LITMIR.BIZ

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no.”

      Kane shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “She’s Ryan Armstrong’s aunt.”

      Derek dropped his beer but caught it before it hit the deck. “The kid from the huge murder trial?”

      Josh felt like whipping his bottle into the ocean. Now Deana was ruining his good mood without even being near him. “She thinks Ryan isn’t guilty.”

      Kane shook his head. “Now there’s a surprise.”

      Josh understood the skepticism. He tried to remember a time when he arrested someone who didn’t claim innocence. Even with drugs in hand they’d be screaming about a frame-up.

      Ryan had been the same way two years earlier when he had gotten in trouble. Drugs that time. He had insisted he was in the wrong place when a sting went down and nothing more. His family believed him until the drug tests came back positive. The family used their connections and wealth to get Ryan out of the legal system and into a rehab program. They managed to keep Ryan’s name out of the paper and make sure he never took an ounce of responsibility for his actions.

      Eight months later the kid’s parents were dead.

      Josh decided to tell Kane about Deana’s plans. “She wants me to get Ryan out of jail.”

      This time Derek set his bottle down on the porch nice and slow. “Didn’t you arrest the kid a few years ago as part of some private school drug ring?”

      “Yeah.”

      Derek glanced at Kane and then back to Josh before trying again. “And didn’t you testify against him at his recent murder trial?”

      “Yeah.”

      “Let me skip to the end of this discussion,” Kane said. “Why does Deana think you’re the guy for this job?”

      To Josh the real question was why they were still talking about Deana Armstrong and her ridiculous proposal. “With my connections she believes I’m the one who can fix this.”

      Kane whistled. “Guess she hasn’t heard you’re out of the hero business.”

      “Exactly.” Josh snapped his fingers a few times, then pointed at Kane. “About time someone believed me.”

      “I don’t. I’m just repeating the crap you told me this morning.” Kane held out a small card. “But I’ll let you be the one to tell Ms. Armstrong all about your new career plans.”

      Josh stared at the paper but did not pick it up. “What the hell is this?”

      Kane’s face lit up with amusement. “A social card.”

      “A what? Let me see.” Derek grabbed it. Studied it. Flipped it over. “It has her name and phone number and that’s it.”

      “A calling card. Unbelievable.” But it wasn’t. If there was something out there that reeked of money, Josh knew Deana would own it.

      “She’s expecting you tomorrow.” Kane mumbled that important piece of information between long swallows of beer.

      Josh heard him just fine. “What the hell are you talking about now?”

      “Since you quit your job—yeah, I know about that, you dumbass—I figured you’d need something to do.”

      “You left the DEA?” Derek asked.

      Josh talked over both of them. “I’m not investigating this kid’s case.”

      Kane shrugged. “Don’t tell me. Tell her.”

      “I did.”

      “Try again.”

      Chapter Four

      Josh eased back into a chair that proved to be as uncomfortable as it looked. It was wooden, with one thin cushion against the back—he guessed the damn thing cost more than his condo. Since it shook a bit under his weight, he tried not to move as he waited for the small Asian woman who answered the door to go find Deana.

      Yeah, she had a maid. With all of Deana’s money, Josh didn’t know why that little fact surprised him, but it did. For some reason he missed that in his background check on her. She was not the only one who liked to poke around in other people’s business. He could play that game, too. Did it all the time.

      From what he could tell, she left her property on rare occasions to attend charity events and a few social get-togethers. Otherwise she kept to herself and close to home. Seeing her place he understood why. Quiet and far from tourists and the hotels in Waikiki, her open-floor-plan, one-story house sat along Lanikai, long considered one of the best beaches in Hawaii. Possibly the world.

      The area served as a private must-visit spot for presidents and movie stars. The stretch of sand was located on the windward or eastern side of the island of Oahu in the town of Kailua. About fifteen minutes and definitely a world of wealth away from the town where Derek lived. With pure blue water clear enough to see to the sandy bottom, soft trade winds, and surrounding palm trees, the spot looked like a Hollywood creation—too good to be true.

      The inside of the house was as magazine-worthy as the outside. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the ocean and the two small uninhabited islands about a mile offshore. Beige couches were arranged in a large, high-ceilinged room to take advantage of the view. Glass shelves filled with expensive looking vases and various small crystal things filled the walls and kept him right where he was in the wobbly chair.

      If he knocked anything over he’d be paying her back for years. And owing Deana anything was out of the question.

      “Thank you for coming,” Deana said from behind him.

      She didn’t need to speak. Even without the clicking of her heels against the koa wood floor and the sound of her deep voice, he knew she had walked in the room. Something about her set off a mental alarm in his brain. She came within ten feet and his insides switched to high alert.

      He got up long enough to be polite before returning to the impractical chair. “Not as if I had much of a choice.”

      “You’re prone to exaggeration.”

      “Not usually.”

      She sank into the only other chair in the room. It was one identical to his, but she looked completely right in the expensive seat. “Well, I find it hard to believe you felt threatened by me.”

      He noted she wore an outfit similar to the one from the courthouse a few days earlier. She could have walked out of a Northeastern prep school. High collar with a cardigan. The only difference was the pair of dress pants instead of the skirt, which was a damn shame because the woman had a decent pair of legs on her.

      “Guess you think eighty-two degrees is chilly.” As far as he was concerned, she was lucky he was wearing pants instead of shorts as he wanted to do.

      “Excuse me?”

      “The shrinking violet routine doesn’t suit you, by the way. Don’t forget, I’m the guy you tried to have fired a few years back.”

      She had the grace to wince. “That’s in the past.”

      Easy for her to say. “And the command performance this afternoon is our present.”

      “Remember how I said you had a problem with exaggerating?”

      “Nice place, by the way,” he said in what likely was the biggest understatement of his life. He tried to look around and almost tipped the chair over.

      A smile skimmed Deana’s lips. “You don’t look very comfortable.”

      Probably because he was folded in a pretzel and afraid of shifting an inch in any direction. “Your maid showed me in and pointed to this.”

      “She’s not a maid, and you can sit on one of the sofas.” Her gaze traveled all over him. “You look a little…tight there.”

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