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  She woke to a dull buzz coming from the front of the house. It was now dark and she blinked to adjust her vision. One upward move reminded her why she was there in the first place. The buzzer came in long spurts and was quickly growing annoying. It could be only one person.

  “Come on in,” she called in a scratchy voice. In seconds she was staring at Officer Milford standing over her, a six-pack of beer wedged in the crook of her arm. Shel sighed. “Well, Officer Milford…surprise, surprise.”

  “I could have been a serial killer.”

  “Too bad you weren’t,” Shel muttered. She clenched her eyes tightly shut. “I might have been put out of my misery.”

  Milford tsked. “You down in the back, hotshot?”

  “What makes you say that?” Shel cynically asked, wincing as she again tried to sit upright. She gave up and pointed toward the kitchen. “Could you get those tablets on the counter left of the stove? And bring me one of your beers, would you?”

  Milford looked at her with unease before disappearing into the kitchen. She returned seconds later with a glass and the requested pills and stood by as Shel tossed them down with what turned out to be water. In the near darkness she’d been tricked. “That…is not a beer.”

  “You had me worried.”

  “Shouldn’t have been,” Shel said. She swiped her hand across her lips. “I drink beer all the time.”

  “You know what I mean.” She referred to the requested tablets, which turned out to be imprinted with the word Tylenol.

  “Jesus, nobody trusts anybody anymore.” Shel handed the glass back. “Could I get that beer now, please?”

  “How’d you hurt your back?”

  “Breaking and entering,” she truthfully answered.

  “Very funny,” Milford said, her rusty voice rising up a notch. The cop fished two beers out of the cardboard carrier and popped the lids. She handed one to Shel, who was now sitting on the couch, but massively pained at her effort to do so. She took a long pull off the beer. Milford, who’d been standing by, seated herself on the facing couch.

  As they drank their beers in silence, Shel mentally reviewed her unusual day and wondered how much of her back pain was physical and how much was stress. Fortier had yet to return her call and his estranged wife was proving to be the mystery of the century. Judging by the pain in her back, she wasn’t going to be able to do much about any of it soon.

  She broke their silence, her tone bordering disgusted. “You want in or what?”

  “I’m in,” Milford coolly said. “I’m in sitting on the couch, about to drink a second one of these beers. You want another?”

  Shel nodded and Milford collected bottles then delivered a fresh round.

  “How long you been in Naples?”

  “Long.” Milford stared at her. “This illegal work?”

  “No, but it’s tricky.”

  Milford narrowed her eyes. “Define tricky.”

  “You ever heard of SLW, LLC?”

  Milford wanted more information up front. “First, what’s your case?”

  They stared at each other in the growing darkness for several seconds before Shel muttered every curse word known to mankind. After a follow-up of exaggerated eye rolls, she said, “Christ, Milford—where’s your sense of adventure?”

  “On hold.” Milford stared her down. “Continue.”

  Shel wondered how telling could hurt anything. After a brief hesitation, she quietly began. “A prominent art gallery owner in New Orleans hired me to find his runaway wife.”

  “Why’d she run?”

  “Not my concern.” Almost immediately, Shel amended her statement. “Doesn’t matter, anyway. She took his daughter, a four-year-old. He says the mom is deranged, a real danger to the kid.”

  “And you took him at his word.” It wasn’t a question. Milford looked very reluctant. “I hesitate to ask, but you’re not planning to kidnap—”

  “No,” Shel cut her off. The cop let out the breath she’d been holding, motioned for Shel to continue. “My job is only to find her and report to him her location.”

  Milford seemed to be thinking it over. She stood up, sauntered toward the window and gazed outside at the dark street. She tapped her beer bottle lightly against the front window indicating the house across the street. “I take it you already know their whereabouts.”

  Shel nodded, an unnecessary move in the darkness. “I’ve got copies of all the legal paperwork and there’s committal papers waiting for the wife when he finds them.” She paused a second. “There’s good money on the line.”

