to lunch. When I hung up, David smashed his fist into my face. I didn't go to lunch with my friend. I never talked to her again. From that day on, yelling at me wasn't enough for him."

Paula rolled up her long sleeves and showed me scars, then lifted her skirt to her knees and showed me more scars. I cringed at the thought of the pain and betrayal those scars meant.

"Did you call the police?" I asked.

She laughed bitterly. "He was the police."

"Oh."

"To be honest, I never even thought about telling someone. I guess a part of me believed it really was my fault. Then one night when he was drunk, he told me his father had physically abused him until he became big enough and strong enough to fight back. I recognized that he was doing to me what his father had done to him. Once I understood, I thought I could help him. I thought I could save our marriage. I could show him what real love was, and he'd be able to heal from what his dad did to him."

"Didn't work, did it?"

"No. It got worse. Then I discovered I was pregnant." She looked up the stairs toward Zach's room. "That changed everything. I had to leave him. I couldn't risk his hurting my baby. One night when he was working, I packed a suitcase, called a cab and left. I got a clerical job, found a small apartment and was able to hide until after Zach was born." She smiled. "The first time I held that precious baby in my arms, I knew I'd do whatever it took to keep him safe."

_Including murder._ "David found you," I guessed.

"Zach was a month old when David found us. He broke down the door in the middle of the night, came in and started screaming at me. He was wearing street clothes, but he had a gun in his jacket pocket. Said he'd bought and registered it in my name, and if I didn't give him his son, he'd shoot me and claim it was suicide. Then he'd have Zach."

She swallowed hard and looked at me, her eyes as full of terror as they must have been on that night.

"I couldn't let him have Zach. I tried to get to the phone, call 911, but he hit me, knocked me down. I got up and fought, hitting him, scratching him, but he just laughed at me. Then Zach started to cry. David threw me against the wall, went to the bedroom and snatched Zach out of his crib. I ran in to see him shaking Zach, bellowing at him to stop crying. I flew across the room and flung myself on him. I had to save Zach. I grabbed that gun out of his pocket and pointed it at him. I told him to put my baby back in his bed and leave immediately or I'd shoot him. He put Zach down but said I couldn't shoot him with the safety on. When I looked down, he lunged toward me and grabbed for the gun, and the whole world exploded. He'd lied. It was a revolver. It didn't have a safety."

My hand lifted to my throat. "Omigawd. You really did kill him." Yes, she'd said in the beginning that she had, but that's a hard concept to grasp.

"Yes. I killed him. He fell backward, blood spurting from his chest, collapsed on the floor and just lay there. I dropped the gun and picked up Zach who was crying at the top of his lungs by this time."

"The gun was registered in your name, and he was a cop." The Brotherhood of Blue. Paula was so screwed.

"My husband, a police officer, was dead, shot with a gun registered in my name. I'd go to prison and Zach would go to my in-laws. They would abuse my son the way David's father abused him. I was not going to let that happen."

I shoved another piece of chocolate in my mouth, trying to wrap my mind around something that horrible. Made my coming home to find Buffy Muffy in my bed seem like a walk in the park. "So you ran?"

"I packed one suitcase for myself and one for Zach then called 911 and told them David was dead, that I had accidentally killed him. As soon as I hung up the phone, I ran out of there, went by my bank and used my ATM card to withdraw everything from my checking account. I drove the back roads to a small town south of Ft. Worth, checked into a motel for a couple of hours, cut my blond hair and dyed it brown. Then I drove to the bus station. I figured the authorities would track me that far and think I was going south since I had driven south. I left the car at the bus station and bought a ticket on the next bus going north, to Kansas City."

"How did you know what to do to change your name?"

"I'd listened to David talk about criminals so I had some idea of what to do. I went to a library, got on a computer, and found the social security number of a child with my first name who'd died young. I became Paula Walters. I bought a clunker car for cash then went looking for a place to live. That's when I met you."

And Rick tried to make me turn her away. Thank goodness I hadn't paid any attention to him!

"I've lived in constant fear this past year that David's father, Lester Bennett, would find me and take Zach," she concluded. "And now that nightmare is coming true. Lester Mackey is Lester Bennett. He wants me to know he's found me. That's why he left the bear on the walk. Truckers refer to traffic cops as bears. He must have been watching when Rick brought the bear to your porch. After Rick left, Lester took the stuffed animal, mutilated it, making a hole in its chest the way I made a hole in his son's chest. Then he left it on my walk."

"That would explain why Henry kept carrying on the way he did after Rick left. Somebody else was there." That gave me a really creepy feeling, to think that some nut had come right up on my porch, beneath my open window.

Paula nodded. "Yesterday Lester must have somehow gotten inside my house, taken Zach and left him in the park, then called the police today to say I was abusing him. He's trying to discredit me as a mother so he can take away Zach before he has me arrested for murdering his son."

"Why go to the trouble to discredit you as a mother? Sending you to prison for murder ought to do a pretty good job of that."

"Who knows why? I suppose because he's like his son. He wants to torture me, make me suffer before he moves in for the kill. And maybe it's partly because I made that call to 911 and told them the truth, that his son's death was an accident. Maybe he's worried somebody might believe me and he wants to be sure, no matter what happens, that he gets Zach, a new victim for his abuse."

I wanted to reassure her that everything would be all right, but I didn't see how it possibly could.

I finished off the piece of Brownie Nut Fudge Pie and the Coke and tried to think.

"We'll hire you a good lawyer," I said. "That's all it takes to get off, even if you're guilty, which you're not, of course. My dad will know who we can call."

Paula shook her head. "Lester really doesn't have any cause to worry. Nobody's going to believe me. David was a policeman. All his buddies will testify that he was a gentle, kind man who never lost his temper, and they'll be telling the truth as far as they know it. Nobody but me ever saw his violent side. The rest of the world saw the wonderful man I married, not the monster I lived with."

"What about hospital records from when he hurt you?"

"I never went to the hospital. That's why I have so many scars." She lifted her hand to the one on her cheek then quickly lowered it again as if touching the reminder of pain brought a return of the pain itself.

I stood and paced the length of the room. "There's got to be something we can do."

Paula wrapped her arms around herself. "I shouldn't have told you any of this. You've got to forget everything I said, and I've got to leave here tonight."

I sat back down on the sofa. "Are you nuts? You can't run away again! If he found you this time, he'll find you next time."

"Maybe, but it's the only chance I've got."

"No, this is not going to work. What about Zach? You can't keep moving him around and changing his name. Poor kid's going to have an identity crisis before he's in kindergarten."

"What other choice do I have?" Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. She was stressed to the breaking point.

"Let me get you a piece of that pie." I rose to go to the kitchen, but she stopped me.

"Lindsay, there are some things not even chocolate can solve." But she did give me a weak smile.

"All right," I said. No, I wasn't giving up. I was just being sneaky. "You have to leave. I understand. But not tonight. Obviously your house is being watched. Loco Lester is probably across the street right now either peeking through that hole in the hedge or watching from an upstairs window. If Lester could manage to break into this fortress you've created and snatch Zach, he'd have no trouble getting in that vacant house. I could get in with a credit card."

Panic replaced the weak smile on her face.

"So what you have to do," I said hurriedly, "is leave from work tomorrow. When you pick up Zach from day care, you head straight for the highway instead of home."

She nodded. "You're right. That's what I have to do. I'll pack as many things as I can get into two diaper bags and load them in the morning, then go by the bank on my way out of town and close my accounts."

"Good thinking. I'll pack the rest of your stuff and ship it to you when you get settled somewhere else."

Paula's eyes were wide and sad. "Lindsay, I won't dare tell anybody, not even you, where I go."

I started to protest, but there was no point in arguing since I had no intention of letting Paula leave.

I stood. "I'd better go home so both of us can get some rest and be ready for a big day tomorrow."

She walked me to the door, then, in a rare display of affection, gave me a hug. "You've been the best friend I've ever had. I'm going to miss you."

I hugged her back but couldn't tell her I'd miss her too. I knew she wasn't going anywhere.

It was dark as I hurried home, and I got a creepy sensation down my spine knowing somebody might be watching. I wanted to charge over there, poke a stick through the hole in the hedge and hope it found Loony Lester's eye. I wanted to at least flip the bird to the old house just in case he was there. However, I restrained myself. It wouldn't be a good idea to let him know that we knew about his covert activities.

As soon as I got home, I called Fred. I felt a little guilty because I knew Paula trusted me not to tell anybody else about her secret, but I hadn't promised, and this was for her own good. Besides, Fred wasn't just _anybody else_. He was our friend.

He listened quietly while I told him everything. "We've got to stop her from running away again," I concluded, "but I don't have the slightest idea how. Do you think we should call Trent? We could try to catch Lunatic Lester, but I don't know what we'd do with him once we caught him. After we beat him senseless, that is. I doubt if talking logically to him is an option. Fred, what are we going to do?"

"I'm trying to think if you'd be quiet for a minute. There are some things that don't add up here. How did this guy know when Paula would be asleep and it would be safe for him to come in and get Zach?"

I remembered what I'd often accused Fred of doing to explain how he knew everything that went on in the neighborhood. "He bugged her place?"

"That would be my guess. He came in while she was gone, installed a couple of hidden microphones and substituted sleeping pills for aspirin. Then the next time she had a headache, she'd be so drugged, he could come in and take the kid without waking her. That would explain his presence at the old house across the street. He wasn't just watching. He was listening."

"Damn! He could have been listening tonight. That means he knows she told me everything. He thinks she's going to run tomorrow."

"Right again. Whatever he's planning, he's probably going to speed up his timetable."

"Well, that pretty much brings me back to my original question. What can we do to help her?"

"I don't know. We need to talk to her but he could have the phone bugged too. We've got to get into her house without being seen. What are you wearing?"

"Fred, this is no time for an obscene phone call!"

He ignored my attempt at levity. "Put on dark clothes then go out your back door and over to Paula's back door. There's no moon tonight so you should be able to slip over unseen if you hide behind trees and shrubs as much as you can. That shouldn't be difficult with the jungle you're cultivating back there."

"I'll bet you're glad now that I ignored all those notices from the Department of Sanitation to clean up the place."

"It's the Department of Health and they didn't send you any notices. I'll meet you on Paula's back porch. If she sees you and lets you in before I get there, don't let her say a word. I don't want anybody to know we're there."

"Got it, General." He might say he didn't know what to do, but he certainly sounded like a man with a plan as well as a man with far too much information. How did he know the Department of Health hadn't sent me any notices?

I started to hang up then realized there was one thing he didn't know yet but probably would soon. At this point, all he could do was get mad at me and he'd get over that. He always does. "I guess I'd better tell you something just so you'll know exactly where we stand. Remember that paper cup in Lester Mackey's bathroom that had the brown hairs with blond roots in it? It's empty now. I flushed those hairs. Destroyed evidence."

He was silent for a couple of heartbeats and I tensed, waiting for the explosion. "Did you flush the tissues with blood on them too?" he asked in a calm voice.

"No. Why would I? It's not her blood, is it?"

"No, but I suspect it's going to play a role in taking her down. Never mind. We'll deal with that when we have to. I'll meet you on Paula's back porch in five minutes."

Men are totally incomprehensible.

I changed into black jeans and a black sweatshirt with a hood. If we didn't get into Paula's house fast, I would be in danger of passing out from heat prostration.

I hesitated before going out the door. How the heck was I supposed to keep Paula from saying anything when she saw me? She was a basket case knowing that creep was in town and watching her. She'd probably scream bloody murder.

I found a piece of paper and printed in big letters, _House is bugged! Don't say a word!_ Now if she'd only read it before she screamed bloody murder...or came after me with a .357 Magnum.

# Chapter Eleven

A few minutes later as I stood sweating on Paula's porch, Fred emerged from the darkness carrying a suitcase of some sort and a canvas bag. From the bag he produced a gadget that permitted him to unlock Paula's deadbolt in a matter of seconds.

The man was definitely going to have some explaining to do when this was all over.

He handed me a small penlight from the canvas bag. "As soon as we get in," he whispered, "I want you to find Paula, but don't let her say anything. Get her into the bathroom. Since we're dealing with a specialized madman and not your garden variety pervert, that's the place least likely to be bugged. If it's dark, use this light to show her your face."

I held up my piece of paper and whispered, "I'll use the light to show her this note I wrote."

"Good idea. I hope you printed it. She'd never be able to read your handwriting."

"I printed it! Jerk."

He turned the knob and pushed against the door. It stuck.

Fred sighed. "This is a bad time for her to become even more cautious."

He deftly removed the glass from the small window, reached inside and pushed away the obstruction, a kitchen chair, then opened the door.

The house was dark. Paula must have gone to bed. No surprise since it was close to ten o'clock and we had to be at work at four.

I tugged off my hot sweat shirt and tossed it onto the chair that had formerly blocked the door. I didn't think a black-hooded figure in her house in the middle of the night would inspire confidence in Paula. Besides, it was hot.

I tiptoed upstairs, cringing every time one of the boards creaked. Old houses made noises, I told myself. Someone listening from across the street would never equate the irregular sounds with footsteps. But I still cringed with every one.

Paula's bedroom door was open. She always slept that way so she could hear Zach if he cried.

Maybe it was also to hear a possible intruder.

I stood for a moment with my back against the wall trying to figure the best way to do this. I doubted if she was asleep so soon after such a traumatic evening, but I was afraid to even whisper her name after Fred's warning.

I eased over into her doorway and was surprised to see that the drapes on the front window were parted a few inches and the blinds were open. From the faint light coming through, I noticed that Paula's bed was undisturbed. She sat in a chair staring out the window. On the alert. This wasn't going to be easy.

I turned on the flashlight, shone the beam on my note and walked into her bedroom.

In the space of a breath, she shot up out of the chair and charged across the room toward me, the blade of a very long, very shiny knife flashing in one uplifted hand. I dropped my note and flashlight and grabbed her arm with both hands, halting that knife in mid-plunge. I'm bigger than she is and stronger from all that chocolate, but she had the adrenaline of panic on her side. Actually, my adrenaline was surging pretty good by that time too. I was amazed...and thankful...that she didn't scream. Probably didn't want to scare Zach. Always the quintessential mother.

After struggling for an hour or a few seconds, depending on whether you measured in real time or perceived time, her gaze fell on my face and apparently there was enough light from that window for her to recognize me. She stopped struggling and opened her mouth as if to speak. I put one hand over her mouth and whispered very softly into her ear, "Don't say anything."

Her eyes scanned my face as if she wasn't sure whether she should trust me or not, but finally she nodded.

I retrieved my light and my brilliantly conceived, completely worthless note from the floor, took her hand and we stumbled through silent darkness to the bathroom at the end of the hall. I closed the door behind us, and we both stood for a moment taking deep breaths.

Paula flipped on the light switch and I gasped in horror at that action. Now I was being paranoid. The bathroom was at the back of the house and had only one small window which was covered by mini-blinds and a heavy curtain like the rest of her windows. The odds were minimal that anyone could see the light, but at that point, I didn't think we could count on even minimal odds being in our favor.

I ordered myself to calm down and think rationally. Someone going to the bathroom in the middle of the night wasn't suspicious behavior. We could safely leave the light on for a few minutes.

I made a writing motion on the back of my stupid note, and Paula nodded then opened a drawer and withdrew an eyebrow pencil. Thank goodness she'd been coloring her brows darker and not bleaching them lighter. It would be difficult to write with a bleach pen.

I sat on the floor and wrote that I'd told Fred everything.

She laid the knife on the vanity, sat beside me, read my words and glared at me. I could tell she was a little upset by the way she tried to snatch the eyebrow pencil away from me, but, as I mentioned, I'm bigger than she is. I kept writing, telling her that Fred was searching for the _bugs_ we suspected were in her house and he would join us soon but we had to be quiet until then.

She got very still and I finally handed her the pencil. She stared at me for a long moment before she took it and wrote, _I've got to get out of here now!_

Fortunately at that point Fred opened the door and joined us. He had some kind of electronic gadget, presumably from his suitcase. He pointed a wand all over the room and checked a dial on the gadget. A _bug_ detector? Fred had some pretty sophisticated equipment for a computer nerd and old movie buff.

Finally he took a seat on the toilet stool.

I had to restrain myself from laughing at the incongruity...Fred with all his dignity and obsessiveness, holding court on the toilet stool while Paula and I sat at his feet.

"This room's clean," he said softly, "but I found one under your bed and one under the coffee table in the living room."

"Did you get rid of them?" Though she spoke barely above a whisper, I could hear the panic in Paula's voice.

"No. That would tip him off. We have the advantage as long as he doesn't know that we know he heard you tell Lindsay about him and make plans to leave town."

Paula gasped. "He knows I plan to leave from day care! He'll be following me!"

"Which means you can't do it," I said, relieved we had that out of the way.

"Then I'll leave before work instead." For a timid person, Paula sure can be stubborn.

"You're not leaving," I said.

"We've been through this before. I thought you understood that I have no other choice."

"No, I just understood I might as well agree with you until I could figure out how to change your mind."

"Fred, you understand, don't you? You see that I have no choice except to hide from this man."

"You can't run and hide the rest of your life," Fred replied. "We've got to get rid of him."

"Good idea." I took Paula's knife from the vanity and handed it to Fred.

"Lindsay, sometimes I worry about you. Paula, tell me everything you know about your father-in-law. We need to find this guy's weak spot."

Paula told Fred what she'd told me. There wasn't a lot to go on. Lester Bennett, like his son, maintained a perfect public persona as an upstanding member of the community. He worked for a freight company, was a deacon in the church, a member of several local civic groups and paid his taxes on time. His only eccentricity was a well-hidden talent for beating his wife.

"I will do some research," Fred said. "In the meantime, we have to dilute the urgency of the situation."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, just what I was thinking. What are you talking about?"

"Tonight Lester encountered two stress factors. First, he heard Paula telling someone else about him. Second, he heard her make plans to leave town tomorrow. These factors could push him into making a move we're not ready for."

"As opposed to a move we _are_ ready for?" I asked.

Fred ignored me. "We can't do anything about the first, but we can use his own device to convince him she isn't going to leave town. Lindsay, you will return to your house through your back door, change into regular clothing, then come to Paula's front door. She will let you in, and the two of you will stand close to the coffee table while having a conversation in which you talk Paula into staying." He stood as if everything was settled.

Paula shot to her feet. "But..."

I waited for her to finish her objection. I agreed with her in theory though I couldn't come up with a logical reason why we shouldn't carry out Fred's plan or a logical alternative.

Paula couldn't either. She didn't finish her sentence.

"Tomorrow," Fred said, "I will install a removable bar on your front and back doors that locks into a slot on each side when you're inside the house. He could still break out a window, but that would mean leaving evidence of a break-in, and he's been careful not to do that so far. Oh, and I'll fix your back window tomorrow."

"My back window?"

"I had to disassemble it to get inside."

"He broke it," I clarified.

"I put some cardboard and duct tape over it for tonight."

"You broke out my window and put cardboard and duct tape over it? Lester could waltz right in any time he wanted to!"

"I plan to spend the night here," Fred said. "I'll sleep on the sofa, and if anyone comes in, I'll take him out."

_Take him out_? I didn't think he meant he'd take the man out to dinner.

Fred and I were way overdue for a chat about his strange skills.

Paula went to her bedroom, and Fred and I went downstairs. I wanted to ask him some questions but realized I didn't dare talk because of that damned microphone under the coffee table.

At the back door, I stretched up on tiptoe, grabbed his ear and whispered, "When this is over, you _will_ tell me about your Ph.D. in B&E."

He leaned down close to my ear and I thought I was finally going to get some answers.

"Maybe," he whispered.

Men! God only put them on earth so pharmaceutical companies would have a market for Prozac and Valium.

I pulled on my black sweatshirt and made the return journey to my house through the darkness and the wilds of my home-grown jungle.

As soon as I walked in the door, Henry came bounding through the house to meet me. That was a little surprising since he normally ambles, saunters or, occasionally, moseys.

I thought he might be hungry...I was ready for another chocolate fix myself...but he turned and bounded back toward the living room. I followed him and saw him stretch upward on the front door, then hiss and bat at the knob.

"Need to go potty, big boy? Sounds pretty urgent." I yanked off my sweaty sweatshirt then unlocked and opened the door.

Henry darted out, arching his back and spitting at the person sitting on the top step of my front porch.

Rick.

My almost-ex jumped up immediately. "Lindsay, what the hell have you been doing for the last half hour that you couldn't answer your door?" he demanded.

Trust Rick to have perfect timing. In the still, quiet night, Loony Lester wouldn't have a bit of trouble hearing that I'd been unreachable for half an hour.

"I've been sleeping!" I shouted to be sure Lester could hear.

"No, you haven't! You're still dressed. And anyway, you're a light sleeper. I rang the bell, beat on the door and even stood in the yard and called your name then threw rocks at your bedroom window."

"You threw rocks at my window? Did you break it?"

"No! They were little pebbles. Besides, your window's open and the screen wasn't on very good. They went inside."

"I don't believe this. You stood in my front yard in the middle of the night, yelling and throwing rocks into my bedroom?"

"Pebbles, and I wasn't yelling all that loud."

"I fell asleep on the sofa, wearing earplugs. I didn't hear you." I was a little surprised I hadn't heard him from Paula's house, but she did have all her windows and storm windows closed with blinds and heavy curtains for further insulation. I smiled at the incongruity of holding a life and death conference in Paula's bathroom while Rick shouted and tossed rocks into my bedroom window.

"Earplugs?" he repeated. "You hate to wear earplugs. You always complained when I snored and you had to. Why would you be wearing them tonight?"

