Wrong move. He’d offended her and he didn’t want that. “Hey,” he said. “I see how lovely she is—and not just in the way she looks. I get what you’re saying.”
She smiled. “I’m glad to hear that. But for heaven’s sake, don’t tell Serena we talked or I’m toast!”
She waved as she walked briskly away, Brutus trotting at her heels.
Bemused, Nick turned back to the door. How would he write that encounter up in his notes? Not that it meant anything—criminals had friends, too—but Serena certainly inspired loyalty. From a personal point of view he liked Maddy Cartwright. From a professional one, it was useful to have met her. She and her husband might come under his investigation, too.
In the meantime, now was his chance to check out his prime suspect at her home.
He took the stairs two at a time to find the door to Serena’s apartment closed. He knocked. His knock was answered by a shrill trill of yipping—Snowball—and a deep, baritone woof that could only come from Mack.
Then Serena answered the door.
Every word of what he’d planned to say flew out of his head, leaving him gawking like a dumbstruck sixteen-year-old.
Her hair was only pulled halfway off her face with the rest waving softly around her shoulders. She wore jeans and a plain dark blue T-shirt. Not baggy Paws-A-While jeans but normal jeans. Though how he could think jeans could be described as normal when they hugged such shapely curves and long, long legs. The T-shirt could only be called modest. High neck. Long sleeves pushed up to the elbows. But how could a T-shirt be modest when it drew a man’s eyes to a body that was so sensational it had put her on billboards all round the country?
She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Anywhere.
Movie screens included.
“You found us,” she said, in that lovely, mellow voice.
Yes. I found you. And I can’t have you.
“Your friend let me in,” he said, his voice hoarse, willing himself not to think of chocolate-coated anything.
She looked around him and down to the floor. “No Bessie?”
“She’s staying with a friend.”
“The same one who ties her bow?”
“Yes.” His aunt ran a small art gallery in Sausalito. Her business partner Hannah doted on Bessie and had taken her for the day.
“Shame. Snowball would like to see her, I’m sure.”
He followed Serena into her living room. Snowball rushed at him and pranced around his feet.
Mack lay on a big, squashy dog bed near the fireplace. He thumped his tail in greeting. “Hey, fella,” said Nick and the enormous dog thumped his tail again. Nick put down his folder and hunkered down next to him. He offered him his hand to sniff. Then, when Mack gave him the go-ahead, scratched him behind the ears. Again he was struck by the look of resigned suffering in Mack’s eyes.
All these years since he’d lost Fella and he hadn’t realized how much he’d missed having a dog.
He who travels fastest travels alone.
But maybe a dog like this would move fast enough to keep up. Once his knee was fixed, that was.
“You can see why I can’t keep Mack, much as I’d love to,” said Serena, indicating the room with a wave of her hand.
Indeed Mack took up a good proportion of the floor space. The high old ceilings gave the room a deceptively spacious look. It looked both comfortable and elegant, the walls a warm neutral, the furnishings simple. Polished wooden floors. White shutters at the windows. At each side of the fireplace was a bookcase, every shelf crammed with books, right up to the ceiling. More books lay on the coffee table. The art on the walls was eclectic, a moody abstract hung next to a traditional landscape of a lake. Propped against the corner behind the sofa, a guitar case and a music stand made a pleasing composition. So she played guitar. He wondered if she sang.
“Nice place,” he said.
“It is, isn’t it? Though you might not say that when you see the kitchen and bathroom. They desperately need remodeling. But it’s a bit of a tight fit for this big boy, isn’t it?” Mack knew immediately she was talking about him. Nick swore his eyes lit up, and his tail wagged way more vigorously than it had for him. “But with Nick’s help, we’ll soon have you up and running about,” she said to the dog, fondling his ears.
Then she looked up at Nick. “Thanks to you,” she said. Then she smiled.
By helping Mack, he had earned that special luminous smile reserved, he realized, for dogs and for people she thought loved dogs as much as she did. He might as well bask in it now because when she found out the truth about what he was doing in her life, he would not be warmed by it again.