  “So what’s your holdup, hotshot?” The cop’s tone said she was testing Shel’s sense of integrity. She came back around and sat down across from the troubled woman.

  “Something seems…off.”

  Milford cut right to it. “Is this a case of conscience or puppy love?”

  She blinked a few times. “A person should know what they’re really looking at before they take a woman’s kid away from her.” And when the cop seemed ready to test her selection of terms, she impatiently revised it. “Alert the father who will then take the woman’s kid—c’mon, Milford, don’t be so technical.”

  Milford sounded deadly serious. “It is technical. You need to mean what you say and say only what you mean, particularly in cases like this one.”

  That she went silent said the cop was at least mulling it over. Shel prompted her along. “I will give you the details of this case, but I swear to God if you screw me over or let the cat out of the bag, I’ll kill you. And yes, I meant what I said.”

  “I’m not going to break the law.” Milford was firm on that point.

  “I’m not asking you to do that.”

  “Exactly what are you asking me to do, pray tell?”

  In a matter of minutes, Shel had briefly filled the woman in on the case details, including the events of the day with Rob the shady bartender.

  “You believe him? This guy fancy himself a cop or something?”

  “No.” Shel chuckled. “He’s just an observant friend.”

  “Be careful who you confide in.”

  “Including you?” Shel coyly asked.

  “Especially me.” Milford was again quiet. Finally, she said, “I’ve never heard of this SLW, LLC, but I can do some checking.”

  “And what do you think about Silvia Frances?”

  “Where’s your computer?”

  “There’s no Internet.”

  Milford held up her telephone and gave it a midair jiggle. “I bring my own Internet.”

  Shel started to stand, but the pain stopped her. Instead, she motioned toward the bedroom. Milford left and came back with it in seconds. She fired up the personal hotspot and clacked around a bit. The light from the screen illuminated her expression of disappointment.

  “Looking at the preschool website and she’s on the board. I guess she skipped picture day.” Milford spun the computer around for Shel to see. “Surprise, surprise.”

  Sure enough, in a row of professionally photographed pictures, Silvia Frances was represented by an ambiguous blue outline and the caption N/A. The women were quiet each caught up in their own thoughts.

  “I’ll see if she has a record, voting card, residence, that sort of thing.”

  Shel didn’t look terribly hopeful about their prospects. She rubbed the small of her back, whispered, “Probably not her real name. Seems to be a trend around these parts, just ask Addison James.”

  “You’ve got yourself quite a case here, my friend.”

  “I know.” Shel looked at her in the darkness. “So, are you going to help me or what?”

  “What’s in it for me?”

  “Escape? Adventure…?” And when that didn’t seem to do it, Shel rolled her eyes again. “What’s your price?”

  Milford stared at her for a while before finally softening a bit. “You stick with my code of ethics, which means no law breaking, you hear? And I’ll do it for the pure delight of it.” Her sarcastic tone an
d perturbed expression said she was wondering what she’d gotten herself into. She shut down the computer and punched a button on her phone before she stood and headed for the door. “Maybe an occasional beer or two.”

  “Thanks, Milford.” Shel meant it. It was an odd feeling having someone else on board with her. She got the feeling Milford worked alone, too. She wasn’t sure how well they’d get along. The thought of it made her ask, “What made you say yes?”

  “The Tylenol.” She opened the door, but didn’t go, only stared across the street.

  “I’d at least like to know what’s going on with those ladies—Ms. James and Ms. Frances. From your story alone, I’m guessing theft or trafficking or something else that requires a bogus corporate name. I don’t like the idea of it happening here, right here in my little highfalutin backyard.”

  Shel motioned toward the yellow house. “Well, if she’s hiding anything, it’s only secrets. Her place is clean.”

  “I did not hear that.” Milford leaned back inside and pointed a finger at Shel, her voice suddenly stern. “And that kind of thing won’t happen again if you hope to get any help out of me. You need to know that.”