I thought about that for a moment. "Because Henry was snoring."

He looked askance at the cat who stood poised to spring, his tail switching, as if ready to attack at the slightest provocation. I needed to get a sign for my door, _Beware of Attack Cat_.

"The cat was snoring? I don't think so! I think somebody else was snoring! I knew when you didn't come to the door that you had a man in there with you, and I know who it is! It's that cop. I didn't miss the way you were looking at each other."

I felt a bit of a glow in spite of the circumstances. "What way was Trent looking at me?"

Rick folded his arms. "Don't pretend you didn't notice. We're not divorced yet, Lindsay. You don't have the right to be sleeping with some macho cop when you're still my wife."

I didn't see any point in reminding him that he was sleeping with the Muffy creature. I wasn't in the mood nor did I have time to argue with him. I had important things to do, like going over to Paula's house and pretending to argue with her and then coming back home and spending some time mulling over the way Rick thought Trent and I were looking at each other. Not that we were, of course. From now on, Fred and Henry would be the only males in my life, and Henry was just visiting.

"If nobody's here," Rick said, "you won't mind if I come in and see for myself."

"I mind." I slammed the door in his face then dashed upstairs and changed into a pair of shorts. Maybe Lester hadn't yet noticed that I was wearing black sweat pants in eighty degree temperatures.

Meanwhile Rick alternated between ringing the doorbell, banging on the door and shouting. I made a mental note to myself to get a new screen for my bedroom window then tossed the rocks out, hoping a few would land on Rick's head. But he was under the overhang so they didn't hit him. I could only hope somebody would call the police and report him for disturbing the peace.

Actually, I could call and report him for disturbing the peace or trespassing or being obnoxious or maybe just for being Rick. Surely he violated several laws simply by being himself.

I placed the call, told the dispatcher that some strange man was making a lot of noise and wouldn't leave my front porch. That wasn't a total lie. Rick is a pretty strange man.

I went downstairs and opened the front door.

He folded his arms, his jaw jutting stubbornly. "I'm not leaving until you let me come in."

"You might want to change your mind on that one. I called the police and they'll be right over."

He nodded and smirked. " _Called_ the police? You mean you leaned over and tapped him on the shoulder?"

"Okay," I said. "You got me. I have a man in here, so there's no way you're coming in."

He threw his arms into the air. "I knew it! Lindsay, how could you do this to me? What chance do we have to put our marriage back together if you're cheating on me?"

I could feel my back teeth clenching, the enamel wearing away...and after five years of marriage to Rick, I didn't have a lot of enamel left. "Go away and let me get some sleep! I have to get up in less than five hours!"

"Did you open my gift?"

"No, I forgot all about it. Get out of my way."

He stood in front of my door, blocking my exit. "No."

I lifted a hand to my forehead and pressed against the headache growing there. "Okay, you win. You can come in." The second I unlatched the screen door and opened it, he slipped inside, a triumphant smile on his face.

I slipped outside.

"Lindsay!"

I ran across the yards with him right behind me. I wasn't thrilled about leaving my house unlocked with a maniac on the loose, but I didn't see any other option. Anyway, I could count on Rick to hang around and act so crazy, nobody would dare approach my house. When he makes up his mind he wants something, nothing stands in his way. I guess that's how he got to be top salesman. It's also how he got to be in the middle of a divorce.

I rang Paula's doorbell then knocked loudly for effect.

"Lindsay, you're making a scene!" Rick said. "Let's go back to your house and talk about this."

Paula came to the door rubbing imaginary sleep from her eyes. "Lindsay, is something wrong?" Then she saw Rick and gave me a panicky look.

"I need to talk to you," I said, pushing through the door then turning back to Rick where he stood on the porch. "I really did call the cops, and you know how strapped for entertainment they are here in Pleasant Grove. They'll be over any minute and slap on the handcuffs and leg irons." I slammed the door in his face again.

It felt so good, I opened it and smiled. "Habit forming," I said before closing it a second time.

Fred lay stretched out on the sofa, fully clothed except for his shoes, and I took the opportunity to tweak his big toe, knowing he couldn't say anything. He scowled at me and I blew him a kiss.

He'd moved the coffee table across the room. I'd have to ask him later if that meant he snored and didn't want Lester to hear him.

Paula and I went to stand beside the coffee table to have our discussion for the benefit of the man on the other end of the microphone. We got as close as we could because we didn't dare talk too loudly. The last thing I needed was for Rick to hear any of it. For perhaps the only time in my life, I was willing to admit that I should have listened to my mother. I couldn't imagine myself as a lawyer, but even that would have been preferable to marrying Rick.

We didn't have a script for our discussion, so we improvised. I assured her that, since my father was a lawyer, I was close personal friends with the toughest criminal lawyers in the country and that we would put together a defense team for her that would make O.J.'s dream team look like law school rejects. Total BS since my father practices corporate law with a focus on real estate. I could probably get her a good deal on a strip shopping center, but I figured Lester the Louse who drove a truck for a freight company wouldn't know that.

I didn't dare look toward the sofa, however. Fred was probably choking in an attempt not to laugh.

"All right, Lindsay," Paula said, and there was something in her voice that got my attention, something very intense that hadn't been there in our mock discussion. "I'll stay. I'll even turn myself in to the police tomorrow."

I shook my head and made a face at that comment which seemed to me to be giving Lester a deadline as surely as the business about running away. However, she ignored me and continued. "But you have to promise me one thing."

"Sure," I said uneasily. I didn't want to promise anything right then.

"If I'm convicted and sent to prison or if I'm not but they try to take Zach away from me, you'll make sure he has a good home, you'll do whatever it takes to keep him away from that monster."

Suddenly the neck of my tank top seemed to be choking me. _It's only make believe_ , I told myself. Strictly for Lester's benefit. But Paula didn't sound like she was playing pretend anymore. Did she believe that story about the lawyers? Did she really think I could do anything to help? "All right," I said. "I promise."

"Then I won't leave. I'll stay and fight."

"Good. Great. But let's don't do anything hasty like turning yourself in before we talk to those lawyers and get everything organized." And since those lawyers were imaginary, that could take a very long time.

She stared at me in silence too long. I began waving my hands in a beckoning, _come on and say it!_ motion.

"All right," she finally agreed. I could only hope the microphone would distort her voice enough that she wouldn't sound as phony to Lester as she did to me. Paula and I were going to have a talk at work tomorrow...assuming the shop wasn't bugged. Maybe I'd write her a note using chocolate syrup.

On the way out, I tweaked Fred's other big toe.

My evening, up to that point, had not been the stuff of which memories were made. At least, not the kind of memories you treasure down through the years and tell your grandchildren about.

But when I walked out and saw two police officers handcuffing a struggling, furious Rick on my front porch, that scene pretty much made up for all the awful things that had happened.

_You're being mean-spirited_ , I chided myself. Bad Lindsay! Revenge isn't sweet. It's ugly. Stop taking such delight in it.

Having properly chastised myself and given lip service to rising above my baser traits, I strolled over to enjoy every delicious moment. Henry sat in front of the door doing his guard cat duty and trying to look solemn and detached, but he had that Cheshire cat grin on his face. He was enjoying it too. I winked at him.

"Lindsay!" Rick shouted as the officers dragged him down the porch steps. "Tell them I'm your husband! They think I was breaking into your house!"

I folded my arms and studied him, this macho man struggling ineffectually against two police officers, one of whom was a slightly-built woman. "Were you breaking in?" I asked.

"Of course not!" he protested.

The officers halted and turned to look at me. "Ma'am," the male officer said, "are you the party who called to report an intruder on your premises?"

"That would be me. I went over to my neighbor's house because this man refused to leave."

Rick's face changed from red to purple, and he gave such a huge lunge in his effort to get to me that the female officer stumbled before yanking him back. "Damn you, Lindsay!" he shouted.

"Hey!" The male officer gave an extra jerk on the handcuffs. "You don't need to use that kind of language to the lady."

"We caught him in the living room," the woman said. "When we asked for proof that he lives here, he became belligerent. Is he your husband? Does he live here?"

"He's my estranged husband," I said, regretting my obsessive tendency to be honest. "Our divorce will be final any day. He does _not_ live here, never has and never will."

"Do you want to press charges for trespassing?"

I tilted my head to one side, trying to look thoughtful and undecided as I observed and savored every nuance of the situation. Rick's blue eyes bulged from his purplish face in a most unattractive manner, and he continued to struggle even though he surely knew by now that it would only cause him more problems. But that was Rick—never give up!

"If he'll promise to go away and leave me alone, I won't press charges," I said magnanimously.

Rick glared at me.

"Well?" the woman prompted. She didn't appear to have fallen under the spell of Rick's charm.

Rick's glare intensified.

"Fine." The officers turned to escort him down the sidewalk to the squad car.

"All right!" he snapped. "All right! If that's what you want, Lindsay, I'll leave you alone forever! You'll never see me again!"

"Let him go," I said, and the female officer unlocked the handcuffs—reluctantly, I thought.

Rick rubbed his wrists, glared some more and, when it became apparent the cops weren't leaving until he did, stalked off toward his SUV. He peeled away from the curb, burning a little rubber. Who knew an SUV had that much power?

As I watched him leave, it occurred to me that I really was getting a divorce from the man, that I _wanted_ a divorce from him, wanted him out of my life...forever, just as he'd promised.

The realization made me happy and a little sad.

It was over.

All the good times we'd shared seemed to crumble into the darkness like a beautiful but unstable old building imploding into a pile of rubble.

I watched Rick's tail lights turn the corner and disappear just as those five years seemed to disappear, as if all the fun times we'd shared had never happened.

No matter how you looked at it, this divorce business was a lose/lose situation.

# Chapter Twelve

After Rick's departure, I stared for a long time at the package he'd left, trying to decide if I should mail it back to him or throw it away unopened. Finally my curiosity got the better of me. He knew it would.

The small box contained a silver necklace and matching earrings. I've always preferred silver to gold though Rick thought I was nuts. Actually, knowing his obsession with "the finer things," the setting could have been platinum. I don't know enough about jewelry to tell the difference.

The jewelry was obviously custom made, the design consisting of two intertwined hearts, each set with a different stone...one amethyst and one diamond...my birthstone and his. It matched the ring he'd given me years ago.

As I sat there staring at the jewelry, Henry climbed into my lap and brushed his face against my cheek as if he understood that I needed affection and comfort. He was right.

To say I was not at my best when I got to the shop the next morning would be the quintessential understatement. Even after two Cokes and another piece of the leftover Brownie Nut Fudge Pie, I was still operating in a fog.

I rubbed the back of my hand across my eyes and tried to concentrate on preparing the morning pastries, an activity that had come automatically yesterday.

Paula wasn't in any better shape. Her tension level had escalated back to _arrival day_ heights. I didn't bring up her strange comments from the night before about turning herself in and my rescuing Zach. Even if the place wasn't _bugged_ , I feared any little push would send her over the edge and then I'd have to make the morning cappuccino and lose every customer who came in.

When she dropped an egg on the floor, you'd have thought she'd done something to doom the place to bankruptcy, the wrecking ball, and maybe even a live, on-site volcano. I tried to assure her that life would go on in spite of the loss of one egg. I even offered to clean it up myself, but then I burst into tears. I don't think I was very successful in my reassurances.

However, it worked out okay because my outburst gave Paula the chance to chide me for my terrible diet of chocolate and Coke and to force me to eat a cheese omelet with picante sauce. I hate to admit it, but that did clear away some of the fog, and by the time we finished with the breakfast customers and closed to fix lunch, my hands were steady enough to measure cocoa.

Paula left to take Zach to the nursery and I decided to make my Brownies with Raspberry Jam and Butter Cream Frosting for the special Dessert Du Jour. The recipe was time consuming and required concentration. Maybe that would keep my mind away from all those other avenues I didn't want to take.

The phone rang, and I jumped and dropped the can of cocoa. If this kept up, pretty soon we'd have a cake on the floor.

I answered the phone, bracing myself to hear Rick's voice. I was pleasantly surprised when it was my mother. That tells you how much I did not want to talk to Rick.

"How are you doing, sweetheart?" she asked in a hushed, compassionate tone, as if worried I might explode at any minute. She'd been doing that ever since Rick and I split up. Okay, so that pretty accurately described my state of mind, but she could have pretended not to notice. Then I wouldn't have had to work twice as hard and do all the pretending.

I'd been silly to think she and Dad would be pleased at the break-up just because they hadn't wanted me to marry him in the first place. They were not, of course. I suppose I should count my blessings they hadn't decided I was still young enough to go to law school.

"I'm doing great, Mom," I lied. "Really great." _One of my best friends is a killer, the other knows way too much about breaking and entering and spying on people, I just lost five years out of my life, I didn't get any real sleep last night and somebody's probably going to call to claim my cat, but other than that, my life's just fantastic._ "How are you doing?"

"My shoulder's been bothering me again. I have an appointment with my massage therapist this afternoon. Your father's cholesterol and blood pressure are up. He works too hard, and he worries about you."

I sighed. "Mom, I swear to you, there is no reason to worry about me. There's no reason for Dad to work so hard, either. It's not like you two would be dependent on food stamps if he took a little time off."

"He has obligations to his clients. He's trying to find an assistant in his field, but first he has to find the time to look and interview and then train."

I sighed again, a long one this time. It was the old familiar guilt jerk about my failure to go into the family business and help my father. I'd better watch it. Maybe they didn't think I was too old to go to law school after all.

"I hope he finds someone soon. Well, it was good to talk to you. I need to get back to my chocolate."

"You work too hard too, darling, getting up in the middle of the night and spending the day cooking." I could almost hear the shudder that accompanied that last word. My mother had always had a full-time maid who prepared the meals. I had no idea what they'd done in the lean days before Dad's practice became lucrative. I was a late-in-life arrival, so by the time I came along, the maid was a well-established fixture. She even opened my jars of baby food.

"I enjoy what I do, and I like getting up when everybody else is asleep. I have the whole world to myself for a couple of hours." Except for Paula and Lester Bennett.

"If you enjoy it, I suppose that's all that matters. I won't keep you. I just called to see if you can come to dinner on Saturday."

"I think I can work it into my schedule." I wasn't about to admit it, but suddenly the idea of seeing my parents was very appealing. Having just lost five years from my past, I was eager to make sure the rest of it was still there, to hang onto what was left with both hands, even if it meant enduring a few veiled and not so veiled comments about my marriage and my chosen career.

"Wonderful," Mother said. "Dinner will be served at seven thirty, but we'd like you to arrive at six. Your great aunt Catherine is flying in from Arizona, and I know she'd like some extra time to visit with you."

I was barely able to suppress a groan. Aunt Catherine, who had never been called Cathy, wasn't related to the grandmother I'd loved, my dad's mother. Aunt Catherine was my maternal grandmother's sister. That grandmother had died when I was six, and all I remembered of her was that she had large nostrils. From my vantage point, that's all I saw. Aunt Catherine was her sister. Could have been her twin, judging from the size of the nostrils.

"I'll be there at six," I said since I'd already committed myself. Maybe I'd get lucky and come down with a case of bubonic plague.

"Oh, and one more thing."

I flinched. My mother only tacks on a rider when she knows I won't like it. A rider to the Aunt Catherine announcement, bad enough in itself, had to be really awful.

I considered telling her the place was on fire and I had to hang up, but she'd just call back. "What is the _one more thing_?" I asked and immediately prayed for a backhoe on a construction site somewhere across town to sever the phone line before she could answer.

"Your father and I—" another bad phrase "—had a long talk with Rick yesterday, and he told us you two are trying to work out a reconciliation. We've asked him to come to dinner also. It would be nice if Aunt Catherine didn't have to know there was ever a problem."

"I can't believe you did that! Rick and I are _not_ working on a reconciliation! He's living with the Muffy Monster, for crying out loud! Why would you want me to reconcile with scum like that? Why would you invite him into your home?"

"Lindsay, you're raising your voice."

"I'm sorry, Mother," I said dutifully through clenched teeth.

"Granted, Rick made a mistake, but he realizes it now. Men are different from us, and sometimes we have to overlook their little peccadilloes."

" _Their little peccadilloes_?" I repeated incredulously. "I think this goes way beyond a little peccadillo!"

"You're raising your voice again, Lindsay. You're becoming hysterical."

"Yes, I am!"

"I wish you wouldn't."

"All right, all right! I am now speaking in a soft voice. I am now grinding the final remnants of enamel off my molars."

She ignored me. "Thank you, dear. I'll look forward to seeing you and Rick on Saturday at six."

"No! I am not coming to your house with that man and I am not overlooking his _gigantic peccadillo_. Mother, I caught them in bed together! _Our_ bed!"

"You must learn to forgive. Holding a grudge only hurts you and, in this case, it will destroy your marriage."

I'm not sure if there was something in her voice or if I had just become cynical, but a terrible thought flashed across my sleep-deprived brain. "Did Dad have his little _peccadilloes_? Did he ever cheat on you?"

She waited a shadow of a second too long to answer. "Your father and I have a wonderful marriage." And her reply wasn't really an answer. "We'll see you on Saturday. Please wear a nice dress."

I hung up the phone in shock. My father had cheated on my mother.

I really ought to write down all the crazy things happening in my life. The list was getting too long to keep track mentally. I might forget something, and heaven knows, I wouldn't want to forget any of these insane events.

I picked up the recipe for Brownies with Raspberry Jam and Butter Cream Frosting, took one look at it and laid it aside. I'd better stick with something simple while half my brain cells were comatose from lack of sleep and the other half were having a nervous breakdown from the stress.

A Chocolate Pudding Cake would stretch the limits of my mental abilities at that moment.

I made a couple of extras pans. No leftover chocolate ever goes to waste, and today was already a double chocolate day. I couldn't wait to see what the evening would bring. I might have to look into the possibility of hooking up a chocolate I.V.



When we closed the shop that afternoon and walked out back to our cars, I did a careful reconnaissance of the area and decided, with the wind blowing, it would be safe to talk as long as we stayed away from anything that might be bugged, like buildings, utility poles, our vehicles, and large insects. Yes, I was getting paranoid. With good reason.

I caught Paula's arm before she could get too close to her car. "Why did you say that last night about possibly turning yourself in and me making sure your in-laws don't get Zach? We were trying to calm old Lester down, not incite him to come after me."

She stared at me in shock and horror. "Oh, Lindsay, I'm so sorry! I never thought about that. I just wanted him to know that even if he succeeds in sending me to prison, he still won't get Zach. I thought it might discourage him."

"I doubt if a man so bent on revenge is going to be deterred by the threat of a chocolate maker and her team of mythical lawyers."

"Mythical?"

The bright sun hurt my eyes, and I could feel the perspiration start to trickle down my ribs under my loose T-shirt. "Oh, no. Please tell me you didn't believe all that crap about the team of Ninja lawyers."

Now she really looked upset. "It wasn't true? But your father's a very successful attorney."

"In real estate law."

"He has other attorneys in his firm."

"Yeah. Taxes, probate, trust indentures, living trusts, corporations, partnerships, securities...anything like that you need, I'll see to it that he fixes you right up."

"I thought—"

I shook my head. "Why do you think I have somebody else handling my divorce?"

"I assumed you were being independent."

"Well, you're right. I wouldn't have used Dad's firm even if I could have, but I couldn't. They don't soil their lily-white, civil-law hands with that sort of sordid stuff. Dad won't even get my speeding tickets fixed for me." Although I now wondered if my father might be more conversant with the sordid side of life than I'd ever suspected.

"I've really messed things up, haven't I?"

"Don't be silly. They were already so messed up, you couldn't possibly have made them any worse. Don't worry about it. It's my fault. I'm just too good at lying."

"What if Lester believed it and he comes after you?"

"I doubt it. He's got his agenda, and you're it. Anyway, I have a vicious attack cat. Come on, let's go home and see what our mild-mannered neighbor, the Fred-man, has done now."

In spite of my reassurances to Paula that I was in no danger, I hoped Fred had dashed into the nearest phone booth, shed his glasses and donned his Fred-man cape, then found a way to dispose of Lester before the lunatic disposed of all of us.



The first thing I did when I got home was to call Fred. He had spent most of the day repairing Paula's window and installing those bars across her doors. Of course each task had to be done to perfect specifications. Heaven forbid Fred should put in a screw crooked or leave a smudge of glue. But all that persnicketiness meant he hadn't even started his computer search and had no news about Lester Mackey.

The second thing I did was take a nap. My mind was ready to fret and stew and worry some more, but my body took control and cancelled that plan. I was sleeping hard, making up for lost time, when the doorbell woke me...and woke me and woke me and woke me. Somebody was leaning on it. Had to be Rick.

Henry opened his eyes, yawned and closed them again.

Either my caller wasn't Rick, or Henry had decided he was acceptable after all.

It could not be Rick.

I staggered down the stairs.

It was Paula.

Balancing Zach on one hip, she pushed inside, her face a mask of terror. I woke up fast, slammed and locked the door behind her.

"What is it? What's happened?"

"The car—it's not mine—in my garage."

"Calm down," I urged. "You're not making sense. Of course your car's not in the garage. You never park it in there."

Zach pointed to the stairs where Henry was sauntering down to join us. Paula set him on the floor, and he toddled over to maul the cat for a while.

Paula covered her face with both hands as if she were going to cry, but then slid her fingers down her cheeks and drew in a deep breath. "There's a car in my garage."

Not usually a statement that would send cold chills down one's spine, but it did this time. Somehow I knew exactly what that car looked like, and those chills ran all the way to my toes. "An old blue Oldsmobile with Texas plates?"

