LITMIR.BIZ

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      “I think,” she said, “I’d rather run into a nice friendly ghost than this gal we’re going to interview.”

      He gave her a warning look. “You be nice now. You hear me?”

      “Su-u-re,” she said with a nasty little grin. “Aren’t I always?”

      Chapter 3

      Dirk drove along the gravel road and stopped just before the gate. He rolled down his window and pushed the call button on the security box.

      Moments later, a female voice with a distinct Spanish accent answered. “Hardin residence. May I help you?”

      “Hardin?” Dirk said.

      “I think that’s the español pronunciation of Jardin,” Savannah whispered.

      “May I help you?” the speaker box asked again.

      “Yeah. Detective Sergeant Dirk Coulter with the San Carmelita Police Department here. Ms. Jardin is expecting me. Let me in.”

      It was a while longer—quite a while longer—before the gate finally swung open.

      “That was deliberate,” Dirk grumbled as he spun gravel, shooting through. “Keeping me waiting like that…just out of spite…yanking my chain…messin’ with me.”

      “You were snippy with her. I keep telling you,” she said, “you’ll catch more flies with sugar then vinegar.”

      “Yeah, well, who needs more friggen flies?”

      “Good point.”

      The Buick’s tires crunched through the gravel as they drove down the long road, through dark clusters of oaks, past groves of avocado, orange, and lemon trees. On either side of the road stood ancient barns, dilapidated outbuildings, and rusting, abandoned farm equipment—all somehow picturesque in their decay, reminding visitors that this had once been a thriving, working ranch.

      Ahead, they could see a long, white wall, glowing in the moonlight. And as they drove nearer, they could tell that it was a walled-in enclosure, like a small fortress. The tiled roof of the hacienda was just visible on the far side.

      In the center of the wall was an arched entry with a wrought-iron gate and above the gate hung a large bell.

      “Wow,” Savannah said. “This is the real thing. You can just tell by looking at that wall it’s been here forever. Back before California was even a state. It’s probably not that different from when this was a great rancho and Don Rodriguez was the lord of it all.”

      “Eh, so what. The chain-link fence around my trailer park’s been there since Eisenhower.”

      “Gee, I didn’t know that,” Savannah replied dryly, her bubble popped. “I’ll have to look at it with renewed respect the next time you invite me over for a hot dog and a beer.”

      Several vehicles were parked near the gate, so Dirk pulled the Buick beside them and killed the engine.

      “Are you ready to meet the Queen of Physical Fitness?” he asked as they got out of the car.

      “More like the Mistress of Meanness. I’m not going to pretend that I like her, you know. Southern belle or not, I’m getting too old for that crap.”

      “The crap of acting civil to jerks?”

      “Exactly.”

      “Hell, I stopped doing that years ago. In fact, I don’t think I ever did it.”

      “Yeah, well, men are smarter than women in that way.”

      He stopped in mid-stride and stared at her. “I never thought I’d hear you admit that men are superior to women.”

      She sniffed. “Get real, buddy, and clean out your ears. That ain’t even close to what I said. Men…they’re deafer than fence posts.”

      Dirk tested the bell gate and found it open. He pushed it and stood aside for Savannah to enter first.

      As she brushed by him, felt his body warmth, and smelled his predictable Old Spice shave lotion, she couldn’t help feeling a surge of affection for him. You had to love a guy who always opened every door and let you go through first—unless there was a possible perp with a gun on the other side. And, in that case, he insisted on being first.

      You just had to love him…faded Harley-Davidson T-shirt, battered bomber jacket, and all.

      But she forgot about Dirk’s attire and gallant ways the moment she stepped through the gate and into the courtyard.

      She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting here on Clarissa Jardin’s property. Maybe exercise equipment? Implements of torture? At least, beds of prickly cacti and roses with all thorns and no blossoms?

      But the moonlight and a few carefully placed blue accent lights illuminated a virtual fairyland. It was a lush garden, planted with every romantic flower, shrub, and herb imaginable. Hollyhocks, delphinium, foxglove, and rosebushes lined the whitewashed walls of the enclosure. Carnations, asters, peonies, nasturtiums, and geraniums grew in profusion along a rock walkway that wove through the courtyard, toward the house at the far end.

      The place looked more like an English garden than a California yard. Lemon blossoms and star jasmine scented the moist night air.

      Savannah could easily picture Don Rodriguez with his wife, children, and servants, living a gracious life in a simpler time here in this place. And with the help of the silvery moonlight, she could easily imagine that their ghosts remained, reluctant to leave this tranquil setting.

      In the center of it all stood a giant pavilion with elegant, comfortable wicker furniture that provided a seating area fit for any rancho lord and lady and their fortunate guests.

      Savannah couldn’t help envying anyone who could bring a morning cup of coffee or an evening glass of wine out to this paradise and spend an hour soaking in the solace of it all, relaxing with their thoughts or a good book.

      “Nice,” she said. “Very nice.”

      “Eh, your backyard is just as good,” he replied.

      “Yeah, sure. How can you even say that? My folding lawn chairs compared to that gorgeous wicker?”

      “Your yard has your lemonade. Your yard has you in it.”

      She gave Dirk a sideways glance, a bit surprised. Dirk was getting mushy in his old age.

      “And your beer is the coldest in town…and free.”

      Okay, some things never change, she thought.

      Ahead of them, at the end of the rock walkway, on the side of the courtyard opposite the bell gate, was the house. Savannah had been expecting something larger, having heard all about the land baron who had built it.

      It was a long building, two stories high, built in the Monterey style with a Spanish tiled roof, white adobe walls, and a railed balcony that stretched across the upper level, from one end to the other.

      The windows glowed with golden light that spilled out in patches onto the garden flowers. And through one of the windows, they saw a couple of figures moving, walking back and forth, in what looked like a dining room.

      Both the upper and lower stories of the house had several doors each, as though the rooms were situated end to end and each had its own outside door.

      “Looks sorta like the Blue Moon,” Dirk said, referring to San Carmelita’s most notorious no-tell motel.

      “I guess architecture is a little different now than it was back when guys rode horses and ladies wore corsets and petticoats.”

      He shot her a mischievous look. “What? You don’t wear corsets?”

      “Only in your dreams.”

      They walked up to the door in the center of the house,

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