  Shel nodded and watched Milford leave. She peeked out the window, watching as the cop lumbered down the sidewalk and into the driveway and hitched up the waistband of her jeans. Milford swung one short leg over a motorcycle and straddled the seat of her Hog and started it up. Shel let the curtain fall back and listened as the cop rode off into the night, only a fading deep put-put-put echo in her wake.

  She knew Milford was right. Old Naples was exclusive—too much so that a starving artist could move in, secondhand furnishings or not. That meant there was money somewhere or at least the prospect of it. Add in the false names and air of secrecy and something was off. It felt like more than a child custody war or even blackmail.

  More and more, Shel’s thoughts were centered on what they might discover about her baffling neighbor. A genuine sense of foreboding hung over Kathleen like a dark cloud. Shel’s objectivity felt shakier than ever thanks to absurd, lustful thoughts she was having about her employer’s wife—God help her—making it difficult to tell if her own instincts were trying to tell her something. It felt that way.

  The cases she’d taken over the last few years had primarily involved outwitting dimwits. There wasn’t much need for employing morals, values, or even emotions for that matter. By now, given the surplus of stupidity she’d witnessed, her gut instincts were so firmly insulated by cynicism she wasn’t sure she’d recognize them if they slapped her in the face.

  That’s why she needed Milford. While the cop’s pared down lifestyle had her at risk for being terminally boring, her simplified view had given her an uncanny knack for easily distinguishing right from wrong. Shel could tell. She found herself admiring Milford’s low maintenance, peaceful existence. Boring or not, she’d bet the woman slept well at night, which was more than she could say for herself.

  She rubbed her eyes and glanced at her watch. It was after ten o’clock and the house across the street was dark, right on schedule with a town that rolled up its sidewalks at dusk. The night air was considerably less stifling than when she’d lain down in the first place. It wafted through the screened windows bringing with it the sounds of crickets and an occasional frog croak, setting the tone for restful slumber. But Shel knew better.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Though she hadn’t been in a pool for years, Shel sat at the edge of the backyard pool wearing the closest thing she had to swimwear: sweat shorts and a T-shirt. She gently lowered herself into the shallow end and slowly began to move about. Low-impact exercises, Milford had instructed her after summoning her from sleep with the faulty doorbell. It was the second such time in less than twenty-four hours. As she’d watched the bedside clock until nearly four a.m., Shel was angry about the disruption at first. She quickly forgave the visit when she realized it was already early afternoon.

  Milford had stopped over during her lunch break with no real update on the SLW, LLC mystery. In truth, Shel knew the cop was checking on her sordid state of mind and rotten back. She promised Milford both were improving.

  Moving around the sun-warmed pool felt like trying to walk off rigor mortis. She waded slowly through the shallower end and discovered that after several minutes, she was feeling slightly better. She continued gentle movement, hoping for continual improvement, but recovery was only marginal. She gave up and free floated with her face to the sunny sky.

  It was funny, relaxing in the pool she’d cleaned and filled, out back of the home she’d rented in a real neighborhood, and it all felt terribly domestic. Never before had she the slightest desire to be stuck in one place or have a home. She was used to hustling just enough jobs to pay rent on maybe four hundred squares in the city. Compared to that, life in the slow lane in Naples didn’t seem too bad. She considered she could get used to it, while alternately wondering if Naples’ brand of small-town quiet could eventually cause her to go stir crazy. Perhaps she’d become like Milford. It changed the feeling of her momentary lapse to domestic fantasy and she grimaced.

  She knew better than to get used to feeling even remotely settled, particularly here. She wasn’t the type. Anyway, she’d be done with the seaside town soon, only the leftover white sand in her shoes to show she’d been here at all. Possibly there was money ahead. Definitely there was freedom.

  Shel stayed in the pool until her skin was sufficiently pruned and pinking. She gently hoisted herself onto the aluminum ladder and slowly climbed up and out then leaned against the porch railing to let the sun dry her.