She nodded, the movement so shaky it was barely recognizable. "This is going to make it look like I did something to Lester and tried to hide his car!"

"Any idea how long it's been there?"

"No. I haven't been in my garage in several days, not since I got out the lawnmower on Saturday. But when I came back from the store and pulled into the driveway, the door was standing wide open, and there it was!"

"Which means he could have put it in there while you were at the store, or he could have done it several days ago, then got tired of waiting for you to find it and came over and opened the door while you were gone. I love all the trees and bushes in this neighborhood, but they sure do make it easy for somebody to sneak around unseen."

"He could be outside watching us right now! He's closing in. You were right. What I said last night didn't scare him at all. It caused him to hurry. Even you've got to admit, the only chance I have is to run." She looked around at Zach where he sat on the floor, laughing as Henry's big tail switched across his face. "It's the only chance _he_ has."

"Let's go talk to Fred. He'll know what to do."

"No! He'll just try to talk me out of it. I have a plan, but I need your help. First, we go over to my house and talk about my leaving so Lester can hear us. Then we move my car as close to the house as possible and load it with empty suitcases. Next you change clothes with me, cover your hair, carry a bundled up blanket like it's a baby, and get in the car. With all the trees, he won't be able to see well enough to know it's not me. You then drive away. After he leaves to follow you, I'll get Zach and a few things and drive your car to the bus station."

"I think that plan sucks."

"Have you got a better one?"

"Well, yeah, as a matter of fact, I do. Why don't we just move Lester's car? Put it around behind that old house. Give it back to him."

She shook her head. "What if somebody sees us?"

I spread my hands in a helpless gesture. "I don't know. He moves around without being seen. Why shouldn't we? Maybe we ought to call Trent and tell him. It's not like you murdered Lester and stole the car."

"Isn't it? He's missing. He had my phone number in his apartment and now his car's in my garage."

We stood for a moment in silence.

"Lindsay," she said very quietly, "what if there's a dead body in the trunk?"

"What? You've been watching too much television. I'm going to take Zach over to Fred's, and you and I will move that damned car."

Paula laid a restraining hand on my arm. "He'd do that, kill someone just so I'd have to take the blame. After all, I killed his son."

"And you called 911 then ran away. He doesn't need to plant a dead body on you. You already did that. He could get you for murder any time he wanted to. He's just playing cat and mouse with you right now."

Paula dropped her head into her hands. "He's insane!"

"No doubt about that."

She looked up, agony and fear blanching her features. "Maybe he isn't just playing cat and mouse. Maybe he has some convoluted plan to kill me and get away with it."

I didn't have an answer for that one. She could very well be right. "I'm taking Zach over to Fred's. Whatever we do, that little boy doesn't need to be in the middle of it."

Standing on Fred's front porch with Zach in my arms, I explained that we needed him to babysit for a few minutes while we did some "female stuff."

"Babysit?" Fred repeated, and his composure seemed to slip a quarter inch or so.

"Yeah, you know, take care of the kid for a few minutes. It's just Zach. You do remember Zach, don't you?"

Fred scowled at me as he took the boy. "I've never been alone with him before. What do I do if he needs something?"

"Unless it's poison or sharp, give it to him. I gotta run."

Before he closed the door, I heard Fred ask Zach if he was familiar with Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line and Transmission Control Protocol. By the time we came back for the kid, he'd be wearing glasses and have a pocket protector in his diaper.

Paula backed her car out of the driveway and into the street then met me as I headed for her garage.

The big old car almost filled the small space. We stood outside staring at it for several moments.

"Are we going to look in the trunk?" Paula finally ventured.

I thought about it but not for long. "No way. If there is a dead body, it won't do us any good to know about it. We're not going to dig a grave in your back yard and bury it."

I squeezed along the side and peered in just to be sure there wasn't a body in the front seat. "The keys are in the ignition. That's a sign. We're meant to move this thing out of here." I started to open the door then stopped. "We need gloves. We don't dare get our fingerprints on it."

"I have gardening gloves."

"That should work."

She found two pairs of dirty, ragged gloves and I reached for the door handle again, but Paula stopped me. "What if there's a bomb?"

I peered cautiously inside. "I don't see a bomb."

Paula looked in the back window. "Do you know what one looks like?"

"No. But there's nothing in the car."

"It could be in the glove compartment."

"There'd be wires." I was trying hard to convince myself. What I really wanted to do was get completely away from that car, call Trent and let the professionals handle this. But I couldn't because of Paula's involvement.

"It may be in the engine."

My hands inside the gloves were getting sweaty. My whole body was getting sweaty. "I guess there's only one way to find out." I tried to make myself reach for that door handle again, but my hands refused to carry out any such insane order. I had a vision of the car, garage and the two of us going up in a huge explosion. Thank goodness we'd left Zach with Fred. Somebody should be left to open the café in the morning. Okay, that was an insane thought. I was feeling pretty insane at that moment.

Finally the obvious dawned on me. "There's no bomb. He wouldn't risk killing his grandson and you'd normally have Zach with you."

Paula nodded slowly. "You're probably right."

"Of course I'm right. I'm going to open the door now." I knew I was right, but my hands shook as I yanked that door open...and found myself still alive and whole. I slid into the driver's seat. It smelled like cigarette smoke, just as the apartment had.

I reached for the key, ninety-nine percent certain there was no bomb, but the other one percent was terrified.

"Lindsay," Paula said, "get out and let me do that. This isn't your problem. If somebody sees us moving it, I don't want you to be involved."

Very slowly I turned the key...as if I could back off should a bomb start to explode. The battery cranked, and I jumped and turned loose of the key. It didn't explode.

"I'm driving," I said, my voice a little squeaky. I cleared my throat and tried to sound as if I hadn't almost wet my pants a few seconds ago. "I drive faster than you do, and we're in a hurry."

"We're only going around the block! How fast can you go in that amount of time?"

I turned the key again, and the engine caught. "I can go pretty fast if you'll get out of my way."

"I'm not moving until _you_ get out of that car."

"Paula, we don't have time for this!"

"Fine. Then get out."

Like I said, she may be little, but she's stubborn. I compromised by sliding over into the passenger seat.

Paula got in, scooted the seat up, put the car in reverse and backed out of the building. A police car came down the street and parked at the end of the driveway, effectively blocking our exit to the street.

Paula hit the brake barely in time to avoid backing into the squad car. The sudden stop tilted us both backward, but then she sagged onto the steering wheel. "It's all over," she whispered.

"It's not over until the red-haired lady sings, and I couldn't carry a tune if I had to. Turn off the engine, then we'll get out and bluff."

She was ghostly pale, but she'd lost the panic and terror. Now she just seemed resigned to the inevitable. She'd given up.

In the rearview mirror I could see Trent and Creighton walking toward the car, Creighton in his spiffy blue uniform and Trent in faded jeans and rumpled Kansas City Royals T-shirt.

"Paula Roberts," I said, using her birth name, "if you don't get out of this car and help me dazzle these cops with bullshit, I'm going to tell everyone at our shop that you use a mix for your cappuccino."

"What?"

Okay, it was a pretty weak threat, but it was the best I could come up with while my own heart was pounding fear through my body fast enough to get it a speeding ticket. And the weak threat worked. It was so absurd, it pulled her out of her stupor.

But before either of us could reach for the door handle, Trent knocked on my window and Creighton appeared at Paula's.

I rolled my window down and smiled. "We've got to stop meeting this way. My cat's getting suspicious."

"Going somewhere, ladies?" he asked, leaning down to look in.

"Ladies," I repeated, looking at Paula. I really just wanted to see if she'd fainted yet. I turned back to Trent and smiled. "I love it when you talk dirty."

He wanted to smile back. I know he did. I could see it in his eyes. He was only looking exasperated because his cop training told him it was the appropriate expression.

"Whose car is this?" he demanded. Damn good cop training.

"I'd say by dint of possession, it's Paula's. A gift somebody left in her garage. There was no note, so we think it's from her secret admirer. We were just taking it for a test spin."

"Where were you planning to spin it to?"

"Oh, down to the lake, come back by the grocery store. We need to get some Tampax." My old stand-by to get rid of unwanted males.

Trent blushed, and for just a second, I thought it might work. But it didn't. He looked down to his shoes then back up and sighed. "Why are you wearing gardening gloves?"

"We were planning to plant some flowers down at the lake."

He shook his head. "Would both of you please step out of the car?"

I turned to Paula. "I know you had your heart set on planting those petunias, but Detective Trent did say _please_. It's so rare to find men with manners these days. I suppose we should do what he wants."

She looked confused, but she complied and so did I.

About that time another squad car pulled up behind Creighton's. Like I said, the cops in Pleasant Grove are strapped for entertainment. The whole force turns out to have a tailgate party when somebody complains about his neighbor's television set being too loud.

Trent led us over to stand in the shade of a tree. He took out his small notebook and pen while Creighton and the two recent arrivals checked the car.

"It's Lester Mackey's, isn't it?" I asked.

"That's right. How do you know that?"

I shrugged. "The man's been dogging us, he's from Texas, the car has Texas plates."

Apparently Paula's the only one who believes me when I lie. Trent studied me intently for a long moment, and it was all I could do not to confess that Lester's landlord had given me a description of the car. It's a good thing I can make chocolate. I obviously have no talent for being a criminal.

"How did it come to be in your possession, Ms. Walters?"

Paula cringed and managed to look even smaller than she was. "I don't know. I came home from the grocery store and saw that my garage door was open. The car was inside."

"When was that?"

"A few minutes ago."

"What are you doing here?" I demanded, butting into the conversation. "Don't tell me you got another anonymous phone call."

He glared at me. "As a matter of fact, someone called to report seeing a car with Texas plates in Paula Walters' garage. Only took a couple of minutes to match up the numbers with the ones Mackey's apartment manager gave me."

"Who's making all these calls? Didn't it ever occur to you that somebody's trying to frame Paula? Look at her garage. You'd have to have awfully good eyesight to see a license plate from the street through all the trees."

"If I knew who was making the calls, I couldn't tell you. But as a matter of fact, I don't. They're made from prepaid cell phones. That's all we know."

"So you agree it looks like she's being set up?"

"I don't agree and I don't disagree. I'm just trying to get a few facts."

"You keep clenching your teeth like that, you'll wear off the enamel. I speak from experience."

He turned away and faced Paula again. At least I'd managed to give her a few moments to regain her composure. "So the car appeared in your garage while you were gone to the grocery store a few minutes ago?"

"I don't know. I don't put my car in the garage in good weather. The door's too heavy. The last time I opened it was on Saturday to get out my lawnmower. The car wasn't there."

"So that means the car could have been put in your garage any time between Saturday and this afternoon?"

She nodded.

Creighton came over. "Need to talk to you a minute."

"Don't go anywhere, ladies."

I smiled. "We'll be right here waiting for you, big boy."

"What are we going to do?" Paula whispered as soon as he was out of hearing.

"We could steal the squad car and run or we could pray for an earthquake."

"Lindsay, will you be serious? We're in trouble!"

"We don't know that. At least not for certain sure."

Trent came back over. "There are traces of blood in the trunk. We're going to see if it matches the blood on some pieces of toilet tissue in Lester Mackey's apartment. In the meantime, Ms. Walters, we'd appreciate it if you didn't leave town."

How true it is, you only regret the things you didn't do. Why didn't I flush that bloody tissue paper when I had the chance?

# Chapter Thirteen

After the cops left, towing Lester's old car away for evidence, Paula and I walked over to Fred's house to retrieve Zach. Paula didn't say much and that worried me, so of course I babbled. I kept trying to assure her that everything was going to turn out okay, and she kept ignoring me. I didn't blame her. Even I didn't believe me.

Fred answered the door with two hairs out of place and a wild expression in his eyes. Zach toddled up behind him with a piece of ivy hanging over his shoulder, a silver candlestick in one hand and a white, partially gnawed candle in the other.

"Zach!" Paula exclaimed, stooping to take the items away from her son. "What have you been doing? Oh, Fred, I'm sorry!"

She handed everything back to Fred and scooped Zach up. "You've been a bad boy! What did you do to Uncle Fred's house? Is anything broken?"

"It's okay," Fred said in a squeaky voice. He stared dismally at the tooth marks on the candle.

"Get over it," I snapped, in no mood for trivialities when Paula was about to be charged with murder. "It's only a candle."

"Fred, if he destroyed anything, let me know and I'll replace it," Paula offered.

"No." Fred kept looking at that candle. "He didn't destroy anything."

"Are you going to let us come in?" I asked. "Or would you like to come to my house where the main concern is fending off giant dust bunnies, not obsessing over a stupid candle?" He looked at me blankly. Even taking his OCD personality into consideration, I was surprised he got so upset over such a minor incident. "We need to talk," I said firmly. "Something else has happened."

He stepped back, permitting us entrance. "Come in." It was the most half-hearted invitation I'd ever heard. Zach must have done more than eat the candle and ravage the ivy. Surely Fred couldn't be this disconcerted over a piece of wax and a messy plant. The house was still standing and so was Fred. I couldn't begin to imagine what had happened.

"Lindsay, you can fill him in on the latest," Paula said wearily. "I'll take Zach home before he does something else he shouldn't."

I entered Fred's house cautiously, but everything looked pretty much the same as before Hurricane Zach. A sauce pan sat on the middle cushion of his forest green sofa and a couple of lids dotted the hardwood floor, but no real harm that I could see.

"I can't believe you got all bent out of shape over one little candle," I chided him.

Fred ran a hand through his hair. "It's not the candle. I don't care if he eats the candle. It's my computer."

"Your computer? He ate your computer?"

Fred scowled and for a second he looked like the old Fred. "Of course not. It's..." He cleared his throat and straightened as if preparing to face a firing squad. "It's got problems. It crashed."

He seemed to be in pain. I certainly was. I realized suddenly how much I'd been counting on Fred to pull a metaphorical rabbit out of cyberspace, and that might prove difficult with no computer.

"Your computer crashed?" I repeated, hoping he'd correct me, tell me I misunderstood.

He nodded.

"You mean it doesn't work anymore? It has to work!" I told him about Lester's car and the blood in the trunk and Trent's admonition to Paula that she shouldn't leave town. "We need you to get on that computer and find out about the skeletons in Lester's closet fast! What happened? Can you fix it?"

"I don't know what happened!" He actually raised his voice, then immediately regained control. "I don't think I've actually lost the hard drive. I think the problem lies in the—" And I can't repeat what he said then because it was in a foreign language...computer language. "Zach was sitting on the floor in my office, pretending that candlestick was a car while I worked," he continued in a quiet, dead voice. "I got up to get another DVD, and when I turned back to the computer, Zach was hitting the keyboard with the candlestick. The whole system was going crazy. I have all my programs and data files backed up, of course, so it's not the end of the world as we know it. I'm running diagnostics. I'll have it up and running again. But it's going to be a little while longer before we can find out anything about Paula's father-in-law."

"Damn! How much longer?"

"That depends on how soon I get back to work on it." He glared at me pointedly.

"Oh! I was just leaving. How about if I bring you some Chocolate Pudding Cake?"

He managed a tiny smile. "That should help. Thank you."

I went home and fixed Fred a huge serving bowl of the dessert I'd brought home, then topped it with vanilla ice cream, nuts and chocolate sprinkles. That should help get him through the computer crisis or send him into a diabetic coma.



Later that evening Henry and I finished our respective cans of dinner and were settling down to have dessert (Chocolate Pudding Cake for me, catnip for him) when the doorbell rang.

I stopped with my first bite halfway to my mouth. Henry looked up from his saucer of catnip but immediately went back to daintily sniffing and nibbling.

I told myself his lack of reaction meant the person at the door was not Lester, but I couldn't be one hundred percent positive. I'd only been speculating as to the cause of Henry's nighttime jungle sounds. I could be wrong. It might not be Lester at all he was reacting to. He could be having attacks of gas in the middle of the night and on the back porch of the house across the street.

Of course, Lester didn't seem to make a habit of requesting entrance. It was unlikely he would be ringing my doorbell. I was getting paranoid with all that had been happening. My visitor was probably Rick. I didn't want to see Rick, but I'd rather see him than some madman who felt the need to cut a hole in my heart the way he'd done with the bear so I couldn't sic my father's army of lawyers on him after Paula went to prison.

But Henry growled when Rick was around. He was still happily nipping his catnip.

The doorbell rang again and I set my cake on the coffee table then slowly made my way across the room, my knees rubbery and protesting with every step. My rational mind knew there was no madman standing on my porch, but my rational mind has never had the starring role in my life. I knew I'd open the door to see Fred or Paula or Rick or a salesman, but I was really glad I'd given in to my paranoia and locked all my doors and windows.

The pile of potential weapons I'd found on Sunday still lay on the living room floor (did I mention I'm not obsessed with housekeeping?), and I picked up the iron skillet on my way to the door.

I flipped on the porch light and peered through the peep hole.

Detective Adam Trent stood there, tall, dark, and macho, looking not at all like a cop in his blue jeans and T-shirt. He scowled against the light or at me or maybe both.

In spite of appearances, he was a cop. This was not a social visit and there were a lot of things I didn't want to talk to him about. Nevertheless, I was so relieved to see him instead of the alternatives—Lester or Rick—I unlocked the door and swung it wide.

"Come in," I invited with a big smile. "You're just in time for dessert." Maybe if I gave him enough chocolate, he'd become so euphoric, he'd forget to ask those questions I didn't want to answer.

He barged into the room, and I wondered if there was enough chocolate in the world to soothe this savage beast. "You tampered with evidence in Lester Mackey's apartment," he snarled.

"You're cute when you're angry." He really wasn't with his face all red and that vein throbbing in his neck. But I couldn't help myself. It came from watching all those old movies with Fred.

Trent's face turned several shades darker and his scowl deepened. This was going to take a lot of chocolate.

"Have a seat." I waved the skillet in the general direction of the recliner.

"What are you doing with that thing?"

"Oh, just cleaning up in the kitchen."

"If you cooked something in that, I hope you've had your tetanus shot. It's covered in rust."

I shrugged. "Haven't you heard? Women need extra iron. Rust is oxidized iron. Kind of like taking chelated vitamins. I'll just put this up and be right back."

Once I got into the kitchen, I considered running out the back door, but Lester might be lurking. Instead, I fixed Trent a smaller version of the dessert I'd concocted for Fred.

When I returned to the living room, he was sitting in the recliner and Henry was in his lap. Traitor cat. Maybe I'd change his name to Benedict.

I handed Trent the bowl of cake and ice cream. He didn't accept immediately, and I could tell he knew he ought to refuse.

"Don't tell me there's a _no chocolate while on duty_ rule."

"No." He accepted the bowl and took a bite. His facial expression relaxed a little. "As long as this isn't a bribe."

Omigawd! He was teasing me! The man was actually attempting levity! I plopped down on the sofa and snatched up my own bowl.

"This is good," he said...a little unwillingly, I thought.

"Thank you."

"Very good. But not good enough to make me forget that you're still in trouble for destroying evidence."

I didn't say anything. Discretion dictated that I wait until he'd had a few more bites.

"George Stinson told me you were over there yesterday with your husband, and the two of you handed him some cock and bull story about an inheritance."

"Rick is my almost-ex-husband, and I was not at that apartment building with him yesterday or any other day."

Trent took another bite, and I could see a further mellowing. His face was almost back to its normal color and his lips weren't scrunched up quite so tight. "Maybe the man wasn't your ex, but the woman was definitely you. Stinson described you in detail, right down to that red hair and the freckles on your nose. It's no wonder he couldn't remember much about the man. He spent the whole time ogling you."

"Yuck!"

"If it wasn't your ex, it must have been your neighbor, Fred. Was he the one that tampered with the evidence?"

"Fred had nothing to do with it!"

Trent's face settled into a smug look. Blasted cop had tricked me. "So it was you. What did you do with the hairs in that little cup? Have you still got them?"

"I don't have to answer that. The Fifth Amendment guarantees my rights against self-incrimination." I've always thought that was a strange amendment, since as soon as a person invokes it, that pretty much says the facts would be incriminating. But it was the only defense I had since I was guilty.

"I can get a search warrant for your house."

"Go right ahead. Search it now. You have my permission. I didn't make my bed this morning, but that's the worst you're going to find."

"You flushed them, didn't you? Stinson said he heard you flush the toilet while you were up there."

I sat straighter, trying to look indignant instead of guilty. "Prove it."

Trent slapped his hand on the arm of the chair. Henry opened one eye then closed it again. "Damn it, you can't go around destroying evidence!"

"I should have flushed that bloody toilet paper too," I grumbled.

"But you didn't, and as soon as we get the tests back, your friend's going to be in big trouble."

"You don't know that."

"I'd bet money on it." He took a slow, leisurely bite of cake and ice cream, his eyes narrowing as he scrutinized me. "I'll tell you what," he continued, "I'll forget about the evidence tampering charge if you'll tell me what's going on, and don't try to bull shit me by saying nothing's going on. I know better. Your friend with the stolen identity is involved right up to the blond roots of her phony brown hair. I'm supposed to be the good guy here. I'm supposed to be helping innocent people, but I feel like I'm trying to work this case wearing my own handcuffs."

I sighed and sat back. Trent knew far too much already...or maybe, as he said, too little. I hesitated. My gut instinct was to trust this guy. He had good eyes. But my gut instinct had been known to be wrong. After all, I'd married Rick.

Henry liked Trent, though, and Henry didn't like Rick. I figured that cat's instincts were better than mine.

"I can't tell you Paula's story, but I swear to you she hasn't done anything morally wrong, and Lester Mackey is not who he says he is."