He pointed to his folder where he’d placed it on the coffee table. “I’ve brought all the notes on the surgery and the X-rays you gave me. Let’s see if we can talk to the vet and the surgeon and get him done as soon as we can.”
The wall between the two bow-fronted rooms had been knocked through. In the next room a table was set for a meal. Nick was aware of a delicious aroma wafting through from where the kitchen must be. His mouth watered. This morning he’d run, cycled, and put in a session pumping free weights. Breakfast seemed a long time ago. Was she expecting a visitor for lunch? Damn, there went his plans for suggesting a meal together somewhere without the dogs.
But that was probably just as well.
Stay detached. Remain focused. Maintain suspicion.
He nodded his head over to the table. “Are you expecting someone? If so, we had better get straight to business.”
“There’s no one else coming. I . . . I thought you might like to join me for lunch.” Color flamed high on her cheekbones and she didn’t quite meet his gaze.
He caught his breath on a sharp intake of air. For the first time, Nick got an inkling that the attraction he felt for Serena might not run one way.
The knowledge flooded him with conflicting emotions. First, a fierce, exultant triumph that was quickly overtaken by the sobering realization that this would only make his job a hundred times more difficult.
He should pass on that invitation to lunch. Maybe even consider handing this case to Adam, asking his partner to take over. He was at risk of getting in way too deep here. Because he could no longer deny to himself that it wasn’t just Mack he was beginning to feel a tug toward.
He took a deep breath. Filled his lungs with the scent of that rich, delicious aroma wafting from the kitchen, then, closer, a tantalizing hint of vanilla and warm, tousled-haired woman.
“Lunch would be great,” he said.
Eight
Nick
grit his teeth.
Damn.
Whatever had possessed him to agree to Serena’s invitation? By saying yes to lunch with a suspect in her own home he risked compromising his professionalism. A public restaurant he could get away with. An intimate table set for two behind closed doors was a different matter altogether.
He could not let her get the wrong idea.
However much he might wish this could be a date, he had to force himself to stay professional. He schooled his face to show polite interest. Nothing more.
“Whatever’s cooking smells good,” he said with an appreciative sniff.
He’d been cooking for himself ever since he’d been house-sitting for Aunt Alice and was getting tired of his own repertoire. No wonder this aroma had enticed him into a wrong decision. It was almost as enticing as the sight of Serena in tight-fitting jeans.
Almost.
“It’s lasagna,” she said. “Homemade. But I didn’t—”
“Homemade lasagna.” He closed his eyes to better savor the aroma. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be slavering. He opened his eyes to meet hers, was surprised to realize she was on edge about whether or not he would like her choice of meal. “Bring it on. And don’t hold back on the cheese.”
Her shoulders sagged in relief, a reaction he found unexpectedly endearing. “Thank heaven. I wondered if you would like lasagna . . .”
“Who doesn’t like lasagna?”
“That’s what I said to . . . uh, I mean, absolutely.” She flushed. “As soon as we’ve sorted out the stuff about Mack, we can eat.”
Said to whom? Maddy Cartwright? Had she and her red-haired friend plotted the meal, discussed him in the girly way his sister and her friends sometimes did when a new guy was on the horizon? That was kind of cute. Not for the first time, he wished he had met Serena under different circumstances.
Because he could not be that guy.
“Sure,” he said. “We can eat then.”
Nick was a big man, and he had big appetites. His stomach gave a rumble in protest at having to postpone the lasagna promised by that tantalizing aroma. Mack, in the dog bed nearby, just happened to shift at the same moment. Serena immediately assumed he was the source of the embarrassing noise.
“Mack!” She glared at him, reprimand in her voice. Blissfully unaware, Mack thumped his tail, his tongue lolling in a doggy grin.
She frowned, and Nick realized it wasn’t annoyance at the dog but rather anxiety that the dog was not on his best behavior. In front of a potential adoptive owner?
There was a note of ill-disguised pleading in her voice when she turned to Nick. “I’m sorry, he does have a few problems with, uh, flatulence. But the vet says that will get better once he can be more active again.”
