LITMIR.BIZ

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retainer.”

      “For what? A slip-and-fall? Workman’s comp case?”

      Both were a P.I.’s bread and butter. Insurers and attorneys hired investigators to expose phony personal-injury claims and employees pocketing compensation pay for job-related accidents. It was astonishing and pretty sad how often paid leaves for, say, a ruptured disc inspired a claimant’s urge to reshingle his house.

      Jack said, “Abramson mentioned taking a hit from a string of residential burglaries.” He stifled an impulse to check the time. Belle, of course, wasn’t wearing a watch. “So, how’s life treating you?”

      Meaning, Carleton better be treating her well, or Jack would cheerfully break him in half. Too cheerfully, he admitted, but protectiveness fueled it, not jealousy.

      “Just between us, I’m a teensy bit bored. Nothing a baby wouldn’t fix, if my ovaries would cooperate.”

      Belle signaled the server for the tab, then pointed at her plate, requesting a go box for it. “You have no idea how many times I prayed to my crotch to get with it when my period was a little late. Now I’m hollering up there, ‘Swim, boys. Swim.’”

      Jack was supposed to laugh. He said, “I didn’t think you wanted kids.” Pride bit off, With me.

      “Woman’s prerogative. One baby would be okay. Wonderful, actually.” Belle drained her glass and blew out a breath. “Carleton isn’t the paternal type, but I’ll be damned if Abdullah Whatthefuckever will be our sole heir.”

      “Abdu—oh. The dog.”

      “How dare you call a champion afghan hound a dog. The old biddies at Westminster would have your head. So would the harem he’s servicing in Florida.” Belle autographed the credit card chit. “That hairball on stilts is higher maintenance than I am.”

      Jack chuckled. “That’s saying somethin’, kid.”

      Motion outside the window caught his eye. Vaguely attuned to Belle’s continued slander against man’s best friend, Jack leaned over the table, expanding his view of the restaurant’s parking lot.

      The lunch crowd had pretty well winnowed to vacationers as logy as over-the-road truckers who were seventeen hours into a ten-hour day. Jack’s Taurus was baking in the mid-July sun. Belle’s café-au-lait Mercedes coupe was parked a half-dozen rows east and farther from the restaurant’s entrance.

      Here and there, customers prolonged goodbyes, nodding and talking over the roofs of their vehicles. No familiar faces among them—no white-and-Bondo-colored subcompacts in the vicinity.

      Still scanning the lot, Jack said, “You haven’t noticed anybody, um, hanging around outside your house lately, have you? A strange car cruising by, anything like that?”

      When Belle didn’t answer, he looked at her. “Hey, no cause for the big eyes. Just curious, that’s all.”

      Belle extracted a pair of sunglasses from her bag and slipped them on. Swiveling in her chair, she said, “I knew you were in trouble. What is it this time? Another pissed-off husband swinging single? Somebody pink-slipped after your background check?”

      “I’m not in trouble.”

      She pulled down the shades an inch and peered over the frames.

      “I’m not,” Jack insisted, then groaned. “There’s this mope—twenty-something, big as an upright freezer. He tagged me for a job, I turned him down, gave him some excellent career counseling and sent him on his way.”

      Belle’s stare narrowed, but remained as steady as twin-beam halogens. Her fingers waggled, Keep going.

      Jack peeled back his suit coat sleeve for a look at his watch. If he didn’t haul asphalt in three minutes, he’d be late for the appointment with Gerry Abramson. “The kid thought he’d impress me with my own résumé, financials and an activities report.”

      “You mean he tailed you?”

      Jack scowled at her apparent amusement. “If I hadn’t been working a domestic, I’d have spotted his crap-mobile—” he snapped his fingers “—like that.”

      “Uh-huh.” A fingernail clicked a riff on the tabletop. “You think he’s stalking you.”

      “Not really.” Saying it didn’t make it true, but Jack liked the sound of it. “Trust me. He’s about as built for covert surveillance as Sasquatch.”

      Belle pondered a moment. “Then you’re afraid he’ll use info from the dossier on you to stalk me.” It wasn’t a question. And there wasn’t a molecule of fear in her tone.

      “It occurred to me.” Jack stood and held the back of her chair to steady it. The scenery below provoked a mental wolf whistle. Belle McPhee deHaven had an unquestionably fine set of legs, but it was the peek at her cleavage that brought back many a fond memory.

      She and Jack epitomized a couple who should never have parlayed friendship into matrimony. He was damn lucky he’d escaped the latter without destroying the former.

      He walked her out, saying, “Okay, I’ll admit, this dude gave me the heebie-jeebies. You know the type. A schlump, except the eye contact’s too long and a touch too intense.”

      “Does this schlump have a name?”

      “Brett Dean Blankenship.” Taking Belle’s keys, he pressed the fob’s remote button to unlock the Mercedes’s door. “About six-three and four hundred pounds of solid flab. How he packs it into a Chevy Cavalier defies physics.”

      Belle scanned the parking lot, as if daring Moby Dick to surface. “Thanks for the warning.”

      “At most, it’s a heads-up.” He kissed her lightly on the lips. “Sorry I have to run.”

      “I’m used to it.” She flashed a no-insult-intended smile.

      Jack couldn’t tell through her sunglasses, but bet it didn’t reach her eyes. Something was bothering her. He could feel it. “How about meeting me for a drink later? If Abramson’s retainer is over a couple of grand, I’ll even buy.”

      “I wish I could.” Belle sighed as though she meant it. “Carleton and I are meeting some people for dinner at the club.”

      Bars kicked off happy hour at four, but Jack gave her a rain check. “If you, uh, want to shoot the breeze some more, you know the numbers.”

      She nodded and pulled the car door shut.

      By the time Jack reached the Taurus, he decided his imagination was working double overtime. An occupational hazard for a semi-underemployed snoop. Belle’s admitted boredom wasn’t a crisis, even if the rival for your husband’s affections was a trophy dog. And he hadn’t seen Blankenship as much as sensed him.

      He dawdled a moment beside his car to let the blast-furnace heat escape the open door. Belle was right about his being a lousy husband and provider, he thought. But for all the things she’d ripped him for, boredom had never been one of them.

      

      The National Federated Insurers’ office was housed in a remodeled Asian restaurant. The mud-brown exterior and pagoda roof reclad in cedar shakes evoked Jackie Chan Does Sante Fe, but the parking area was large enough for employees, visitors and a bank’s repossessed-vehicles sales lot.

      Jack perused a sweet electric-blue speedboat marooned on its trailer. Babe magnet. Babe-in-a-bikini magnet. He could be the Captain and she, his Tennille. The fantasy shimmied and vanished, like a cartoon genie into a bottle. Babes young enough to wear bikinis probably wouldn’t know the Captain and Tennille from Captain Kangaroo.

      On that depressing note, Jack entered the insurance agency’s reception area and gave his name to the blonde behind the counter. Without missing a beat of her cell phone conversation, she pointed over her shoulder at Gerry Abramson’s private office.

      A double

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