He waved a negligent hand. "We already figured that one out. The address he gave in Dallas was phony. He bought that car from an individual, paid cash, and never even had the title transferred. The tags are phony. What's his real name?"

If I told Trent even that much, he'd be able to find out who Paula was and what she'd done.

"I can't tell you. But he has a grudge against Paula, and he's setting her up. He took Zach to make it look like she's a bad mother. He switched her aspirin for those pills so she'd crash and he could snatch Zach. They were sleeping pills, weren't they?"

Trent nodded. "Heavy duty sedative."

"I'd be willing to bet Lester made those calls to the police. He planted two bugs in her house, and he's been listening and watching from across the street. He's an evil man. He beats his wife."

"He planted two bugs in her house?"

"Yeah, you know, hidden microphones, not cockroaches."

"I know what bugs are. I want to know how you know, how you found them and when I can see them. I also want to know why this man has a grudge against Paula, what his motive is for setting her up."

I couldn't very well tell him that Lester Bennett had a grudge against Paula for killing his son, and I had a feeling Fred wouldn't want Trent to find out about his involvement in locating the bugs or about his unusual skills. "I can't tell you any of that."

He studied me quietly for a few seconds then shook his head. "I gotta say this for you, Lindsay Powell, you go to the mat for your friends."

I shrugged and had more chocolate. "They'd do the same for me."

"Would they? It seems to me you may be far too trusting for your own good."

"Yeah, well, it seems to me you may be far too cynical for your own good."

"What did your almost-ex do to make you divorce him? Another woman?"

I focused my attention on the last bites of pudding cake in my bowl. "I don't think that's any of your business."

"No, it's not. I heard he was arrested last night but you refused to press charges."

I didn't answer but felt he was chastising me for that refusal.

We ate in silence for a few seconds. I heard him scraping his bowl at the same time I did. I set mine on the coffee table and looked up to find that he'd set his on the lamp table and was looking at me.

"I did a little checking on your Rick," he said. "If you hadn't trusted him so much, you'd have caught him years ago."

"You checked on Rick? You already knew what he did? How dare you! I suppose you checked on me too!"

"Yep, sure did. That's what cops do when we're trying to solve a crime. Check out everybody involved."

I suddenly saw an opportunity to find out something I'd been wondering about. "Fred too?"

He hesitated maybe half a second, just long enough for me to know he'd found something he didn't like or understand in Fred's background. "Fred too."

"So what did you dig up about him?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary." He sounded a little puzzled by that.

"What does he do for a living?"

"Don't you know?"

"Of course I know. Fred and I are close friends. I just want to see if you know."

"He's a day trader in the stock market."

I nodded as if I'd known that all along. "Sure, everybody knows that, but what did he do before?"

We stared at each other for several moments. I'm pretty sure he knew I was bullshitting him.

"He did everything," Trent finally said. Apparently he was curious enough about Fred to play along with my bull shit and see what he could get out of me. "A clerk in a grocery store, a maintenance man at an apartment complex, a bookkeeper for a small trucking company, you name it, he did it."

None of that sounded at all like Fred, and none of it involved finding bugs or breaking and entering. I wondered if Trent was using one of my favorite techniques...toss out bogus information in the hopes the other person will correct you and tell you what you want to know.

Again I nodded knowingly and left it up to Trent to decide if that nod meant I knew Fred had those jobs or if it meant I knew he was trying to con me.

"I was a little surprised," he finally said. "I'm usually a pretty good judge of character, and I had Fred pegged for more the white collar type."

Apparently he wasn't trying to con me. I decided this was a good time to change the topic of conversation.

"What else did you find out about me?"

"That you drive too fast."

I shrugged. "Travel time is wasted time. I have a lot to do. I don't think I like the idea of your knowing so much about me when I don't know anything about you." I looked at his T-shirt. "Except that you're a baseball fan."

"I'm the cop. I'm the one who gets to know things." He avoided my eyes and stroked Henry, oblivious to the cat hair that flew up then settled all over his clothes.

"I know you like cats."

"Yeah. I like cats." He sat there for a minute, stroking Henry and looking at me, his lips tight. I could almost hear the thoughts going round and round in his cop brain. I'd turned the conversation to him, and not him as a cop but him personally. I sensed that he wasn't sure he liked that but he wasn't sure he disliked it either. I waited. If I do say so myself, I have nosiness down to an art.

Finally he cracked. "In my business," he said, "you learn real quick not to trust people. But you can trust all cats and most dogs."

I watched Henry wallowing in the affection. Henry trusted Trent.

"You ever been married?" I asked him. Hey, if you don't ask the questions, you sure won't get the answers.

His hand stilled on Henry's head. Henry, however, took the initiative and moved his head under Trent's hand until Trent started petting him again. "Three years," he said. "Divorced for ten."

"Any kids?"

"No kids."

"What happened?" You really have to pull information out of some people.

"We got married, we lived together for three years, then we got a divorce and stopped living together. Well, actually it was the other way around. We stopped living together and then got a divorce."

"Wow," I said sarcastically. "That's a pretty dramatic story."

"I'm a dramatic kind of guy, but enough about me. Let's talk about you and how far over your head you are in this situation with your friend, Paula."

I didn't want to talk about that again. "I think I'll have some more cake," I said. "You want some?"

He looked longingly at his bowl, and I knew he did. But he stood, set Henry on the floor, and began to brush off the hair. "The owner of that house across the street is sending us a key and his permission to search it. Think you could do me a favor and stay away from there in the meantime? Avoid tampering with any more evidence?"

I shuddered. "You think I'd go near that place knowing that creepy guy could be over there?"

He drew in a long breath and exhaled slowly. "Lindsay Powell, I wouldn't be surprised at anything you did. I'd just like to think that if there's a dead body lying around, it'll still be there for me to find instead of winding up in your garbage disposal."

"Oh, gross!"

He strode to the door. I was right behind him. I wasn't going to let that door remain unlocked for longer than a few seconds.

When he suddenly stopped and turned around, I ran into him. I put my hands on his chest to balance myself, and he put his on my shoulders. Kind of an intriguing position, and for just a minute I thought he was going to say, or maybe even do, something interesting. We had kind of bonded, shared war stories about our ex-spouses. For just a minute I thought I wanted him to do something interesting. Must have been the chocolate.

"Thanks for the cake. It was really good."

"Welcome. Come by the shop sometime and I'll show you what else I can do." Yikes! Did that sound like I thought it sounded? "Chocolate, I mean," I added hastily, removing any doubt that I knew my first comment could be taken as something else. When would I learn to keep my mouth shut and settle for embarrassment instead of total humiliation?

"I'll take you up on that." He smiled and I prayed for a live volcano to open up under the floor and swallow me. "Chocolate, I mean," he added, making it worse. I wished for a volcano and a hurricane. "Be sure to lock up after I leave."

He left, and I closed the door behind him then turned the deadbolt and leaned against it for a minute, berating myself. I had no control over my mouth or my curly hair. I'd given up on the hair years ago. I hated to admit defeat with regard to the mouth, but I might have to.

I took the rusty skillet upstairs with me when Henry and I went to bed. Locking the door was a good idea, but Lester and Fred had both slipped past Paula's locks without a problem. Didn't make me feel safe. The skillet had the potential to crack a skull as well as give the crackee tetanus. Tomorrow I'd buy some mace and maybe some pepper spray too.

And perhaps a muzzle for my mouth.



I was dreaming about a creepy man with moles all over his face trying to smother me with his hair piece when Henry woke me. He was making those horrible jungle noises again.

I sat upright in bed, heart pounding, afraid to put my feet on the floor. I just knew if I did, Lester would reach out from under the bed with big, nicotine-stained fingers and grab my ankles.

"Having another attack of gas?" I asked Henry, trying to convince myself. It had made a nice theory earlier, but that unearthly sound in the middle of the night conjured up images of monsters and madmen, not gas attacks.

I swallowed hard and retrieved the rusty iron skillet from my nightstand. "He's here again, isn't he?"

But Henry wasn't looking out the window...the window I had closed and locked just in case Lester decided to use a ladder. Henry was pacing back and forth from the bed to the bedroom door. Was Lester in the hallway?

I listened between Henry's yowls and didn't hear any boards creaking.

"I'll bet you need to go outside and potty, don't you?" I asked hopefully, clutching my skillet with both hands. "That's the problem, isn't it? You really, really need to go to the bathroom. I know how that is. Terrible feeling. I'll just go downstairs and let you out and then you'll feel better and so will I."

It sounded logical, but logic didn't stand up to a cat pacing back and forth from my bed to the door, making noises like an alien creature. I couldn't convince myself to put my feet on the floor, to move out of that bed.

I have a phone on the night stand. All I had to do was lift the receiver and call Fred or 911. But if I lifted that receiver and found the phone lines had been cut, I'd probably die of a heart attack on the spot, and Henry would have to learn to use the can opener himself.

Nevertheless, I made myself pick up the phone. I don't think I've ever lived through a longer split second waiting for the dial tone to kick in. It did, of course. I was overreacting. I felt silly.

I punched in the first three digits of Fred's phone number then stopped. Either Henry needed to go to the bathroom or Lester really was down there. In the first case, I'd be waking Fred for no reason, and in the second I'd be putting him in danger.

I depressed the button, got another dial tone and punched in 9-1, then stopped.

What would I do if the cops came and Henry promptly went outside, pottied, buried it and came back in?

I couldn't decide if I was more terrified of facing an intruder or more worried about making a fool of myself and of having Trent find out about it.

"There's nobody in my house," I assured myself sternly. "And if there is, then I need to go down there and escort him out. This is my house. I refuse to allow uninvited guests."

I set my jaw and hung up the phone.

Nevertheless, it took all my courage to get out of that bed and walk across the room. I started to put on a robe, then decided it was ridiculous to worry about a murderer seeing me in an oversized T-shirt. Besides, the long sleeves of a robe might restrict the motion of my arm in case I got a chance to whack him with the skillet. I drew in a deep breath, hefted the skillet high and yanked the door open.

The hallway was empty.

Henry darted past me and down the stairs.

I had to follow. What if Lester was in my house and he hurt my cat? Obviously Henry was so macho he thought he could handle it, but even though he might sound like a fully grown tiger, he was really only an overgrown pussy cat.

I hurried down the stairs, being as quiet as I could. Even so, I was pretty sure any intruder could hear my ragged breathing and my heart pounding against my ribs.

The living room appeared to be empty, though the moonlight wasn't bright enough to illuminate the corners. I desperately wanted to flip the switch and flood the room with light, but then an intruder would be able to see me. Anyway, Henry wasn't in the living room which surely meant the intruder wasn't there either.

I gulped down the lump of terror in my throat, checked the front door to be sure it was still locked then tiptoed on through the dining room into the kitchen. My back felt cold and exposed, vulnerable to attack from behind.

Henry stood in the kitchen at the back door, trying to see under it. When I walked into the room, he turned around and ambled over to his water bowl.

"You were thirsty? You scared me half to death because you were thirsty?" I wanted to believe that. I really, really wanted to believe that.

But why had he been peering under the door?

A bug of the crawly variety? Curiosity, that famed cat killer?

I checked the deadbolt on the kitchen door. It was secure.

I sagged against the counter, the adrenaline suddenly ebbing, bile surging up, bringing a bitter taste to my mouth.

"Henry, if I had the energy, I'd kill you."

He looked at me, those blue eyes wide and complacent, then strutted across the room and rubbed against my leg.

As if expecting praise for running off an intruder?

I shook my head to try to clear it. When that paranoia gets a grip, it doesn't let go. Okay, there really was a nut case skulking around out there, but he was after Paula, not me. He'd only come after me if Paula went to prison and I sicced Dad's nonexistent Ninja lawyers on him.

I set the skillet down on the counter beside the pan of Chocolate Pudding Cake. That's what I needed. A chocolate fix would make everything better.

With trembling fingers, I removed the plastic wrap from the pan then took a spoon from the drawer. Considering the way my hands were shaking, I decided not to bother with the middleman bowl but took the whole pan into the living room and sat down on the sofa.

With every bite, I became a little calmer even though the bitter taste in my mouth kept me from thoroughly savoring the dark, rich flavor.

"Henry, we need to talk about this," I said as soon as I got back enough breath to be able to speak. He climbed onto the sofa beside me and purred happily. "You're obviously not the least bit concerned that you just took twenty years off my life." I shook my spoon at him. "This is not a good thing! I appreciate the fact that you have ambition and want to be a watch cat, but you've got to learn to differentiate between a burglar and a thirst."

I shoveled in more chocolate and chattered nervously to Henry. I still wasn't completely convinced there hadn't been an intruder in my house. However, I was beginning to feel calm enough to consider venturing back upstairs for another hour of sleep before I had to go to work.

Then I began to feel queasy. I looked down at the pan. Small wonder. I'd eaten all that remained of that entire pan of Chocolate Pudding Cake. That's a lot of chocolate, even for a pro like me.

"Henry, it would seem my gluttony for chocolate has finally caught up with me." I sat very still, taking deep breaths, trying to relax my stomach muscles, but it rapidly became apparent that I was going to lose the battle and the chocolate.

I set the pan on the coffee table, charged upstairs into the bathroom and proceeded to empty my stomach of all contents. Half a pan of Chocolate Pudding Cake, partially digested, is not a pretty sight.

When there was nothing left but my stomach lining, I staggered up from hugging the commode, rinsed my mouth and brushed my teeth. By that time, I was so dizzy, I could barely stand. I needed to clean the toilet bowl, but I didn't think I could do it right then.

Paula was right. I shouldn't eat so much sugar, especially on an empty stomach. Maybe if I ate some cheese, the protein would counteract some of that sugar and I'd feel better.

I stumbled downstairs into the living room, trying to make it to the kitchen and promising myself I would never again, as long as I lived, pig out on chocolate, so help me God. I doubt if God believed me. I didn't.

But something was wrong beyond my stomach problems. I was pretty sure the room shouldn't be spinning in circles and there shouldn't be three blue eyed cats hurrying toward me with concerned looks on their faces.

I had a hard time keeping my balance as the room spun round and round. Walking was out of the question. Just in time the floor came up to catch me and solved that problem. When I first landed, I thought I was going to throw up again, but the blackness closed around me and I sank into it gratefully.

# Chapter Fourteen

I was having a terrible dream about being dragged all over my high school gymnasium while Rick and Fred shouted at me and tortured me with needles to make me tell Trent my secret recipes. They beat me with iron skillets and pans of Chocolate Pudding Cake while hundreds of people in the stands booed me when I tried to tell them there was no secret. Finally Trent handcuffed me and carted me off to a dark, dank dungeon where he put me on the rack and tortured me some more.

I was happy to wake from that dream even though my throat hurt, my mouth tasted like I'd been eating Henry's cat food, and my body ached all over. On second thought, I didn't really want to wake up. The dreams were over and the alarm wasn't screaming at me. Surely I could go back to sleep for a little while and maybe have a pleasant dream.

"She's coming around!" someone shouted.

There shouldn't be anybody in my bedroom. Damn! Surely I hadn't let Rick smooth talk me into spending the night again. The voice didn't sound like Rick's. It was familiar, but I couldn't quite place it.

"Lindsay? Can you hear me?" A female voice too? In my bedroom? Omigawd! Did we have an orgy? That certainly wasn't on my list of things to do, but, judging from the way I felt, I could have been drugged and done about anything. The question of what had made my throat sore bothered me a lot. I didn't want to go there. The only place I wanted to go was back to sleep.

I was drifting downward, hoping this supposed awakening was just another bad dream, when somebody else shouted at me. Did these people think I was deaf?

"Ms. Powell, can you open your eyes?"

Oh, God, please tell me I didn't orgy with somebody who calls me Ms. Powell!

"No!" I tried to shout, but it came out a whisper. In fact, I wasn't a hundred percent certain it came out at all.

Someone took my hand. "Lindsay, you need to wake up now." Fred. That was a good sign. I was positive Fastidious Fred would never be involved in anything as unorganized and messy as an orgy.

I opened one eye a crack but the painful glare slammed it shut again. "Bright," I whispered. "Hurts."

"Close the curtain," the owner of the _Ms. Powell_ voice said. An open curtain was another good sign. I was pretty sure people didn't orgy with open curtains on a sunny day. "You're going to be fine," the man assured me.

I opened the other eye a crack, blinked a couple of times then managed to keep it open. The man leaning over me was dressed in white. A doctor. Now I understood. I was in the hospital. I'd finally had that car wreck everybody predicted would happen if I kept driving so fast.

"Go away," I whispered.

"Lindsay, I need you to tell me what happened." It was the first voice again, and this time I recognized it. Trent.

My eyelids flew wide open, blinked closed a couple of times, but finally adapted to the light, remained open and focused.

Trent and the guy in white leaned over me on one side with Paula and Fred on the other.

"Anybody else hurt?" My voice cracked as the words rasped up the tender surface of my throat.

"Someone was with you when this happened?" Trent asked, his notebook in one hand and pen in the other. "Who?"

"I don't know," I croaked.

"Lindsay, do you remember what happened?" Trent prompted.

I had absolutely no memory of the accident, but I wasn't going to admit that to him. However, his nagging did bring back the memory of him coming to my house and grilling me, asking me a million questions, wanting to know everything about everybody but refusing to answer my questions. Now he was harassing me again while I lay at death's door. "Don't wanna talk about me. Tell me about your ex." That should shut him up.

"She's still pretty much out of it," the man in white said.

"Am not." If I could tell such an outrageous lie as that, obviously the orgy folks hadn't drugged me with truth serum.

"Do you want a drink of water? Your throat must be sore."

"Water?" Note to self: Never orgy with a man who'd offer me a drink of water when I'd barely survived a terrible car wreck. "Coke." I needed something to get the awful taste out of my mouth.

"Can she have a Coke?" Fred asked.

I was about to protest that I'd been having them for most of my life and wasn't going to stop now, but the man in white spoke up and assured Fred that I could. How nice of him. As soon as I got my voice back, I'd tell him a thing or two about making decisions for me. "The caffeine and sugar will help her wake up," the man continued, "but a Seven-Up might be easier on her throat and stomach."

"I want a _Coke_."

"I'll get you one from the vending machine." Fred left.

I turned to the man in white who obviously knew nothing about my drinking habits. "Who are you?"

"I'm Doctor Claxton. You're in the hospital. You've been very sick."

"I'm still very sick. Did I hit a train? Did a train hit me? How fast was I going? Did I get a ticket?"

"No ticket this time," Trent said. His voice was sympathetic, and he wasn't even scowling at me. I must be at death's door. "There was no automobile accident. Did somebody come to visit you after I left last night?"

I shook my head, but then more events of the night before came back to me. "Henry was making that jungle-cat noise and I thought somebody broke in, but nobody did."

"How do you know?"

"I looked."

"Did you eat some more chocolate when you were looking?"

"Oh, yeah. That's right, I did." I could feel a weak blush rising to my face. "I ate the whole thing, the rest of the pudding cake, and I got sick." I looked at Paula. "You warned me. If I live through this, I swear I'll never pig out again. I'll eat lots of vegetables and chicken and give up sugar forever."

Fred walked in the door carrying that familiar red can.

"Right after I have this Coke," I amended. I reached for it with a hand that weighed a ton and had an IV attached. Yuck!

Doctor Claxton intercepted the pass.

I frowned. "Don't take my Coke."

"I'm just getting you a straw and then we're going to raise the head of your bed so you can swallow better."

That was kind of fun, sitting up without making an effort.

Drinking my Coke through a straw while the doctor held the can wasn't as much fun as gulping it down, but I decided to humor the man. It's probably not wise to make your doctor mad, not if you felt as bad as I did.

After a few sips, I was more awake and those dancing bubbles had cleared away most of the disgusting taste in my mouth. The liquid stung my throat at first, but then it sort of numbed the pain. Everyone around me seemed totally absorbed with watching me drink. I do love attention, but that wasn't really the kind I wanted.

The doctor tried to take the can away but I grabbed it, and this time I had the strength to actually hold on. He released it to my custody and I felt I was once again regaining control of my life and my Coca-Cola intake.

"What time is it?" I asked. I could tell from the brightness of the sun that Paula and I should have been at the shop long ago.

Trent checked his watch. "A little after nine a.m."

"I put a sign on the shop saying we're closed for the day," Paula said.

"Damn! Maybe we can still catch the lunch crowd." I made an effort to get out of bed, but it was a futile effort. Holding the can of Coke took all my energy.

Claxton laid a restraining hand on my shoulder. "You nearly died. You need a little rest."

"Almost died?" I groaned. "You mean Death by Chocolate isn't a joke? I almost died from eating too much chocolate?"

"Not exactly," Trent said. "We're pretty sure that chocolate was laced with poison. Were you eating from the same pudding cake you gave me a piece of?"

"Poison?"

The doctor took my pulse. It was racing at that point. "We pumped your stomach," he said. "That and your vomiting is why your throat's so sore. There was nothing left in your stomach, but we gave you charcoal to absorb as much of any potential poison as possible from your stomach lining and intestines. Don't be alarmed when you have your next bowel movement and pass the charcoal."

Pumped my stomach? Gave me charcoal? Don't be alarmed about charcoal in my next bowel movement?

I gulped down the rest of that Coke and tried to figure out what it all meant...well, all except that last admonition. I didn't want to think about what that meant.

"We won't get the lab results back for a few hours," Trent continued, "but from your symptoms, the evidence of an intruder, and the piece of plastic wrap on your kitchen counter with six tiny punctures, we're pretty sure someone came into your house after I left and used a hypodermic needle to inject poison."

