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      To Michael, for always.

       Chapter One

      Harte Delancey always felt like such a wimpy kid around his older brothers—probably because that’s how they treated him.

      He looked up from the grill where steaks were sizzling. Lucas and Ethan were tossing long spiraling passes to each other in the football-field-sized backyard of their parents’ Chef Voleur home. If Travis were here instead of overseas somewhere, he’d be out there too.

      Harte preferred more solitary forms of exercise—running, backpacking and biking. He chuckled wryly and flipped the steaks as Lucas made a spectacular leap and snagged the football out of the air.

      “Steaks ready in five,” he called out as his mom brought a big bowl of her famous buttermilk ranch potato salad from the outdoor kitchen to the already laden table. Lucas’s wife, Angela, followed her carrying a massive casserole of baked beans.

      “Everything looks great,” Harte said.

      “I hope so,” Betty Carole Delancey said in her self-deprecating way. “The tomatoes don’t look very good.”

      He eyed the plump, bright red slices with amusement. “If they were any better, the Times-Picayune would be on the story. What do you think, Dad?” he asked his father, Robert, who sat in his wheelchair watching Lucas and Ethan.

      Harte’s dad turned his head slightly. “Everything good,” he said haltingly. It had been fourteen years since the massive stroke had left him partially paralyzed and unable to speak. With his wife’s help, he’d relearned how to talk.

      Lucas and Ethan washed up at the sink, arguing about who had the more accurate throwing arm. Then Lucas kissed Angela on the cheek before sitting down beside her. Ethan grabbed the chair opposite the two of them.

      Harte took the last T-bone off the grill and set the platter down in the middle of the table. He sat between Lucas and their mother.

      “Want to play a game of three-team touch later, Mr. Prosecutor?” Lucas asked as he tousled Harte’s hair. Harte ducked but not in time. “Or should I call you Monsieur Chef?” he mused, stabbing a steak with his fork and holding it up for inspection.

      “After you eat all that and can’t move? Sure.” Harte was used to Lucas ribbing him about his choice of career and his cooking.

      Lucas was a detective with the New Orleans Police Department, as was Ethan, and Travis, an Army Special Forces operative, was stationed overseas. It was a sore spot with all three of them that their youngest brother had broken tradition and studied law.

      As if reading his thoughts, his mom said, “I was hoping we’d hear something from Travis this week.”

      “What’s it been—six months since you last spoke with him?” Ethan asked, then washed a bite of steak down with iced tea.

      “September,” his dad said.

      “That’s right, darling,” his mom said as she cut his steak into bite-sized pieces for her husband. “It’s been seven months.”

      Harte saw Lucas and Ethan exchange a glance. He knew what they were thinking. It chafed them that their mother was so solicitous and gentle with her husband. Neither one—especially Lucas—had ever forgiven their dad for his drunken rages and punishing fists. It didn’t matter to them that Robert’s stroke had rendered him a docile wraith of his former self.

      At that moment, the patio door opened. It was Cara Lynn, smiling and dressed in a casual floral dress that sported all the pastel colors of spring. Not that the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana ever saw spring … or fall for that matter. The weather was generally either hot and humid or chilly and wet.

      Still, the sun seemed to shine brighter when their only sister and Harte’s closest sibling was around.

      “What a gorgeous day to have dinner outside,” she said as she rounded the table, giving everyone a quick kiss, then sat.

      “Nice of you to grace us with your presence,” Ethan said, cutting into his steak.

      Cara Lynn made a face at him. “I’m showing twelve pieces at the New Orleans Fiber Arts Show in just over a month,” she said, “and I’ve got finish work to do on five of them. You probably won’t see me again until after the show.”

      Harte’s mother sighed as she set two loaves of French bread on the table. “That’s why I try to have these dinners as often as possible. Everyone’s so busy these days.”

      “Speaking of which,” Harte said, “the court date in the Freeman Canto murder case has been moved up. The judge will hear opening arguments on Tuesday.”

      “Tuesday?” Lucas said. “Five days from now? That seems sudden. Didn’t you just take over the case a couple of months ago?”

      “And they were talking about putting it on the docket for June. But now defense counsel Felix Drury has to have open-heart surgery, and the judge didn’t want to put

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