  At a child’s shrieking scream she forgot about her back. With a strength and speed she didn’t even know she was capable of, Shel ran around the side of the house toward the street. Another shrill scream had her running full force across the street. In seconds she was hammering her fist against the front door. If harm came to the child living there, Shel would be to blame. Her stomach was in knots. She wished she hadn’t seen enough in her career to know how vulnerable kids truly are.

  She pressed her face against the front window, but saw no movement. She abandoned the front porch and ran along the fence to the gate. When the latch stuck, she impatiently rammed the flimsy wooden door with her hip until it burst open. It loudly slammed against the fence, splintering around the rusted latch and in three long strides she was standing in the backyard.

  The child’s tiny hands were wrapped around a garden hose, the stream of water aimed directly at her mother. Mother and daughter were obviously startled by Shel’s sudden appearance, her intense expression, the sound of the gate—all of it. The child lowered the hose and stared at the intruder, gaping.

  “Off,” Kathleen commanded the child in an unexpectedly chilly voice. The stream of water died. Kathleen’s hands went to her hips and she took a bold step toward her neighbor, implying that she was prepared to defend herself and her child. Given her petite size it seemed absurd. Still, she had a right to be angry.

  Shel stood breathless, staring at the soaking wet woman. Uneven blond strands were damp and sticking to Kathleen’s cheeks and lips creating a funny frame for the otherwise perfect face. Helpless to her wandering eyes, Shel’s gaze moved lower, falling over the damp T-shirt that hardly disguised perfect, erect nipples. Trying desperately to look away, she lowered her eyes further, only to land on the gauzy skirt now almost transparent as it clung to the woman’s petite curves. Kathleen’s icy demeanor remained intact, as conveyed through her stance and the hard look in her aqua eyes.

  “Can I help you?”

  After hesitating longer than she would have liked, Shel muttered, “I heard a commotion.”

  Her skin prickled in a light breeze and for a moment, Shel thought Kathleen’s chilly demeanor was contagious. Only then did she realize she was still in wet clothes. In fact, Shel’s attire was only a partial improvement over what she’d worn the first time she’d barged into their lives.

  Kathleen’s a
rms crossed in front of her damp T-shirt, effectively reducing the wonderful view. “Are you always on high alert?”

  Feeling foolish, Shel looked away. Her face felt warm either at her embarrassment or her adolescent musings concerning Kathleen’s wet shirt. She slowly nodded. “Maybe.”

  “Are you a cop or something?”

  The question caught Shel slightly off guard, but no more than anything else that had transpired in the last two minutes. She looked at the child, still standing there with the hose nozzle clutched in her hand, staring at the women. Shel wondered what the kid was used to seeing and couldn’t stomach the thought of adding more insanity to it. Her tone indicated surrender when she said, “Just a nosy neighbor.”

  Kathleen turned toward the child. “Harper, go inside. Now.”

  The child promptly dropped the hose and without question, did exactly as she was told.

  “Harper…” Shel hadn’t meant for the word to make its way out of her mouth. It was the final piece of what was truly unnecessary confirmation that all the players were accounted for. Kathleen remained staring at her and Shel raised her hands in faux surrender. “I’m going.”

  She took a few steps toward the gate, but thanks to her grand entrance complete with splintering the wood, it had shut too hard and now wouldn’t budge. Desperate to avoid making an exit as brazen as her entrance, Shel quietly struggled with the latch. Every ache and pain trickled back into full strength until even jiggling the gate was intolerable.

  Kathleen was suddenly at her side, working at the dilapidated latch. Her arm brushed against Shel and she flinched, as if Kathleen’s very touch caused her even more pain than her back ever could.

  Kathleen didn’t seem to notice the impact she had on her unwelcome visitor. She continued to struggle with the latch, her damp skirt swaying with her movement, revealing the barest hint of lovely midriff when she finally bumped the gate with her slim hip. It slowly swung open.

  Shel felt a dangerous kind of warmth building inside her. The woman was having an extraordinary physiological impact on her, yet Kathleen didn’t even seem to notice.