I was having a hard time assimilating all this information, especially since the doctor was making a pest of himself, shining a light in my eyes, poking and prodding my throat, stomach and back. I did my best to ignore him, but he was getting on my nerves and interfering with my concentration.

"Poison?" I repeated incredulously. "I did notice a bitter taste, but I was so scared when I went down to check for that intruder, my mouth already had a bitter taste." I told him what happened. When I got to the part about not calling Fred or the cops, Fred, Paula and the cop all jumped my butt.

"That's why you pay taxes," Trent exclaimed, "for the privilege of calling us on a false alarm!"

"Lindsay, after all we've been through together, I can't believe you didn't call me!" Paula admonished.

"I was awake!" Fred protested. "I was working on my computer. Even if I'd been asleep, I wouldn't have minded coming over! Did I complain the night you woke me up to be sure I was all right after you dreamed an alien space ship came down and took me away to dissect my brain?"

"Yes, you did."

He shrugged. "Okay, maybe I did get a little miffed that night, but not very much. And I wouldn't have complained at all last night if you'd called me because you thought you had an intruder."

"There wasn't anybody in my house. I looked all over, and I checked the doors to be sure they were locked, which they were."

Fred shook his head. "Your kitchen door was wide open when I got there."

"No, it was closed and locked. I told you, I checked." Then a horrible thought hit me. "Omigawd! Does that mean he was in the house when I came downstairs? He was there all the time, hiding and watching me?"

Paula gasped and even Fred flinched.

Trent folded his arms and tried to look macho. "I'd say that's exactly what it means."

I shuddered and shook my head. "No way. When we went downstairs, Henry went straight to the back door but settled down to have a drink of water. I don't think the intruder was in the house then. I think he went out through the kitchen. If he'd still been there, Henry would not have been so calm. He'd have led me to the man's hiding place and demanded I get him out of there."

Trent considered that for a moment. "Could be. The intruder could have left when he heard your door open upstairs, locked the door behind him and then came back later, leaving the door open when he left that second time. Where did you put the pan after you finished the cake?"

"It was on the coffee table when I got sick and went to the bathroom. I passed out before I could get back to it. It must still be there."

"No. We searched the entire house for a pan or bowl or anything that would have remnants of what you'd eaten so we could analyze the contents."

"You searched my house without a search warrant?" I exclaimed indignantly, thinking of the unmade bed, the pile of junk still in the living room, the dirty clothes in the bathroom...especially the white cotton underpants. So much for that stupid admonition from our mothers to always wear clean underwear in case we're in a car wreck. Always wear black silk underwear in case a hunky police officer searches your bathroom.

"Yeah, we searched your house. We don't need a search warrant when the back door's wide open and the occupant is passed out in the middle of the living room floor."

"I didn't mean..." I stopped myself since I had no intention of telling him what I did mean. "Did you find anything?"

"The only spoons and bowls we found were the ones you and I used. I took them to the lab, but I don't think we'll get anything from them. That would explain why the intruder came back after you passed out, to get rid of the evidence."

"Then we'll never know for sure if it was poisoned."

Trent grinned. "We had plenty of samples in the bathroom where you vomited."

I thought I might vomit again. I swallowed hard and resolved to keep that Coke in my stomach. "But how could somebody that careful forget to take the plastic wrap with the holes?"

"Failing to relock the kitchen door was a major glitch too. Something must have made him leave in a hurry."

I smiled as a vivid picture of half-inch claws and razor-sharp teeth crossed my mind. "I'd put my money on my guard cat."

I swear Trent's macho expression got kind of soft at the mention of Henry. "That's what we figured, so we took him in to check his claws. We had a hell of a time getting scrapings. I can't believe that wild animal was the same cat who curled up in my lap and made me pet him. He sure doesn't like it when you start messing with his feet."

"If you did get something, you need to try to match the DNA to the blood in Lester's apartment and the trunk of his car. Did you get any prints off the glass knob on my back door? That should hold prints really well. Did you find any prints in Lester's apartment to match to?"

"Do you want me to see if we can put you on the department payroll?"

"That's so sweet of you to offer. I could be your special assistant. We'll be a dynamite team. They might even want to make a television show about us. I can see it all now. Powell and Trent. Brains and brawn. What a combo!"

Paula giggled, Fred looked to the ceiling for help, the doctor snickered and Trent had a really hard time trying not to laugh. At least, I'm pretty sure that's the reason his face got all red.

"You're going to have to include Henry on your team," Fred said. "Your gluttony and your cat saved your life. Henry came to the window where I was working, scratched off half the screen and demanded in quite pithy language that I come out and follow him to your house. He led me right to where you were passed out on the floor. I called 911, but you'd already made yourself sick by eating too much and consequently emptied your stomach of most of the poison."

_Consequently emptied your stomach of most of the poison_. Fred would never say I'd pigged out then heaved up my guts. For the second time that day I found myself appreciating his fastidious nature.

I let out a long breath and lay back on the pillow. "I think I may have to change the name of my shop. Somehow, now that it almost became a reality, Death by Chocolate doesn't seem nearly as cute and darling as it did when I chose it. I'll never look at that sign without thinking about that floor coming up to meet me and my friends on death watch."

"On the other hand," Paula said, "as Fred pointed out, if you'd been able to eat just one piece of chocolate and stop there, you probably wouldn't have thrown up and might have died. So you could say chocolate saved your life by being irresistible."

"I'll give that some thought, but I may never be able to eat chocolate again."

Fred rolled his eyes. "Yeah, right. I'll believe that when you actually pass up a brownie. Well, now that it looks like you're going to live, I'm heading home to feed your cat and install bars across your doors like the ones I installed for Paula."

His words brought home to me that I was no longer safe in my own house. Lester could return tonight or tomorrow night or the night after that.

"Thank you," I said gratefully. "And don't worry about getting every screw in straight and the bars perfectly level and all the smudges wiped off. I know you have more important things to do." I gave him a meaningful look, trying to convey that such _more important things_ were finding something we could use against Lester, some way out of this before Paula went to jail and I went to that big chocolate pie in the sky.

Fred and Paula started to leave, but I called them back. With the shop closed, Paula was free all day. I didn't quite trust her not to leave town. In fact, I wouldn't blame her for leaving town.

"Would you do me a huge favor, Paula? Would you open the shop for lunch? There's some chocolate chip cookie dough in the freezer for emergencies. You can bake that and just tell the regular customers I'll be back tomorrow."

She looked uncertain. Since I'd hired her, neither of us had run the place alone. We'd both made it a point to always be there, come rain, snow, sleet or flu, and we really needed a third person as it was, so the idea of her handling things by herself was bound to be intimidating if not impossible.

"Fred can help you," I added.

His eyebrows shot up in surprise and distress. I'd just reminded him that he had important things to do, and now I'd found him another task to keep him away from those things. But I didn't want Paula to be alone at the shop for two reasons. I didn't want her to have the chance to leave town and I didn't want Lester to have the chance to poison _her_. She's a much daintier eater than I am. She'd never pig out the way I'd done. She might not survive.

I tried to look weak and helpless. Pretty easy since that was how I felt. "Please? You'll be finished before two o'clock, even if you have a large crowd."

They both grudgingly agreed and left.

I turned to the doctor who was making notes on a clipboard. "You want to take this thing out of my hand?" I asked.

"Why don't we leave it a little while longer, just until this bag of fluid is empty?"

"Why don't we not?" I started pulling the pieces of tape loose along with several hairs and chunks of skin. "Ouch! You must have put this on with super glue!" The tape was bad enough. I wasn't at all sure I'd have the guts to yank the needle out myself and was hoping I wouldn't have to.

Claxton glared at me, but he took the damned thing out.

I rubbed my hand. "Doctor Claxton, I've really enjoyed meeting you and you have a terrific place here, but I'm leaving shortly. Two o'clock at the latest, preferably closer to one or one thirty."

"We'll see." He hung the clipboard on the end of the bed and left.

Trent sat down on the edge of the bed. "He tried to keep you from your Coke and now he's going to try to keep you here. The man doesn't know you very well, does he?"

"Modern relationships are like that, I guess. Wouldn't you think after all the quality time we spent together, he'd be more sensitive to my needs? After all, I let him put his tube down my throat and dress me in this designer gown. That's getting pretty intimate."

"Actually I think it was a nurse who put that ventilated flour sack on you and the tube down your throat. A big, brawny male nurse. I heard you bit him for his efforts."

"Yeah, right. I couldn't even bite a chocolate cupcake right now, much less last night. I held out one arm and plucked the sleeve. "What do you think of this gown? If I bit the nurse, it was probably over this gown instead of the tube. I really don't think it's my color."

"I'd ask for another one if I were you. See if they have one in that blue green color like you had on last night. You looked a lot better then."

Okay, it wasn't what you might call a gushy compliment, but he had noticed what color T-shirt I was wearing.

"It was teal," I said. "And of course I looked a lot better last night. I felt a lot better. But thank you for noticing. You're not completely bad after all. I think we're going to have a lot of fun when I become your partner. Can I drive the squad car? Don't you cops have sort of an honor thing where you don't give speeding tickets to each other? This is going to work out really well. Which reminds me, you never did say if you got any prints off my door knob."

He heaved a huge sigh. "No, it's none of your business and not a one. No fingerprints in Mackey's apartment either. Before you ask, yes, that in itself is suspicious, but it doesn't prove anything. We do plan to check whatever we find under Henry's nails against the blood we found in the apartment and the car."

"Does this mean you finally believe me, that Lester's trying to set Paula up?"

He ran a hand through his hair making it even more tousled than before. He wore his official sport coat over a blue shirt and faded jeans. Everything looked pretty rumpled, but on him it looked good.

I, however, was wearing an ugly gown with little blue spots all over it. I could only imagine what my hair and face looked like. Actually, I didn't want to imagine.

"It doesn't matter what I believe," he said. "All that matters is what the evidence shows."

"The evidence shows Paula's being set up! Somebody broke into her house and planted two bugs and some sleeping pills. Somebody broke into my house and planted poison in the chocolate."

"But there's no evidence that those two events are related."

"There certainly is!"

"What?"

I sighed. "I can't tell you."

"That really helps."

I tried to think of a way to tell him the gist without admitting anything that would get Paula in trouble. "Well, you see, Paula and I had this conversation for Lester's benefit after we found the bugs, and during this conversation, she threatened to sic my father's law firm on him." I applauded myself for a truthful, albeit abridged, version of the story. "Of course, my father's firm only does civil law, but Lester doesn't know that. So now he's trying to kill me."

"But. I. Don't. Have. Any. Proof. Of. That." He spoke through clenched teeth. "I don't even have any proof these bugs exist."

"I saw them!" Well, Fred saw them, which was close enough. "Why would I lie to you?" Okay, maybe a couple of white lies, just to protect the guilty.

"Lindsay, damn it, I'm not saying I don't believe you. I'm just saying that, as a cop, I have to stick with the evidence. Right now, there's nothing to link your break-in with Paula's problems, and it still looks like Paula knows something about Lester Mackey's disappearance."

"He hasn't disappeared! He came to visit me last night."

"Show me the evidence that was him in your house."

I glared defiantly at Trent and he glared defiantly back. His square jaw with a day's growth of dark beard was set stubbornly, and I noticed for the first time that he had dark circles under his bloodshot eyes. "You don't look any better than I feel. You sure that chocolate didn't make you sick too?"

"No, I just didn't get much sleep last night. Your friends called me as soon as they got you admitted to the emergency room." He drew a hand across the stubble on his jaw. "I haven't even been home to shave."

"Don't tell me you've been here since the middle of the night!"

"I spent the first couple of hours searching your house, but, yeah, then I came over here. Paula and Fred were pretty worried about you. She had the kid with her until seven when she took him to the child care place. They took turns napping in the waiting room and keeping an eye on you until you started moaning and groaning about fifteen minutes before you woke up. I had to stay in here the whole time in case you said something that would prove critical to the case."

"You were worried about me too, weren't you?"

"Maybe a little bit. I hate it when people I know die on me, especially material witnesses. It looks very bad in my personnel file."

"Ah, Detective Trent, you do have a silver tongue, don't you?"

He stood and slapped me on my sheet-covered leg with his notebook. "I'll be here at two o'clock to help you make your great escape. Since you didn't drive your own car, you're going to need a ride home."

"One thirty."

"One thirty," he agreed.

"Any idea where they put my clothes?" Not that I'd had on many clothes the last I remembered, just the T-shirt and white cotton panties. But it would be better than this stupid gown with no back.

"We took your T-shirt in for evidence. It had remnants of pudding cake on it. I'll go by your house and bring you something to wear."

"Thanks."

"Welcome."

I smiled.

He smiled. He really did have a nice smile.

As soon as he left, I got up and went to the bathroom. They must have given me several of those IVs.

As I washed my hands, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and groaned. It was as bad as I'd feared. My skin was even paler than usual. My freckles stood out like black dots by comparison, though not as black as the bags under my eyes or the charcoal residue around my mouth. Trent was either a very kind person or had very poor eyesight to have been able to smile at me.

I washed my face and rinsed out my mouth, scrubbing my teeth with one finger. It helped a little.

I got back into bed and lay there pondering the mysteries of life and how close I'd come to checking out. It kind of put things in a different light, important things like the value of friends and the trivial things like my anger at Rick. I didn't ponder long, though, before falling asleep.

A nurse woke me a couple of hours later to give me lunch. I use the term facetiously.

"Chicken broth, Jello and milk? I wouldn't eat this if I was well. I certainly need more than that if I'm going to recover."

"It's what the doctor ordered," she said primly. She had a scrunched up little mouth and beady eyes, and I wouldn't have liked her even if I'd been well and she'd been offering me a pizza.

"Look," I said, trying to sound reasonable despite the fact that I was suddenly ravenously hungry and this woman was standing between me and food, "I'm not a picky eater, but I have to get my strength back. How about a bologna sandwich and a bag of chips?"

"You can discuss it with your doctor." She turned and walked away.

"Can I at least have chocolate milk?" I called after her, but she just kept walking. "Some Oreo cookies to dunk?" So much for my fear I'd never want chocolate again.

I gave up and valiantly consumed the pitiful, tasteless broth and the watery Jello, then chug-a-lugged most of the plain milk. I was still starving, of course. Fred had mentioned vending machines. If I could get a Coke and some chips, I might stand a chance of surviving until I got home to leftover pizza.

I got out of bed and felt the cool air on my bare bottom. Stupid hospital gowns! I pulled the top sheet off the bed and draped it around me like a toga. Thus clad, I started out of the room, then realized I didn't have any change for the vending machines. I plopped back onto the bed with a sigh. Next time I got poisoned, I'd have to remember to grab my wallet before I passed out.

"Hey, you're sitting up!" Rick walked in carrying a huge floral arrangement.

It didn't seem fair that I should be poisoned, pumped, charcoaled, starved and visited by my ex-husband all in less than twelve hours.

# Chapter Fifteen

I reminded myself of my recent epiphanies about life, love and anger and forced a smile. Besides, Rick undoubtedly had some loose change on him and could probably be conned into getting me something to eat.

He set the flowers on the night stand. "How you feeling, babe?" he asked, and leaned over to kiss me on the forehead.

"Hungry. How are you feeling?"

He smiled and stroked the back of his hand along my cheek. "Can't keep my girl down."

"How did you find out I was here? Did it make the local news?" I was kidding, of course. At least, I hoped I was kidding. If my parents found out about this, I'd never hear the end of it. Somehow it would be my fault that I'd been poisoned and embarrassed them in the media.

"I called the shop and Paula told me. I told her I was very unhappy with her for not calling me when they first found you. I'd have been right here with you the whole time. You know that, don't you?"

I didn't know any such thing considering how much time I'd been alone when we lived together, but I didn't want to irritate him when he was my closest link to food. I grunted noncommittally. "The flowers are beautiful," I said sweetly, "but you know what would make me even happier right now? A Coke and some chips and maybe a candy bar. Would you mind getting me some? Please?"

He frowned. "Paula said you were in here for food poisoning. Do you think you ought to be eating junk food already? I could ask the nurse to bring you some Jello."

_Food poisoning._ Very clever of Paula, telling the truth but making it sound like something totally different. "Been there, done that. Now I want something substantial. And anyway the poisoning didn't come from junk food. Tell you what, if you'll lend me some money, I'll order a pizza with lots of veggies on it. Does that sound healthy enough?"

It took some persuading, but I knew he'd give in. I could tell from the flowers that he was in suck-up mode. I ordered a giant pizza with double toppings. What the heck, I could probably sell the extra pieces, if there were any, to other starving patients.

He even got me a Coke and some peanuts to tide me over until the pizza arrived.

He insisted on opening the bag of nuts and popping the top on the can of Coke. Yes, he was definitely in suck-up mode.

"When are you being released?" he asked as I inhaled both items. With a little food, my attitude mellowed. I might even like the nurse if she came back.

Nah, probably not.

"I'm checking out at one thirty," I said.

"That's just another hour and a half. I'll wait and take you home."

That was not a good idea. "I've already got a ride."

"With who?"

"A friend." Maybe that was stretching it a bit, but I wasn't going to admit my ride was with a cop.

"Just call her and tell her your husband is taking you home."

I really wished he'd stop that _husband_ business, but I didn't think this was the time to bring it up when I needed money from him to pay for the pizza. "I can't do that. I don't know how to reach my friend." That was sort of true. His business card with his extension number was home with my clothes. "Look, it's already set up. My friend is going to my house to bring me back some clothes then come back here to take me home. Everything's planned. I really appreciate your offer, but there's no point in it."

"I'm your husband. You can change those plans for me."

I was getting distinctly unmellow in spite of my previous epiphany. "No, I can't. Didn't I say that already?"

The arrival of the pizza put a temporary end to that conversation, though I knew it wasn't over for good. I had to get rid of him before Trent showed up. How would I explain that a cop was taking me home after a case of food poisoning?

Of course I didn't get rid of him. Nothing worked, not even pretending to take a nap once I was sated with pizza and Coke.

Rick waited.

Trent arrived at one thirty with a canvas bag and my purse.

He stopped at the door when he saw Rick.

Rick sprang up from his chair when he saw Trent.

"What are you doing here?" Rick demanded.

"Taking Lindsay home. What are you doing here?"

"Taking my wife home."

"No, you're not," I protested.

" _This_ is your friend?" Rick asked and gave me that condescending look he did so well.

"Yes." I wasn't buying the condescension thing anymore.

"He's that cop."

"Can't slip anything past you, can I? Trent, if that bag has clothes in it, I'd be thrilled beyond measure if you two boys would leave me alone with it for a few minutes."

Trent set the bag and my purse on the bed, then he and Rick went into the hall and closed the door behind them.

Trent had packed underwear, canvas shoes, cutoffs and a T-shirt. For a cop, he was all right.

I dressed hurriedly, listening for sounds of violence outside my room. I heard nothing but silence. Either the door was sound-proof or the guys were waiting for me to come out and be a witness to the bloodshed.

I opened the door to find both men standing facing each other, legs a shoulder's width apart, arms crossed over their chests and grim expressions on their faces.

"I'm ready, Trent," I said. "Thank you so much for the pizza and the flowers, Rick, and for coming by to check on me." I barely stopped myself from adding the standard superficial suggestion that we _do lunch_ sometime. My mother's training.

"So now you're not even going to pretend this man isn't your lover? I was right all along."

I didn't dare look at Trent, but I thought I heard him choking.

Where's a huge chasm in the floor when you need one to fall into? "Rick, don't do this. Detective Trent is a police officer. That's all."

"Oh, really? If he's not your lover, why is he taking you home?"

"Because I need a ride home. I've just had my stomach pumped and charcoal shoved down my throat. I'm not up to the third degree. Can we talk about this later?"

"No problem. I'll get your flowers and meet you at your house."

"I meant _later_ as in tomorrow or next week or the twelfth of never, after I've had a little time to recover," I said through clenched teeth.

He smiled that famous smile. "Sure. I'll bring your flowers to your house then Detective Trent and I will both leave you to rest and I'll pick you up Saturday afternoon to go to dinner at your parents' house. You should be all recovered by then."

Maybe I shouldn't be so eager to leave the hospital after all. If I stayed over until Sunday morning, the problem of that Saturday night dinner would be solved.

The hospital insisted I leave in a wheel chair, and Trent and Rick had a grim, silent tug of war to see who'd push me. The nurse won. He was big and burly. I was pretty sure I hadn't bitten him because we chatted happily as he pushed me out of the hospital. Trent and Rick didn't say anything.

When Trent and I were seated in his generic, standard-detective-issue, dark blue sedan and pulling out of the parking lot, he finally spoke.

"We got the lab report back." His tone was all business. He'd lost the teasing lilt. Just one more mark in Rick's debit column. "There was a large amount of potassium trichlorate in the pudding cake. It's a slow-acting poison that's virtually tasteless except for a slight bitter flavor which would probably be hidden by the chocolate."

"No, I noticed it. My taste buds are very sensitive when it comes to chocolate. But I already had a bitter taste in my mouth from the fear of thinking that nut was in my house, so I figured that's all it was. Do I want to know how I'd have died if I hadn't been such a glutton?"

"It's not the worst death. Potassium trichlorate works by slowing down all your muscles, including your heart. Your death would have been diagnosed as occurring from natural causes. I doubt if whoever planted the poison thought it would happen so soon, though. He probably anticipated that you'd have a piece when you got home from work tomorrow or maybe after dinner, then die in a couple of hours. He must have panicked when you came downstairs and almost caught him. He was probably watching you after he ran out. Otherwise he wouldn't have known you'd eaten the poison and passed out and he'd better get the evidence and run."

I shivered.

"Air conditioning too cold?"