“The poor animal can’t help it,” said Nick, not feeling the slightest bit guilty. “The sooner he gets that surgery, the better.” He’d forgotten how useful it could be to blame dogs for all sorts of human misdemeanors.
“Amen to that,” she said, again her relief visible. “In the meantime, let me get you a drink. Beer?”
“Coke’s good for me,” he said. He needed his senses on full alert.
He knew he only had minutes while she was out of the room to survey it for clues to her contacts and lifestyle. A lead, no matter how small. Names. Numbers. Anything. He had to make it quick and make it subtle. She’d caught him once before looking too interested in her possessions. If she caught him again, he’d blow the case for sure.
He rapidly scanned the multitude of framed photos that were propped on the mantelpiece. A posed studio portrait of Snowball. Maddy and Tom O’Brien on their wedding day with Serena standing next to Maddy. It was difficult not to stop and examine more closely how she looked in that figure-hugging bridesmaid dress.
Same, too, with the faded print of Serena at around ten years old, hugging tight a nondescript mutt, her eyes glowing. Next was a smiling older couple, their arms slung loosely around each other’s shoulders, the man bald and spare, the woman tall and slender with a look of Serena but falling short of her beauty. Then Serena with Kylie and some of the other Paws-A-While staff around a restaurant table. Then Snowball as a puppy. Snowball wet and indignant in a bath. Snowball. Snowball. Snowball. Dog. Dog. Dog.
Quickly, he checked out the small telephone table. It was scattered with fliers and used envelopes with shopping items scribbled all over them. On one was written “J & T—new” and an Oakland phone number that he memorized. Written underneath that was “Call Lydia Sat.” Lydia, he knew, was the vet. She had referred Mack to a surgeon who had not yet seen the dog. An appointment with the surgeon was one of the things he and Serena needed to sort out today.
On the coffee table was a newsprint magazine that on first glance he thought was from the
San Francisco Chronicle
but on second, astounded look proved to be a doggy newspaper entitled
Bay Woof: News with Bite for Bay Area Dog Lovers
. Next to it sat a well-thumbed paperback,
Dogs Never Lie About Love,
and a glossy picture book
Winery Dogs of Napa Valley
.
Nothing there.
He moved on to the bookshelves. Pulled out some titles. Looked for hidden files. By the time Serena came back into the room carrying a Coke for him and a Diet Coke for herself, he was nonchalantly perusing a row of books at eye level.
“There are a lot of titles here by Valerie St. James,” he said. “And more by Leonard Oakley. Any connection?”
He’d discovered these names in his investigation of Serena Oakley—also known as Serena St. James—but wanted confirmation from her that they were connected.
She nodded. “Valerie is my mom and Leonard my dad.”
“They’re authors?”
She put the drinks down on the coffee table.
“Yes. Mom writes about organic gardening and sustainable living. Dad’s books are on eco design. They were hippies way back in the seventies and never stopped believing. Much to their surprise, they’re right back in fashion.”
And selling well, too, he knew from his investigations.
“I recall you said you moved around a lot when you were a kid.”
“Yep. All over the country. I remember more than one commune. For a while we even lived in Scotland.”
“That must have been fun. An adventure.” He thought of his own existence in the valley. From preschool to high school, never farther than a yellow school bus ride away. He’d itched for the opportunity to see more.
“Not so much for me.” She shrugged her elegant shoulders. “All that moving from place to place is kinda disruptive when you’re at school. Not great for your grades, not great for your friendships.”
“I guess,” he said.
And if you’re a certain kind of person, you learn to be a loner.
To not get too attached to people. To develop the ability to put on a face—be what people want you to be. In short, to breed the kind of personality that could gravitate to fraud.
“You learn to be independent, that’s for sure,” she said.
That, too.
He fought the urge to crack his knuckles. He was finding it frustratingly difficult to pin her down and categorize her.
“Where are your parents now?” he asked.
“At this exact moment? In DC marching against capital punishment. Placards outside the White House and all.”