"No, but my proximity to cashing in my chips sure is." I turned sideways in the seat to face his rigid profile. "Trent, you've got to stop this guy. He's crazy. He wants Paula in prison and me dead."

"You know, you keep saying that, but you don't give me anything to work with. Let's say I buy into your theory about somebody wanting you dead so you won't hit him with a bunch of lawyers who don't exist. We still don't have any motive for somebody trying to get Paula into prison."

"We certainly do! We have a damn good motive. I just can't share that information with you right now."

"Well, if you ever decide to share that information with me, maybe we can get somewhere. In the meantime, we're not making a lot of progress. We searched the house across the street even though we didn't have a lot to go on except your suspicions and a hole in the hedge. Don't go all ballistic on me about how I'm not doing anything to help you."

"What did you find in the house?"

"Nothing. We could tell by the way the dust was disturbed that somebody had been in it, especially in the attic room that faces the street. There was apparently a lot of activity in that room, but whoever it was didn't leave any evidence for us. Damned inconsiderate of him, I know, but some criminals are like that."

"The attic room! I knew it! Sunday evening I thought I saw the sun glinting off something metallic in that window. Probably a telescope. That ought to prove something. Why would somebody be hiding out in a vacant house and watching Paula from a telescope while listening to her from those hidden microphones if he wasn't up to no good?"

Trent's jaw clenched. "Damn it, Lindsay, all it proves is that somebody was in the vacant house. For all we know, it could have been a homeless person or teenagers having a party or any number of things. We have no proof it has anything to do with Paula or Lester Mackey. We don't even have any proof those hidden microphones exist."

"If the blood on Henry's claws matches the blood in Lester's apartment and his car, that will prove it."

"We didn't get anything from Henry's claws."

"Damn! Maybe he wiped it all off while he was shredding Fred's screen. Did you check there?"

"Modern technology is great, but it has its limits."

We rode in silence for a few minutes while I tried to figure out some way to convince Trent that Paula needed protection, not a jail sentence.

"If I show you the microphones, will that prove what I've been telling you?" I finally asked.

"It'll go a ways toward convincing me that somebody is setting Paula up, although a motive would go even further."

"You can't have the motive, but I'll tell you what. When we get home, we'll march over to Paula's house and I'll show you those microphones."

"You don't live there. You can't give me permission to search somebody else's house. Only Paula can do that."

"And she will." At least, I hoped I could con her into agreeing.

"Okay." He gave me a brief glance and a wicked smile and I realized I'd been had. Well, it was for a good cause, and seeing the microphones wouldn't give away Paula's secret.

We drove another block before he spoke again. "You planning to get back together with that guy?"

"No, of course not."

"He doesn't seem to realize that."

"That's why he's a successful salesman. He doesn't know the meaning of the word _no_."

"You're going with him to your parents' house for dinner on Saturday. That sounds pretty cozy."

"It wasn't my idea. I did everything I could to get out of it."

"Ever thought of saying _no_?"

"Several times. I told you, he doesn't know the meaning of that word."

"When's your divorce final?"

"Should be three weeks." But I was beginning to worry that Rick would contest it. He'd been eager to get it completed at first, but now he was talking about reconciliation. That worried me.

Trent parked in front of my house. Rick pulled into my driveway. Paula's car was already sitting in hers which meant she hadn't left town yet. Henry was waiting on my porch.

We all got out and went inside. Henry alternated twining himself around my legs and Trent's legs. He hissed at Rick. Good cat.

"Rick, I've got to take Trent over to Paula's house and then I'm coming back and going straight to bed. I really don't feel very good."

He pecked my cheek with the type of parting kiss married people share. "I'll pick you up at five on Saturday. Call me if you need anything."

I didn't see any point in wasting more time arguing, and he left.

Trent and I went to Paula's house. She wasn't wild about the idea of letting him come in to search for the bugs, but I convinced her. Convinced, conned...

Not that any of it mattered. The bugs were gone.

# Chapter Sixteen

All things considered, I was feeling surprisingly good by the time I got to work the next day. I didn't even mind waking up so early. I was just happy to be waking up at all.

We'd finished with the breakfast crowd and I was trying to decide which chocolate fantasy to feature that day when Fred called.

"Is Paula there?"

"No, she just left to take Zach to day care. What's up?"

"I finally got some information on Paula's father-in-law." He sounded disgusted, and I couldn't wait to hear what the dirt would be. "I should have uncovered it long ago, but I did it the hard way. I can't even tell you how many databases I've hacked into, and all this time it was a matter of public record, available to anybody. I can't believe I was so dumb about this."

"Fred! Just tell me what you found! You can beat up on yourself later. In fact, I may come over there and do it right now if you don't tell me what you know about Lester Bennett."

"He's dead."

"Dead? Damn! Somebody got to him before me, huh? I hope they tortured him first."

"Not exactly. He died in Dallas six months ago from complications of a stroke."

"Six months ago?" I repeated incredulously. "No, wait a minute. If Lester Bennett's been dead for six months, who the hell is Lester Mackey?"

"There's no way to be certain, but, considering all the available data, it's possible Lester Mackey is really David Bennett."

My head was spinning almost as wildly as it had after I ate all the poisoned pudding cake. "David Bennett cannot be Lester Mackey," I said, slowly and precisely. "David Bennett is dead. Paula killed him."

"Unfortunately, she didn't. After I wasted hours getting to Lester's death certificate, I checked David's and didn't find it. Then I checked the newspaper stories. All public information. All right out there in the open for anybody to find. I can't believe I missed it."

"Fred! Stop obsessing! What was in the newspaper stories?"

"I have the first story right here. _Dallas police officer, David Bennett, was shot Thursday night by his estranged wife, Paula Bennett, at Mrs. Bennett's place of residence in Ft. Worth. Mrs. Bennett called 911 and confessed to the crime then disappeared with the couple's infant son. Officer Bennett is in stable condition at Harris Methodist Hospital. A warrant has been issued for Mrs. Bennett's arrest for attempted murder. According to Officer Bennett, his wife's recurring mental problems were exacerbated by her recent pregnancy. Mrs. Bennett requested Thursday morning that her husband come to her place of residence to discuss a reconciliation. However, when he arrived, she became hysterical and threatened to kill herself and the child. Officer Bennett tried to calm her, but she took a gun from her purse and shot him. Bennett is concerned for his child's safety._ "

"That's outrageous! How could they believe that bastard?"

"It sounds plausible. If I didn't know Paula as well as I do, I'd believe it."

The pieces of the puzzle fell into place. "But anybody who knows Paula wouldn't believe it. That explains why he's been trying to prove she's an unfit mother and even a murderer. He can't afford for people to hear her side, not with all those scars he gave her. They'd make a good case for self-defense."

"It certainly wouldn't help his reputation. So to completely discredit her, even make it look like she could have killed somebody, he invented Lester Mackey. Hard to prove the man's not dead when he wasn't alive in the first place."

"But that business with Mackey is all circumstantial evidence. Without a body, it would be very difficult to get a conviction. Putting her under suspicion wouldn't even help Bennett get a conviction against her for his attempted murder. The evidence of Lester Mackey's pretend murder wouldn't be admissible in a trial for Bennett's attempted murder." Even though Dad's a civil lawyer, I knew a little bit about criminal law. I read John Grisham and watch _Law and Order_. "None of this makes sense."

"No, it doesn't make sense if you look at it from the angle of sending Paula to prison. But there's another possible angle we need to consider. All of that would be admissible in a custody action. If you've got two parents competing for custody of a minor child and one of them is a police officer while the other admits shooting her husband, even in self-defense, and she's under suspicion of involvement in another death, namely Mackey's, _plus_ Zach disappeared one evening while in her custody, _and_ the police found sleeping pills with no prescription in her medicine cabinet, the social worker isn't likely to choose Paula."

"Damn." The swear word came out weak, lacking its usual oomph. Sick fear had taken the place of all that adrenaline of righteous anger. "He wants Zach." I couldn't even stand to think of what the monster who'd put that scar on Paula's cheek would do to that sweet little boy.

"That type sociopath prefers to target people he can easily control...vulnerable women and children. You'll notice part of his activities, like the teddy bear, were geared solely toward tormenting Paula, punishing her for betraying him. Taking her son will be the ultimate punishment."

"Geez! Do you have to sound so clinical?"

"Yes, I do. And I'm not finished. Bennett's problem with you is that he can't control you. He's not trying to kill you because of your father's mythical lawyer associates. He knows Paula told you the truth, and he knows you're pushy and you've got a big mouth and an _in_ with a cop. He knows he's got a real problem with you."

"Much as I enjoy discussing all my positive attributes, the big question is, what do we do now? Paula can't keep running. This guy's a cop. He'll find her wherever she goes. What if we catch him and make him submit to a blood test then compare his blood to Lester Mackey's? If they're the same, we'll have him. Wouldn't that clear up a lot of things and prove how nuts he is?"

"It would certainly throw a new light on things. But first you have to catch him and then you have to get blood from him and then you have to find somebody who'll do the testing."

"If I ever catch him, trust me, I'll get blood from that bastard, and if Trent won't do the testing, you can find somebody."

"One thing about you, Lindsay, you don't back off just because something's impossible. Even after you extract blood from this guy and, we hope, live to get that blood analyzed, what we need is a confession. Considering the dearth of witnesses, this could turn into a nasty court battle."

"Okay, so we'll get a confession too."

"I see. How?"

"We'll think of something."

"Since this guy's so good at hiding that we've never even seen him, first we have to catch him."

I thought about that for a minute then finally came up with an idea that rivaled the time I vacuumed out the fireplace using a bag with a hole in it. "If Bennett's so hot to do me in, can't we use me as bait?"

"I think that poison affected your brain!" Fred rarely spoke in exclamation points. "Why would you put yourself in danger again? Anyway, this guy's smart. He's going to be very cautious now that he failed to kill you. It could be that he's even accessed the police records and is aware that we know you were poisoned."

Call waiting beeped.

"Hang on a second, Fred. I've got a call on the other line. This could be a customer or the Department of Health trying to close us down or somebody equally unimportant." It was probably Rick, but if it was, I'd have a good excuse to get off the phone. I clicked over. "Death by Chocolate. Can I help you?"

"Lindsay, this is Adam."

"Adam?"

"Adam Trent."

"Oh, Trent! Hi! What's going on?"

"Is Paula there?" The tension in his voice gave me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

"No," I said carefully, "she's not. Why?"

"When will she be back?"

"I'm not sure." I wasn't really lying. After all, who could be sure about something like that? She could have had a flat tire or made a wrong turn or been kidnapped by aliens.

"Where is she?"

"I'm not sure about that either." Another not-quite lie. She could be anywhere between here and the nursery or between here and Jupiter if those aliens got her.

I could hear Trent relaying that information to someone in the background, then another male voice answering though I couldn't make out the words.

"Did she leave to take Zach to the nursery?" Trent asked.

That was a hard question to evade. I considered several possibilities but they all involved outright lies, and I hadn't done well in the past lying to this man. "Yes," I finally answered. "Why do you want to know?"

"David Bennett, an officer with the Dallas Police Department, is here with proof that Paula Walters is Paula Bennett, his wife, and he has a judgment giving him custody of Zach. We pulled an outstanding warrant off the computer for Paula Bennett's arrest for attempted murder."

That sick feeling in my stomach reached up into my chest while fingers of panic squeezed my throat. "No!" I protested. "You don't understand!"

"I've got to go. We're on our way to serve that warrant."

"Wait! Check him for scratches!"

"What?"

"King Henry scratches!"

"Of course he scratches. He's a cat. I've got to go."

"No!" I was shouting into a dead phone line.

I clicked back over to Fred. "I just told Trent where Paula is, and they're going to arrest her and Bennett's going to get Zach and it's all my fault for being honest!"

"This wasn't the best time to decide to turn over a new leaf," Fred admonished. "All right, we've got to get to her before they do and hide her for a couple of days until we get all this straightened out. You find her and bring her home. I'll make reservations at a motel in Overland Park. That's half an hour away and across the state line in Kansas, so that should slow their search minimally. I'll make the reservations for a husband and wife. The authorities will be looking for a woman and child, not a married couple. I'll take her over there and check in as the husband while she stays in the car and hides Zach. You need to stay home and lie to the police, and I strongly suggest you lie this time."

"Got it! I'm on my way to intercept Paula!"

"Feel free to drive as fast as you like. If you get a speeding ticket, I'll take care of it."

_I'll take care of it?_ Fred certainly possessed a lot of interesting skills.

I slammed the phone down, put a closed sign on the front door and ran to my car, cursing myself all the way for not lying to Trent about Paula's whereabouts.

I slid into my car, revved the engine and peeled out of the parking lot. If the traffic cops wanted to give me a ticket today, they'd have to catch me.

Have I mentioned how much I love my little Toyota Celica? Small car, low center of gravity, five-on-the-floor...I made it to the day care center in seven minutes flat. I'd halfway expected to find Paula still there. She doesn't drive nearly as fast as I do, and she usually spends a few minutes with Zach before she leaves him. However, her car was nowhere in sight.

I charged up onto the porch of the big old house then stopped and drew in a deep breath. If she'd left Zach here, I had to appear rational enough that the people in charge would let me take him. Paula had listed me as the other person who could pick him up, and I had done so a couple of times. I couldn't risk that they'd think I was hysterical and shouldn't be trusted with a child. I _was_ hysterical, but I was still a better choice than David Bennett.

I walked into the entry way, and the woman with glasses and a rigid hair style looked up from her desk. "May I help you?"

What the heck was her name? "Hi, Dorothy! Remember me? Lindsay Powell, Paula Walters' friend?"

"Hello, Ms. Powell. Yes, I remember you. You're the lady who always calls me Dorothy. I'm Karen Winslow."

I cringed. If there was a way to screw up, I'd find it. "Sorry. I washed my brain and can't do a thing with it. Look, I just got an important phone call at the shop, and I need to get hold of Paula fast, like immediately. Has she been here? Is Zach here?"

"Ms. Walters was here a few minutes ago. She brought Zach in, but then suddenly remembered he had a doctor's appointment."

"A doctor's appointment? Are you sure?"

"I'm quite sure."

Paula hadn't mentioned any appointment, though it was possible she'd forgotten with everything going on.

It was also possible she'd panicked and was on her way out of town already.

I dashed back to my car and headed homeward. I hadn't passed Paula on my trip from the shop so she wasn't on her way back there. The choices left were the mythical doctor's office, the open road, and home. I could only hope she wouldn't leave town without stopping first to pack a few things. She had no idea of the new urgency of the situation so surely she would take the extra few minutes. I floored the gas pedal.

Contrary to popular opinion, speeding is not something that can be done recklessly and on the spur of the moment. It is an art requiring constant practice and intense concentration. I'm proud to say, I've never allowed that skill to become rusty. Like a ballet dancer on four wheels, I deftly avoided dogs, children, traffic cops, cross traffic and elderly drivers going fifteen miles an hour, then turned onto my street just as Paula's car stopped in front of her house. She didn't bother pulling into the driveway but was getting out of the car when I came to a screeching halt behind her. Obviously she wasn't planning to stay long.

She looked up at the sound of my arrival but continued around to the passenger side to get Zach out of the back seat.

"Paula, David's alive!"

That stopped her.

I ran over to help her with the car seat. From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of Fred's garage door going up and the rear of his white Mercedes emerging.

"We've got to hurry! The cops are on their way to arrest you and give David custody of Zach! You've got to go to a motel with Fred!"

"A motel with Fred? What are you talking about? I've got to get out of here!"

"That's what I mean! You're going to have to trust me on this because I don't have time to explain."

We got Zach unhooked from his car seat and she snatched him up. I grabbed the diaper bag, and we headed across the yards toward Fred's house. However, we'd barely reached my sidewalk when two police cars, lights flashing and sirens screaming, turned the corner onto our street.

We both froze. I loosed a string of words not appropriate for Zach's ears.

"Sit!" He smiled happily as he repeated my words. "Da! Uk!"

From the corner of my eye, I saw Fred's Mercedes reentering the garage. We were trapped. I knew it, Fred knew it and Paula knew it.

Nevertheless, she turned as if to run back to her car. I stopped her. The cops were already pulling in behind and in front of our vehicles. We were not driving anywhere.

"Go inside my house and out the back door." I have no idea where I thought she'd go from there. I was acting from a point of total panic, and she followed my directions. We ran onto my porch. I let her in then locked the door behind her and turned to face the cops. Henry, who'd been sleeping on the porch, stretched lazily and sat down beside me.

Trent, Creighton and another man got out of the first vehicle and started up the walk. I knew immediately that the third man was David Bennett. He was tall with dark, razor-cut hair and regular facial features that could have come straight from the pages of a men's fashion magazine, possessing about as much depth as the pictures in that magazine. His biceps bulged from the short sleeves of his knit shirt, and his huge hands were clenched into fists at his sides.

I shuddered at the thought of him hitting Paula with those hands powered by those arms and of what he would do to Zach if he got possession of him.

As the men approached, Bennett watched me intently from cold black eyes that reminded me of a rattle snake I once encountered on a hiking trip in Big Bend National Park down in Texas. I found myself mesmerized by that gaze, unable to look away.

I saw movement from the corner of my eye and noticed that two officers had exited the second car and Trent was motioning them to go around to my back yard. Damn!

"We saw Paula go into your house, Lindsay," Trent said, stepping onto the porch. His words broke the spell of Bennett's gaze. I swallowed hard and gratefully turned my attention to him. "Are you going to let us in?" he asked. "We're in hot pursuit and don't have to ask your permission, but I'd prefer to do it the easy way."

Creighton and Bennett moved up beside Trent, and I heard a low growl from the vicinity of my feet. The growl grew into Henry's jungle cat yowl, and if I'd had any sliver of a doubt that this was the man who'd come into my house and poisoned my pudding cake, that sliver was swallowed up in Henry's yowl.

David Bennett had tried to kill me. David Bennett wanted to take Zach and put Paula in prison. David Bennett looked like one smooth, charming, deadly rattlesnake....and I had to get his blood.

Whose stupid idea was that?

"Hi, Trent," I greeted, trying to force a smile. "Hello, Officer Creighton. I don't believe I've met your friend."

Trent's lips compressed and he glared at me, but he responded anyway. "This is David Bennett. Now that we're all good friends, can we go inside?"

"Of course! Would you like some chocolate cookies?" I fumbled with the lock and discovered it's hard to turn a key when your fingers are shaking. "Paula had to run to the ladies' room, but she'll be right back." I was babbling. Panic tends to do that to my mouth.

I got the door open, and the trio of cops moved toward it.

Henry unleashed a terrible yowl and launched himself into the air, landing against Bennett's chest. Bennett was big, but Henry was twenty pounds of fury moving faster than I drive. He took Bennett down onto the porch and went for his throat and face.

Blood!

I snatched a clean diaper out of Zach's bag while Trent and Creighton rushed into the melee, trying to get Henry off Bennett. They were hampered by flashing half-inch claws and needle sharp teeth. Bennett tried to protect his face with one hand while he tugged a gun from his waistband with the other. The bastard was going to shoot my cat!

I had no choice. I flung myself onto Bennett's chest, holding his arm in place with my thigh and sitting on his diaphragm while I grabbed Henry, praying the cat would remember who had custody of the can opener and not slash me to ribbons with those claws.

His blue eyes were wild and he continued to make those jungle noises, but he allowed me to remove him from Bennett's face without so much as a scratch on me. Bennett had quite a few, however. Plenty of blood.

Bennett tried to get up, but that's hard to do with a five feet, eight inch woman sitting on your chest.

"You poor thing!" I said, handing Henry to Trent. Trent looked at me dubiously, but Henry was now docile except for a low growling deep in his throat. When Trent took him, he cuddled against his chest. Like I said, he's just a big pussy cat.

Bennett was not so docile. "God damn it!" he shouted, still trying to push me off him. "Are you nuts? Your cat's fine! I'm the one who's injured!"

"I was talking about you, you poor thing!" I said solicitously. Okay, pseudo-solicitously. "Oh my, you're bleeding!" I dabbed at the blood with the diaper, using a twisting motion and trying to open the scratch as much as possible for maximum blood. "I'm so sorry! I don't know what got into my cat. He's usually so gentle and sweet." I not only wiped blood off his face, but also some makeup which had been hiding other scratches, scratches I'd guess to be a couple of days old. As I'd suspected, this was not Bennett's first encounter with my guard cat.

With his free arm, Bennett grabbed my throat. "Get off me!"

I felt relatively certain he wasn't going to strangle me in front of two police officers, so I pried at his fingers with one hand while wiping blood from his arm, the arm with which he'd tried to protect his face. I still had his gun hand trapped, though he'd slid the weapon back into his pants, out of sight.

Creighton grabbed my shoulders and lifted me up just as two more officers came around the house, one of them carrying Zach who was crying and reaching for his mother. The other was leading Paula in handcuffs. She walked with her head down and her shoulders drooping.

Bennett staggered to his feet. "That's her," he said. "That's my wife, Paula Bennett, the woman who shot me."

Paula looked up at the sound of his voice. Fear washed over her features. "David, don't do this! You know I didn't mean to hurt you. It was an accident. If you'll just let me have Zach, I promise I won't leave again. I'll come back to you. Whatever you want. Just don't take my son."

"Everything's going to be all right, Paula," he said smoothly. "I would never let the mother of my son go to prison. I'm going to see to it that you get psychiatric help, and I promise to bring our son to visit you every week."

That explained a lot. He was going to get her committed to a mental institution where nobody would believe her stories of abuse. Keep her imprisoned there and let Zach think his mother was crazy. Yeah, Bennett was no dummy. He had all this worked out really well.

The only thing he hadn't counted on was Paula having friends, Fred and me. Not that we'd been very helpful up to that point, but now we had a plan and some of David's blood. His reign of terror was just about over.

The officer steered Paula toward the squad car. Zach began to cry more loudly. "Mama...Mama...Mama!" He reached desperately for his mother.

"Don't worry!" I called to Paula, trying to reassure her. "My dad will get you the meanest criminal lawyer in the country! You're not going to any mental hospital! You'll be back home in no time!" I cut my eyes toward Bennett. "And the guilty party will be in jail," I said quietly.

The officer holding Zach approached the porch. Zach saw me and changed his plea. "Anlinny!" He reached his small arms toward me, and my heart broke into a thousand pieces. It was all I could do to restrain myself from dashing across the porch, snatching him from the officer and running away as fast as I could. I knew the whole idea was impossible, but emotion is like that.

"Aunt Linny can't take you right now, Hot Shot," I said. "You have to go with somebody else but only for a couple of days. Then you'll be back with Mommy and Aunt Linny."

Paula's deadly husband glared at me and reached for the bloody diaper I was holding. Definitely no dummy.

"Don't worry about this," I said sweetly, holding it behind my back and hoping my voice didn't sound as shaky as it felt coming out. "I'll do whatever needs to be done with it."

His gaze was so much like that snake, so menacing and cold, I expected him to rattle when he walked. "I'll dispose of it." His words were measured, his voice as intense and menacing as his eyes.

I gulped and reminded myself I had to make certain he came after me. I had to taunt him. "Oh, no," I protested. "I'll dispose of this as if it were nothing but plastic wrap with holes in it. I'll dispose of it like it was poisoned chocolate. Yes, indeed, I'll take very good care of this blood."

From the corner of my eye I could see Trent staring at me in wide-eyed amazement. "Here's your son, Bennett," he snapped. "Take him and let's go. We've got a ton of paperwork to fill out."

The officer holding Zach came up on the porch and surrendered the screaming boy. Tears streamed down Zach's face as he held his arms toward me. I moved closer, tears starting in my own eyes.

"I love you, Hot Shot," I said. "You go with this man today, and I'll see you soon. I promise." And no matter what it took, I was going to make good on that promise.

I shot Bennett another glare that started out in my head as defiant, but probably came out scared. He had no trouble keeping his glare deadly.

Suddenly I had a chilling thought...or maybe I could read this creep's chilling mind. No way was he going to break into my house a second time. Nah, he'd probably just burn the whole place down or blow it up. That would get rid of me and the evidence and would offer the further benefit of not exposing him to Henry's claws. Sometimes I'm amazed by the total stupidity of my ideas.

I leaned closer, going in for the final bluff. "If you're interested in cutting a deal, be here at eight tonight," I said softly, using Zach's cries as a cover so no one else could hear. Bennett wasn't likely to try to kill me if the cops heard about our assignation. "The kid for the evidence. If you're not here, the blood goes to a private lab at nine and you're dead meat."

"I don't need to cut any deals with you." His voice was as quiet as mine but somehow sounded like a menacing bellow.

I shrugged. "Suit yourself." I looked at Zach who continued to cry and hold his hands out to me. I held the diaper behind me with one hand and took his with the other. "I promise, you'll soon be home with Mommy." I cut my gaze back to Bennett. "One. Way. Or. The. Other."

I turned away from him. "So long, everybody!" I said loudly, waving the diaper. "It's been great fun, but I've got a lot to do tonight. Research, DNA testing, all sorts of interesting activities coming up!" I opened my door with trembling fingers and stumbled into my house.

As I turned back to close the door, I saw the unmistakable warning in Bennett's snake eyes.

I'd accomplished both things I'd set out to do...procured a sample of his blood and found the bait for the trap that would capture him or kill me.

Clever Lindsay.

# Chapter Seventeen

"No, no, no!" Standing in my living room, Fred held at arm's length the plastic baggie containing the bloody diaper. "Bio-hazard type evidence needs air and must be stored in paper bags or cardboard boxes."

I took the baggie, retrieved a grocery sack from the kitchen and repackaged it. "Where do you come up with all this off-the-wall information?" I handed him the paper bag.

He shrugged. "Everybody knows that. We need to decide on our next move." He walked over to perch on the edge of my sofa.

I sank down beside him. "Our last plan, getting Paula hidden out in a motel, was not what one would call a huge success. Now she's off to jail and Zach's in the hands of a man with snake eyes. That's about as glaring a failure as I can imagine."

He nodded. "Things did not go as planned."

I picked up a bowl of chocolate chips and a jar of peanut butter from the coffee table, scooped out a spoonful of peanut butter, then rolled it in the chips until it was covered. I couldn't deal with all this stress without my best friend, chocolate. However, since I hadn't baked in two days, I was driven to this old standby.

"Want some?" I offered.

Fred shuddered. "No, thank you."

King Henry strolled by, rubbed against my leg then leaped gracefully onto my recliner and stretched out.

"Hard to believe that's the same vicious animal who attacked Bennett only a little while ago," I observed.

"Multiple Personality Disorder," Fred diagnosed. "You have a Jekyll and Hyde cat."

Henry yawned, unconcerned with any psychoses he might or might not have.

"I think Bennett will bite. He'll be here tonight." I prepared another spoonful of the chocolate and peanut butter glop. "You should have seen the look he gave me when I mentioned that I had research and DNA testing to do. He thinks I think he thinks..." I paused with my spoon in mid-air and tried to decide if I had the proper sequence of thought processes. "Anyway, he'll be here because I convinced him that I'm willing to cut a deal, that I'm dumb enough to think he'll trade Zach for the evidence."

"Of course, you're really smart enough to know he won't, that he'll just take the opportunity to try to kill you."

"Yep, I know that. Guess that makes me pretty smart, huh?"

"That depends. Any idea how you're going to get him to confess what he's done, then capture him and manage to stay alive?"

"I don't have all the details worked out yet. I had to improvise when I was talking to him. But just as soon as I get over the abject terror of what I've done, I'm sure my brain cells will start working again and I'll figure out something."

Fred shook his head and grimaced. "I hope your being murdered in this house doesn't lower property values in the neighborhood."

"Fred! Stop that and help me think." Somehow the image of a real estate appraiser studying my lifeless body and trying to decide how much it would lower property values got my thought processes moving. "Okay, first, you need to wire me for sound, like they do in the movies."

"And just exactly where do you think I'm going to find this _wire_?"

"The same place you found that bug detector and whatever that thing was that you used to pick Paula's lock."

He had no response. I didn't think he would.

"Then you need to keep Henry at your place," I continued. "It's going to be hard to make this creep confess if Henry's trying to pierce his jugular."

Fred looked across the room at Henry. "He sheds."

"Deal with it. Third, we need to get a phony bloody diaper and you keep the real one." I swallowed hard. "Just in case."

Fred shook his head. "Lindsay, you don't know what you're getting into."

"Certainly I don't. If I did, I wouldn't have the courage to do it, so don't tell me. To continue, fourth, how about if you hide in the closet or something and be close while I'm extracting this confession? It wouldn't hurt if you could come up with a gun from your treasure trove of lock picks, bug detectors and hidden microphones."

He didn't reply, so I took that for an affirmative.

I slapped my palms onto my knees. "Then that's settled. We have a plan."

Fred folded his arms. "We do not. You've lost your mind. If this guy shows up—"

"He'll show."

"If he shows, then your life is in danger."

I held up a thumb and forefinger with barely a silly millimeter of space between. "Just a tiny little bit. I have all the confidence in the world that you'll protect me." The gesture would have been more effective if that thumb and forefinger hadn't been shaking. "If you've got a better idea, speak up."

He sat there in stoic silence for several moments. "I don't," he finally said. "But I will tell you this, there's not going to be any wiring you for sound. That's done when you need to be mobile, and you're not going anywhere with this guy. What I will do is hide upstairs with a microphone so sensitive it can hear and record if you so much as breathe hard, and if you do, I'm coming down and putting an end to the whole scenario. And if you get yourself killed, I'll never forgive you."

"See? I knew we had a plan in there somewhere."

Fred sighed then left to get a microphone, a gun and who knew what other paraphernalia. I put in a call to Trent, left my name on his voice mail, then went upstairs to write my last will and testament. How humiliating it would be when everybody found out my secret chocolate recipes weren't secret at all.

A few minutes later I sat at my ancient computer, composing my will and contemplating what I should do about Henry. Technically speaking, he was only visiting, but realistically speaking, it didn't look like his owners were going to claim him. Should I set up a trust fund for him or not? And if I did set up a trust fund, what would I use to fund it with?

I'd just decided that dying posed far too many problems and I would have to live when the phone rang.

"Lindsay, this is Trent."

Well, at least he got his own name right this time. "We need to talk," I said.

"We certainly do! What the hell was that business about the diaper and the plastic wrap and poisoned chocolate? It sounded like you were trying to accuse Bennett of something."

"Damned straight I was. He's Lester Mackey, and this blood sample I got from him will prove it. All you have to do is match it against what you found in the car and in the apartment."

"Where are you coming up with this stuff? I can't run that blood. Even if I wanted to, I'd have to have Bennett's consent. But there's no reason to. Lester Mackey was the detective Bennett hired to find his son. Mackey's the one who was using the vacant house to spy on Paula. From what Bennett's been able to piece together, he thinks Mackey got greedy and tried to blackmail Paula. She killed him, dumped his body and hid his car in her garage. Mackey hasn't contacted Bennett since Saturday, the day he disappeared, and Bennett said during that last contact the man acted strange, as if he had his own agenda."

"That is such bull! I can't believe you'd buy into it! If all that's true, then who tried to kill me? Wouldn't Mackey already be dead by that time if Bennett's telling the truth?"

Trent was quiet for a moment, and when he finally spoke, some of the anger in his voice had been replaced by uncertainty. "I don't know. I'll admit this case has got a few tangles in it, but the legalities are clear enough. Your poisoning is a separate case."

"Damn it, there are no tangles, and my case isn't separate! It's all very simple. Bennett was Mackey. You'll never find Mackey's body because there was no such person. You said you couldn't find a listing for him in Dallas."

"Bennett admitted the guy was probably using a phony name. Said he came highly recommended, but not necessarily legit. Bennett told us he'd been so desperate to find his kid after all this time that he didn't look very close at the guy's credentials."

Even though I knew it wasn't true, the story made me hesitate for a split second. I suppose I couldn't blame Trent for being taken in. "You wanted to hear Paula's story, well, sit back and listen."

"I already know Paula's story."

"You don't know squat." I proceeded to fill him in on what Paula had told me.

"Why are you telling me all this now? My job ended with that arrest warrant. From here on out, it's between the DA, Paula's defense attorney, the judge and the jury."

"What a cop-out! You can't haul an innocent woman off to jail and let her abusive husband take her kid to abuse and then just cavalierly say your job's ended. If that's the kind of man you are, don't bother coming to my shop for chocolate! You don't deserve—"

"Lindsay, be reasonable! My job is to enforce the law. I had a warrant. I had to take Paula into custody. Bennett had a judgment giving him custody of Zach. I had to deliver the boy to him."

"Well, there are some of us who believe in justice instead of legal technicalities. I'm bringing Bennett in tonight, and I'll have a taped confession for you."

I slammed down the phone and seethed for a while. Actually, the righteous anger was a nice break from the abject terror. It just didn't last long enough, and by seven that evening when I took Henry to Fred's house, I was deep into the abject terror again.

Fred lugged another canvas bag over to my house then set up his equipment in my bedroom, directly over the living room.

"Are you sure this is going to work?" I questioned. "It's so small."

"It'll work. This is the latest technology in the field."

"What field might that be?" My terror didn't completely overpower my curiosity.

"The technology that allows me to hear and record if you so much as breathe hard in the room below."

"When this is over, Fred Sommers, you've got some questions to answer."

"Haven't you ever heard the old saying, _Dead women ask no questions_?"

"That's not funny."

"Sure isn't. Go downstairs and recite the alphabet, first in a normal tone, then whispering, and we'll do a test."

I stomped down, hoping he'd be listening and my footsteps would hurt his ears.

By eight o'clock I was sweating though the evening was pleasantly cool. I was too tense even to eat chocolate. I just sat on the edge of the sofa, sweating and waiting.

When the doorbell rang, I jumped at least five feet off the sofa.

"Okay, Fred," I whispered to the ceiling, "show time."

I walked across the room on legs that felt sort of like spaghetti cooked to the _al mushe_ stage. When I wrapped my fingers around the glass knob, I swear it was hot. As I opened the door, I noticed for the first time that it creaked. Ominously.

Bennett stood on the porch in the gathering darkness, a pleasant smile on his face, and for a minute I thought maybe I was all wrong.

But then he came inside, and in the light I could see those cold eyes again.

"Have a seat," I invited automatically. "Can I get you something to drink?" Good grief! All that work my mother had done instilling proper etiquette and good manners had obviously taken, but I wasn't sure she intended it to apply to murderers.

"Thanks, but I'm not thirsty." He sat on the sofa, leaning back casually, one arm draped along the back.

I sat way on the other end, leaning forward tensely, both hands clenched in my lap. "Where's Zach?" I asked.

"With a sitter. I thought we should have a chance to talk by ourselves. I'm not quite sure why you wanted me to come over here tonight, but I suspect it has something to do with my mentally ill wife. She can be pretty persuasive. She's not really lying, you know, because she totally believes the wild tales she tells."

This certainly wasn't what I'd expected. He was good, very good. "Guess that makes me mentally ill too because I believe those wild tales and I believe those scars."

His smile became sad. "I really appreciate your being such a good friend to Paula all this time. I still love her, you know. It's not her fault she's sick."

"If you don't cut the crap, _I'm_ going to be sick!" Anger was rapidly displacing some of my fear. "You abused Paula for years. You threatened her with a gun which went off accidentally, injuring you instead of her. She ran away because she thought she'd killed you, and it's a real shame she didn't. You followed her here. You invented Lester Mackey, knowing the Lester part would make her think it was your father and she'd get all freaked out, and then you made Lester Mackey disappear so it would look like she killed him."

Bennett's sad smile never slipped nor did he say a single word. This business of forcing a confession wasn't easy.

I plunged on, my voice rising directly in proportion to the rise of righteous anger. "You watched her from the house across the street. You planted hidden microphones under her coffee table and her bed so you could spy on her."

That brought a flicker of surprise and a flash of rage to those cold eyes.

"You slipped sleeping pills into Paula's aspirin bottle," I continued, rising to my feet so I could look down at him, "and then you took Zach to the park while she was asleep so it would look like she wasn't a good mother. You must have worn your uniform so if anybody saw you, they'd just report it as a police officer, and the neighborhood was soon crawling with them. That's what Zach was trying to tell the officer who found him. _Pees man._ You. A policeman had taken him. And finally you hid that car in Paula's garage to throw suspicion on her."

He lowered his gaze to his lap and shook his head. Sadly. Then he looked back up at me. "Lindsay, I'm so sorry you had to go through all this trauma with my wife. But surely you can see how ridiculous that story is. Why would I do those things?"

I leaned closer, getting into his face, invading his space. "To torment her because that's what abusers do when the abusee escapes. And to set it up so she couldn't possibly get custody of Zach. Why do you even want him? Just to keep Paula from having him or so you can abuse him the way your father abused you?"

A muscle in his jaw twitched. "I want Zach because he's mine." Bennett's smooth voice had acquired a rough edge. The fingers of his hand on the back of the sofa curled into a clench. I was making progress, getting to him.

The front door burst open and Rick charged inside. "I knew it!" he shouted, and hurled himself on Bennett.

"Have you gone crazy?" I screamed, grabbing a handful of his hundred dollar haircut and trying to yank him up.

Bennett didn't need any help, though. Once he got over the surprise, he flipped Rick onto the floor and pinned both arms behind him so fast it was almost a blur.

"What the hell's going on here?" Bennett demanded. That sad, caring mask had completely disappeared and his eyes blazed with cold fury.

When Rick didn't answer immediately, Bennett gave his arm an upward twist and made him groan. I flinched. Much as I wanted to hurt Rick myself, I wasn't too thrilled about somebody else doing it.

"This woman is my wife!" Rick snarled.

"You have my sympathies, but what does that have to do with your charging in here like a lunatic and attacking me?"

"You don't have any right to do whatever you two were doing or planning to do! Don't you have any respect for the sanctity of marriage?"

"You dumb son-of-a-bitch!" I shouted. "We weren't doing anything but talking!"

"Only because I arrived in the nick of time! I saw you leaning toward him. You were about to kiss him. I've been watching your house all evening, expecting that cop to arrive. Is this one somebody new or has it been him all along?"

"You've been spying on me?" I kicked his knee, and he flinched but didn't groan. Bennett knew how to hurt better than I did. "I don't even like this man! He's Paula's husband and he's an abusive asshole and I'm doing my best to get Zach away from him and you interrupted negotiations!"

"Yeah, right!"

I threw my hands into the air. "I don't believe this. If I may remind you, you're the one who was having an affair while we were still living together. You're the one who suggested I might want to pack my bags and move into this house so that Muffy creature could move in with you."

"She's gone. I want you back."

"But I don't want you back! Damn it all to hell, Rick!" I squatted down so I could get close to his face where Bennett still held him on the floor. "You listen to me and you listen good or this man is going to give your arm another yank and maybe break it because that's what he does. He loves to hurt people."

"You're as crazy as he is!" Bennett protested. "I don't want to hear your marital squabbles."

I ignored him. I had to get Rick out of there. "Pretty soon we're going to be divorced, Rick," I said quietly. "Completely divorced. We had a lot of good times in the past, and I'd like to think we could still be friends, but that's only going to happen if you stop doing stuff like this. Now, here are the rules. You stay away from my house unless you're invited over. You give up the notion that you and I will ever be anything more than friends, and I'm not even feeling real friendly right now. Have you got all that?"

He didn't say anything.

"Twist his arm, Bennett!"

"Yes!" Rick shouted. "I got it!"

"Let him up."

Bennett glared at me but didn't move.

"Let him up and throw him out the door unless you've got some other plans for him."

Bennett got up, releasing Rick who scrambled to his feet, ran his hand through his hair and straightened his clothes.

"I'm leaving now," he said. "But I'll see you tomorrow night at your parents' house for dinner."

"No, you won't."

"Can I call you?" Suddenly he looked pitiful.

"I'll call you."

"When?"

"Next week."

"You promise?"

"I promise but only if you leave in the next ten seconds!"

"Fine. I'm going." He left with a final glare over his shoulder at Bennett.

As soon as the door closed behind him, Bennett turned to me. "I'm going too. I've told you the truth, and if you don't believe it, that's your problem."

I folded my arms. "I'll tell you what I believe. I believe tests will reveal that the blood on that diaper is the same blood in Lester Mackey's apartment and car."

"What would that prove if it is?"

"That you set Paula up. That maybe she's telling the truth and you're not. That you're one sick puppy."

His jaw started twitching again and white lines appeared around his mouth.

"You try to make people believe Paula's sick but really it's you," I taunted, taking advantage of this sign of weakness. "No wonder your father abused you. He was probably trying to beat some of the crazy out of you. I'll bet he wondered if he was even your father."

That one hit home. Bennett's face lost all semblance of sanity. He grabbed my shoulders. "Listen, bitch, you took that blood from me without my permission. Since your father's such a hotshot lawyer, you should know that won't stand up in any court."

I twisted away from his grip. "Since my father's a lawyer, what I know is that rule doesn't apply to a civilian. You bled on my porch, my premises. I did a good deed and cleaned your wounds. Furthermore, the lab that's set up to analyze this blood has nothing to do with the cops. It'll stand up in court, all right. When I get through with you, your career with the police department will be over forever. They'll lock you away in a mental institution and keep you on drugs the rest of your life."

In one slick move, he had my arm pinned behind my back and I knew exactly how much Rick had hurt when Bennett twisted upward. A lot.

Fear crept back in to blend with the anger and make a huge mess of my insides. Actually, the fear didn't creep. It _poured_ back in. I was succeeding. I was making him lose control and any minute now he'd spill his guts. I should have been pleased, but all I could think was, if Bennett decided to kill me, would Fred be quick enough to save me?

"You're going to get that diaper," he growled, "and give it to me. Do it now or I'll break your arm. Move!"

"It's in that shoe box sitting on top of the television," I said as he marched me across the room. "Any thoughts on how you're going to keep me from telling the world exactly what transpired here tonight? Adam Trent and I are close, you know. Real close. He'll believe me, and the whole force will turn out to take you down. I'll blab to the world. Your career's over. Your freedom is over. I have a really big mouth."

He opened the shoe box with one hand while holding me with the other. "You sure do, but I'm not really worried. I don't think you're going to be doing a lot of talking after I leave here."

I swallowed hard. "Why?" I squeaked. "How do you plan to stop me from talking?"

He didn't answer me. He just retrieved the diaper I'd drizzled with hamburger blood.

"You think I'm scared of some lunatic?" I taunted. You're not enough of a man to stop me from blabbing to the whole town!"

He yanked my arm so tight I couldn't hold back an audible gasp, almost a scream. "I can stop you," he said. "There's going to be a tragic fire at your house tonight and you're going to die in it. I think that will shut your mouth."

"Ha! You're nothing but a wimpy bully! You think you scare me?" Actually, he did. But I felt I was doing a pretty good job of acting. As long as I didn't wet my pants, I could carry it off.

He yanked so hard I thought my arm might be broken, but I refused to give him the satisfaction of more than a grunt. "I told you that bitch is crazy," he said. "Any sane woman wouldn't have made me hit her. She kept egging me on just like you're doing. I loved hurting her, and I'm going to love hurting you. The fire will hide a lot of cuts and bruises and broken bones."

"You'll get caught! You pushed it too far. If you'd just turned her in, you might have made it work, but you had to torment her and do that stupid Lester Mackey trick. You're an impotent idiot!"

"I had to teach her a lesson. She deserved to suffer after what she did to me!"

"She married you, cooked your meals, cleaned your house! What did she do to you that was so terrible?"

"She made a fool out of me. She left me, and everybody was talking about how I couldn't control my own wife. Then she shot me and left me for dead and all those people were saying David Bennett was married to a crazy woman."

I was pretty sure my arm was broken and it would be a long time before I could hold a pan of chocolate chip cookies. Anytime would be a good time for Fred to show up and rescue me. Surely we had enough, but Fred's so obsessive. He probably wanted all loose ends tied up. I could only hope my dead, one-armed body wouldn't be one of those loose ends.

"You tried to kill me!" I said, plunging on to the only thing I could think of that we hadn't covered. "You put poison in my Chocolate Pudding Cake! You're a criminal and a sicko and a pervert and you're going to pay!"

He gave my arm another yank and I was positive then that it was broken beyond repair. I'd never be able to hold a Coke with one hand and eat chocolate cake with the other. "You can blame Paula for that. If she hadn't confessed everything to you, I wouldn't have to kill you. I told you that woman's crazy! If she'd just behaved, I wouldn't have had to hurt her. I wouldn't have to kill you. Oof!"

Suddenly my arm was free and I whirled around to see Bennett on the floor with Fred standing over him.

My front door flew open again.

"Police! You're under arrest!" Trent and Creighton came through that door, guns drawn. Rick was right behind, and two more officers emerged from the direction of the kitchen.

The cavalry had arrived, all the different divisions.

Trent yanked Bennett off the floor and handcuffed him.

"Adam," Bennett protested, "what's going on? I'm one of you! I'm a police officer. That man attacked me for no reason! I was standing here talking to Ms. Powell about doing some babysitting for me and he came up behind me and kicked me on the side of my head. Nearly broke my neck. Get me out of these cuffs."

"Save it for your trial," Trent said. "I've had a microphone on that window since that idiot Kramer came inside and got out of our way long enough for us to do it."

"Lindsay, are you okay?" Rick took my arm...the sore one. I yanked it back and tried to rub circulation into it.

Fred was easing toward the stairs. He was barefoot.

_Kicked Bennett on the side of his head_? Fred?

"You have the right to remain silent," Creighton began.

"I know my freaking rights!"

"You have the right to an attorney."

"Shut up!"

"Give 'em hell, Bennett!" I shouted as they dragged him out the door. "Show them what a tough guy you are!" I hoped his head hurt as much as my arm, but I wasn't about to give him the satisfaction of knowing he hurt me.



The cops had lots of questions, but finally only Trent, Rick and I remained downstairs.

"Rick, go home," I said.

"I thought we were going to be friends," he protested.

"After the divorce, we'll talk about being friends. Tonight, the only friend I want to see is my cat."

He left, though he shot Trent a final glare. I could tell it didn't bother Trent.

I breathed a sigh of relief when the door closed behind Rick. "I can't believe it's finally over," I said.

"The deal with Bennett or your marriage?" Trent asked.

"Both, I guess."

"How's your arm?"

"Hurts."

He took it in a surprisingly gentle grasp and probed a bit. "I don't think it's broken."

"I didn't hear anything snap, but if it did, it'll be on Fred's recording. We have our own, you know. Probably better than yours."

Trent looked toward the stairs. "Who is that guy?"

"Day trader in the stock market."

"Yeah, right. A day trader who knows karate and has more sophisticated listening devices than the police department does?"

"Don't you know who that masked man was? Why, he's the Lone Day Trader!"

Trent's features warred between irritation and a grin. The grin won. It looked good on him.

He still held my arm. He had nice hands.

"So you were watching my house after all, huh? I thought you didn't believe me."

"I didn't, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to put a tail on Bennett, just in case."

I looked Trent directly in the eye.

"Okay," he admitted, "I thought you might be right. The first time Bennett opened his mouth, he struck me as a smooth-talking dickhead. Then you mouthed off to him and made all kinds of insinuations and taunts on your front porch. I didn't want to take a chance on your getting hurt."

I wasn't sure what to say to that admission.

"Well," Trent said brusquely, dropping my arm as if he'd just noticed he was still holding it, "I guess that winds it all up. I don't think you'll be having any more uninvited night time visitors."

"Are you going to let Paula out of jail?"

"I'll get the warrant quashed. She'll be out in the morning."

"What about Zach?"

"I stationed officers to watch the house where Bennett left him. By now he's been picked up and will spend the night with social services, but we'll get him back to Paula tomorrow."

"Cool."

"Well. I guess if everything's taken care of, I'll leave and let you get some rest. I know this has been pretty stressful for you."

I sighed. "Yeah, you could say that. Death by Chocolate is not a fun way to go, and I'm thinking death by fire would have been even worse."

"Well," he said again and started moving toward the door. "I'll see you around."

I got up my courage. After all, I'd just stood up to a murderer. I could proposition a cop. "How about going to dinner with me at my parents' house tomorrow night? It'll be worse than Chinese water torture, but the food will be good."

He stopped with one hand on the door knob and grinned. "Yeah, I'd like that."

"Pick me up around five?"

He left and I gave myself a moment to let my lips play with a silly smile before I went to the base of the stairs. "Fred! Get down here! It's confession time!"

"I'm not your priest!" he shouted back. "You don't need to confess to me!"

It was going to be a long night.

###

Check out Lindsay's not-so-secret chocolate recipes, then read a chapter of the second book in the Death by Chocolate series, MURDER, LIES AND CHOCOLATE.

Lindsay's Not-So-Secret Recipe Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 c. butter, softened

1-1/2 c. dark brown sugar

1 egg

1 T. vanilla (yes, tablespoon, NOT teaspoon)

1/2 t. baking soda

dash of salt (bigger dash if you use unsalted butter)

1-1/2 c. flour

1/4 c. oat flour

handful of hazelnut meal (optional but suggested)

8 (or more) oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips (I like to use semi-sweet, dark and white)

1/2 to 1 c. chopped nuts, unless someone is allergic

Cream butter with sugar. If butter is too hard to stir with a spoon, use a potato masher to soften. Add egg and vanilla and stir briskly until well mixed. Combine dry ingredients and add to butter mixture. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Dough should be very stiff and just a little sticky. Add more flour or butter as necessary to achieve this state.

Form dough into balls larger than a jacks ball and smaller than a golf ball. Place on cookie sheet a couple of inches apart. Bake at 375º for 8 minutes. Cookies will be moist and chewy with a firm outer crust.

Especially in the summer, it's best to refrigerate the dough a couple of hours or overnight. Makes it easier to handle and it seems to bake up even chewier.

Makes 2 dozen cookies, more or less, depending on how many samples were tested before baking.

Chocolate Pudding Cake

Preheat oven to 350º

Cake:

3/4 c. sugar

1 c. flour

1 t. salt

2 t. baking powder

1/4 c. cocoa

1/2 c. milk

3 T. oil

1 t. vanilla

Sift dry ingredients into a 9x9 pan, ungreased. Add wet ingredients. Mix a little bit. Smooth top.

Topping:

1/2 c. white sugar

1/2 c. brown sugar

1/4 c. cocoa

1-1/2 c. water

Mix sugars and cocoa. Spread evenly over batter. Pour water over all. Bake for 45 minutes. Pudding cooks through to bottom. Serve slightly warm or cold with ice cream. Or just serve with a spoon!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Preheat oven to 350º.

1/2 c. butter

1/2 c. peanut butter (crunchy or smooth or a combination)

1/2 c. white sugar

1/2 c. brown sugar (firmly packed; I prefer dark brown for a richer flavor)

Stir in:

1 egg

1 t. vanilla

1/2 t. salt (1/4 if butter is salted)

1/2 t. baking soda

1 c. flour

1 c. chocolate chips (milk chocolate or M&Ms for a mellow experience; semi-sweet or darker for a maximum chocolate experience; add more than a cup if you're having a bad hair day)

Cream together butter and peanut butter. Beat in sugars. Stir in egg and vanilla. Mix salt, soda and flour well, then add to mixture, stirring until well blended. Add chips. Press into balls roughly an inch in diameter or the size of the kidney stone you wish your ex-husband would get. Flatten on baking sheet, leaving 1 inch between cookies. Bake until firm but not hard, about 10 minutes.

Decadent Chocolate Cheesecake

Preheat oven to 300º.

3 pkgs. cream cheese (8 oz. each), softened

1 c. sugar

3 T. flour

6 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled

3 eggs

3 T. amaretto, Frangelica, Bailey's or just plain cream

2 t. vanilla

6 oz. pkg. chocolate chips

Combine cheese, sugar, flour and chocolate. Beat until well blended. Add eggs, beating well after each addition. Blend in liqueur or cream and vanilla. Stir in chocolate chips. Pour into chocolate crust (below). Bake 70-80 minutes or until filling is set.

Top with:

Vanilla yogurt sprinkled with chocolate chips

Fresh or frozen strawberries* either alone or over vanilla yogurt and/or chocolate chips

Fresh or frozen raspberries* either alone or over vanilla yogurt and/or chocolate chips

*I love to put sugar on the berries, let them set for a while, then drain off the resulting juice, add 1 T. cornstarch to juice and cook in microwave in 45 second increments, beating with wire whisk after each increment, until thick. Cool, add berries back to juice, chill and pour over cheesecake.

Chocolate crust:

8-1/2 oz. pkg. chocolate cookie wafers, crushed (about 2 cups)

1/3 c. butter, melted

1/4 c. sugar

Mix and press into spring-form pan.

Chocolate Earthquake Cake

Preheat oven to 350º.

1 c. chopped nuts (I use more)

1 c. coconut (I use more)

1 box chocolate cake mix, prepared according to package directions

(I prefer the deep chocolate varieties, but lighter varieties can be used...though I can't imagine why anyone would want less chocolate)

1/2 c. butter

3 oz. cream cheese, softened

1 lb. powdered sugar.

Grease or spray 9x12 pan. Cover bottom of pan with nuts and coconut. Pour cake batter on top.

Melt butter in a bowl in microwave. Add cream cheese and powdered sugar and stir. Spoon over unbaked batter, spreading as much as possible. Bake 42-45 minutes. (You cannot test for doneness as cake will be sticky even when it's done. About all you can do is eat a piece or two. Or three or four.)

Sprinkle with chocolate chips while still hot so they'll partially melt.

Brownie Nut Fudge Pie

Preheat oven to 375º.

1 unbaked pie shell (see below)

2 squares (2 oz.) unsweetened chocolate

2 T. butter

3 eggs

1/2 c. sugar

3/4 c. dark corn syrup

1 c. nuts

Melt chocolate and butter in microwave, stirring every 30 seconds. Beat eggs, sugar, chocolate mixture and corn syrup. Mix in pecans. Pour into pastry lined 9-inch pie pan. Bake 40-50 minutes just until set. Serve slightly warm (to die for!) or cold with ice cream and hot fudge sauce.

No Worries Pie Crust

(This pie crust does not contain chocolate. It is merely the device that allows one to lift chocolate pie from the pan. Therefore I see no point in wasting time on all that cutting the grease in until it's the size of mutated peas, etc. This crust is quick and easy and always flaky...and allows you to spend more time with your chocolate.)

1-1/3 c. flour

1/2 t. salt

1/3 c. oil

3 T. cold milk

Mix flour and salt. Add oil and milk. Mix.

Put between two sheets of wax paper. Roll out to something vaguely resembling a circle.

Remove top layer of paper then lay it gently back onto crust. Flip crust over and remove new top layer (old bottom layer) and discard. Lay pie tin, upside down, on crust. Flip crust and pan right side up. Remove and discard remaining layer of wax paper.

Flute edges of pie crust by pinching between thumb and forefinger of one hand while pressing finger of other hand between said thumb and forefinger. (Use first knuckles if you have long fingernails.) Some people think this fluting makes it pretty. The truth is, it assures that none of the chocolate filling will spill out into the oven in case of overfill.

# MURDER, LIES AND CHOCOLATE

# Chapter One

"Are you out of your freaking mind? No, you cannot have my house." I spoke the words through gritted teeth to keep myself from shouting since it was noon and my small restaurant, Death by Chocolate, was packed. I didn't want my customers to hear me screaming at my almost-ex-husband. Might ruin their appetite for dessert. I had no doubt Rick deliberately chose that setting so I wouldn't yell at him.

"Lindsay, you'd have to be crazy to pass up a deal like this." Rick leaned across the counter and gave me his most engaging, most insincere real estate salesman smile. "You'll get almost twice what that old place is worth, and I'll sign the divorce papers the minute you sign the Contract for Sale."

Rick knew how to work me. He'd convinced me to marry him in the first place and now he'd delayed our divorce for almost a year. Every time I got a court date, he got a continuance. I really, really wanted him to sign those papers, and I certainly could have used the extra money, but I've learned not to trust a Rick bearing gifts. He was up to something. Had he discovered my house had oil under the basement? Was the railroad scheduled to come through? I was pretty sure those things only happened in old movies, but I was equally sure this deal would have some money in it for Rick, more than was in it for me.

"Do you not see that I'm busy right now? Go away." I turned to the man who'd taken a seat on the stool next to where Rick stood. "What can I get for you, sir? Our special today is a ham sandwich and a piece of Sinful Chocolate Cake."

"I'm not leaving," Rick said. "I'm meeting my client here. Throw a little business your way. We'll be at that table in the corner in case you change your mind. Give it some thought." He smiled and winked as he walked across the room.

Had I really once thought that smile was sexy?

Paula Roberts, my best friend and co-worker, was waiting tables while I took care of the counter. That meant she'd have to deal with him. Not that I wished Rick on her, but better her than me. At least he was a good tipper, especially when he was with a client. The old impress.

For the next hour I focused on serving sandwiches and chocolate goodies and tried to ignore Rick. I did notice that an older male joined him. Probably a real client. I'd expected him to bring in his latest bimbo. Excuse me...I mean, his latest girlfriend.

The man was likely the client who wanted to buy my house since he and Rick kept looking at me.

When Rick and I split up he moved his bimbo-of-the-month, Muffy, into the big home we once shared, and I moved into one of our small rental properties in the Kansas City suburb of Pleasant Grove. I wasn't happy about it at the time, but I'd since become quite fond of that house. It has character and personality as well as great neighbors. Paula and her son, Zach, live on one side with my OCD computer nerd friend, Fred Sommers, on the other.

True, with as much money as Rick was offering, I could buy the vacant house across the street and fix it up, thus retaining my neighbors. That was just one of the many reasons I didn't trust the whole deal. Why would anybody offer that much more than the house was worth? I did not for one minute believe Rick's story that his client's grandparents had lived in the house and he wanted it for sentimental value. What a crock.

The lunch crowd began to thin, and I noticed Rick and his client still sitting at the corner table. Across the room Paula cleared the dirty dishes off the table next to them and exchanged a raised-eyebrow look with me. I repressed a sigh as I handed the last lady at the bar a to-go bag with half a dozen gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. Rick was obviously planning to wait until everybody was gone then ambush me. He didn't like not getting his way. That's why our divorce was still pending. He didn't want it, and if he didn't want something, he'd figure a way to stop that something from happening.

A few months ago he kicked Muffy out and decided he wanted me back in. By that time I'd recovered from the temporary insanity that had induced me to marry him in the first place and got a cat instead. That cat loves my house. Make that, _our_ house. King Henry took ownership the day he moved in.

The last customer left the counter. Besides Rick and his buddy, only one other table remained occupied. An older man and a younger woman sat there, nibbling on their cookies, talking softly and laughing. Probably married but not to each other.

Paula took her load of dishes to the kitchen then returned to where I stood behind the cash register. After her evil ex-husband was sent to prison last fall, she quit coloring her blonde hair brown and came out of hiding, but she still wore her self-appointed uniform of long sleeves and ankle-length skirts to hide the scars he'd left. I'd worn the same uniform for a while to make her feel comfortable but had recently gone back to jeans and white shirts. I'd tripped on those long skirts too many times.

"They didn't order anything except dessert, and Rick gave me a twenty dollar tip," she said. "Watch your back."

"He wants my house."

"What?" Her eyes widened in surprise. "He made you take that house so he could keep the big one."

"Shhh. Here they come."

"I'll just step into the kitchen and eavesdrop." Paula vanished into the back room.

"Lindsay, I'd like you to meet Rodney Bradford."

The tall man with gray hair, acne-scarred skin and dark eyes wore a business suit, but he didn't look like a business person...more like a member of the mob cleaned up for trial. He gave me a big smile and extended a large hand across the counter. "Good to meet you, Lindsay."

I took his hand automatically. It was thick, hard and callused. He didn't grip too tightly, didn't hang on too long, didn't do anything wrong, but something about him creeped me out. Maybe just because he was hanging with Rick. Or maybe it was something to do with the darkness that seemed to expand out from those eyes and surround the man.

Nah, that was silly. Probably just because he was hanging with Rick.

"Can we talk outside?" Bradford asked, his gaze shifting nervously around the restaurant, scanning the couple in the corner as if they might be spies.

"No," I said. "The acoustics are just fine in here. Feel free to speak."

"Lindsay." Rick spoke my name as if it was a threat, but then he gave a big salesman smile. "Please?"

I considered the situation. Stand there and argue with a man whose ears were tuned to hear only his own words or go outside with the two of them, then run back inside and lock the door. "Fine." I took a fortifying sip of my current Coke, set it on the counter and headed for the front door.

Outside I led them away from the door but still in the shade of my awning. It was a hot day. I stopped in front of the sign painted on my window, positioning myself directly beneath the words _Death by_ and obscuring most of the word _Chocolate_. I figured that would make a nice picture, though Bradford was probably too dense to get it and Rick was too self-consumed.

"Rodney is interested in purchasing that little house you're living in, the one you and I own," Rick said, ramping up the wattage on his smile.

Jerk. Reminding me the house was still community property, that we were still legally—no, I can't say the "m" word when it relates to Rick. We were still legally bound.

I smiled with the same degree of sincerity as he did. That would be...none. "You mean my home? I'm not interested in selling."

"It would mean a whole lot to me," Rodney said. "My grandparents used to live there. That house has got sentimental value." He paused, blinked and seemed confused for a second. Was this guy sick? His tanned skin did look kind of pallid. He swallowed, recovered and continued. "I used to visit them when I was a boy. Some of the best memories of my life. Now they're—" He lowered his gaze, and this time his pause was deliberate. Con job. I'd seen Rick do it too many times not to recognize it. "They're in heaven, and I'd just like to be able to go to that old house, sleep in my old room, sit on the porch like we used to and remember the good times."

I was sorry to hear the nice elderly couple Rick and I bought the house from was dead. They'd seemed healthy, looking forward to life in a retirement village. "The house across the street is for sale. You could buy it, get a pair of binoculars and sit on the porch every day looking at my house."

"Lindsay!" Rick exclaimed.

Beads of sweat broke out on Rodney's forehead. The temperature was in the 80s, but the shade was cool. Was my refusal freaking him out that bad? "I've got a little money," he said. His voice sounded creaky. "I'll pay you more than you'd get anywhere else just so I can have my dear old grandmother's house."

"I'm sorry. It's not for sale. If you'll excuse me, I don't want to leave Paula with all the cleanup."

I took a step toward the door.

Rodney cleared his throat. "Could I have a glass of water?"

A stalling tactic. I sighed. "Sure."

I went inside.

Paula had come back from the kitchen to stand beside the door. "Don't sell him your house."

"Don't worry." I poured a glass of ice water and went back out, planning to hand it to the man then run inside while he was drinking.

He raised his head to look at me. His skin was very pale and his eyes had a shiny cast to them. Maybe this was more than frustration at being thwarted. My cookies had nuts. I hoped he wasn't allergic. If he went into anaphylactic shock and died, it wouldn't be good publicity for the diner.

He reached a hand toward the glass, his eyes rolled up in his head, he groaned and slowly crumpled to the sidewalk.

"Did you bring a drunk man into my restaurant?" I demanded of Rick, hoping that's what it was. I didn't need my place to be quarantined for an outbreak of malaria or shut down because my cookies made somebody sick.

Rick sank to the ground beside the man. Paula rushed out. The couple at the corner table stood and looked through the window. I held onto the glass of water as if it was a glass of Coke and prayed for a verdict of too many beers.

"Call 911!" Rick shouted.

I set the water on the sidewalk, fumbled in the pocket of my jeans for my cell phone and punched in the three ominous numbers.

Paula rose, her face pale, her expression solemn. "Lindsay, he's dead."

The couple exploded through the door and hauled butt out of there. They didn't want to be seen on the ten o'clock news.

This was worse than getting sick. Heart attack? Nut allergies? Please, not poisoned chocolate again! "You don't know he's dead," I snapped. "You thought your husband was dead just because you shot him, but he was still alive."

Rick stood. He'd lost his salesman's smile. Damn. That did not bode well.

Someone answered my phone call. "911. What is your emergency?"

I swallowed and spoke into the phone. "I think I just killed a man. I mean...my cookies killed a man. I mean—"

"He had the brownie," Paula interrupted.

I didn't correct the 911 lady. Cookies or brownies, a man had just died after eating my dessert. Even if it was a good old-fashioned heart attack, death and desserts just don't go well together.

