LITMIR.BIZ

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Romney Marsh, right on the Channel. Our cousin Morgan got in touch with him a few months ago about something, and he decided to accept the invitation to come see the place.”

      “Morgan? Yet another handsome guy, right? Nice to know there’s one left for me to romance and then toss away,” Jessica said, toasting Jolie with a can of Coke.

      “Children should be seen and not heard,” Jolie warned her tightly.

      “Sorry, Jessica,” Sam told her. “Morgan’s a girl. Morgan Becket Eastwood. Her branch of the Beckets has been living at Becket Hall since a bunch of the family emigrated to America nearly two hundred years ago. Court and I had a bet going as to how drafty the old pile has to be.”

      “If it’s two hundred years old, it probably has a bunch of ghosts, too,” Jessica said, raising her eyebrows. “I’m surprised you didn’t go with Court. Even if there aren’t ghosts, think of all that moldy old furniture. You’d have been in heaven.”

      “I thought about it, but as it turns out, I’m glad I decided to come home instead,” Sam said, looking at Jolie. “At any rate, I really should go call him. He should know about your father, decide whether or not he wants to cut short his vacation.”

      “Jade won’t thank you for it,” Jolie pointed out. “And Court will go nuclear when he hears what Jade and Jess and I are going to do.”

      “Yes, what you three are going to do,” Sam said, looking across the room to see Jade unloading fat manila file folders on his antique table—after pushing a delicate Sevres porcelain bowl to within a half inch of the edge. He wasn’t a stickler, he really wasn’t. Still…“Jolie? Pretend I’m Jade, issuing orders. Rescue that bowl, find coasters for your glasses in that drawer next to the couch Jade’s sitting on and let me go call Court. I’ll be back in five minutes.”

      Well, that settled it. He was now officially old. And boring. Although he hadn’t been all that old and boring an hour ago, upstairs. Maybe there was hope for him yet…

       Chapter Three

      THEY WERE SITTING around the coffee table, Rockne, having walked in a circle three times in front of the fireplace, now soundly asleep in front of the cold hearth.

      They were not, basically, a jolly group.

      “And that’s it, a thumbnail sketch. Business has been slow, as it usually is around Christmastime, and then it tails off again a little in the summer months.”

      “Maybe all the adulterous spouses are too full of holiday cheer in December, and on vacation in June?” Sam suggested, and Jolie covered a laugh with a cough.

      “We do more than divorce work, Sam,” Jade told him tightly. “Background checks for corporations, for instance. That’s really the bulk of our business. We’ve had nothing new open this past month except, okay, a few run-of-the-mill divorce cases, and they’re already wrapped up except for the paperwork. Nothing out of the ordinary there, unless Teddy was hiding something from me.”

      “Not out of the realm of possibility,” Jessica said, popping a pretzel nugget into her mouth. “If it was a dangerous case, that is. His little girl and all that—oh, stop glaring at me, Jade, you know I’m right.”

      “I know,” Jade said, sighing. “He’s hidden a few things from me before, but I always found out eventually. So we work the case Teddy may have been working when he died—as soon as we figure out what the hell it is. In the meantime, we work these four old cases that have been driving him crazy for years, hoping one of them may be the right case and lead us to the true killer. He had all four cases out on the desk in his bedroom, so I know he was checking into them again. As I said, it’s been a slow month.”

      Jade looked all business, as she always did, Jolie thought, watching as her sister straightened the pile of manila folders, unaware of the picture she made in the afternoon sunlight streaming in through the French doors. She was really pretty—elegant actually. The one who most favored their mother in appearance.

      Although Jade had never played up her good looks. She wore her light brown hair straight and long from a center part. Her hair was naturally streaked with gold, because Jade would consider hours spent in a stylist’s chair, her hair separated and wrapped in tinfoil, to be a total waste of valuable time. At least she wore black mascara on her lashes, highlighting her sherry-brown eyes, and she occasionally remembered to tint her wide, full lips a soft apricot.

      And Jessica was wrong. Mother Nature hadn’t overlooked putting Jade through puberty; she’d just employed defter strokes, so that Jade was slim, slightly curved, not voluptuous.

      Again, like their mother. Maybe that’s why Jade had never played up her looks. For Teddy. Because seeing her might then bring back the pain of his wife’s defection. Was that the reason? Was that why Jade stayed, worked with Teddy in the agency? Did her big sister still long to go to medical school, as she’d talked about years ago, in junior high school—before their mother left?

      That was a hell of a depressing thought on a generally depressing day. Jolie wondered if she might run it past Court the next time she saw him. A self-sacrificing Jade might explain a lot of things to her ex-husband.

      Jolie shook herself back to attention when, after having remained silent for several minutes as Jade stated her case, Sam finally spoke. “You’re kidding, right? You three can’t really, seriously be considering playing at private detectives.”

      “Playing? Jade has a license,” Jolie pointed out, wishing he didn’t sound so incredulous and she didn’t sound so defensive.

      “Yeah,” Jessica added as she popped another pretzel nugget into her mouth. “Go ahead, Jade, whip it out, show Sam that big bad boy.”

      Jolie covered another involuntary smile with her hand, wondering if it might be possible to muzzle her baby sister. But Jessica got away with outrageous statements. Maybe it was the blond hair. Maybe it was the innocent tilt of the head and the fairly bemused look. Maybe it was all a carefully orchestrated act…

      “All right, Jolie. So Jade has a license. And yippee for her,” Sam all but barked, getting to his feet and heading for the wall of Chinese cases that served as a concealed wet bar. “However,” he said, turning his back to them, “you do not have a license or any training, Jolie, and neither does Jessica. It’s a bad idea. A really bad idea.” He opened the doors, pulled out the stopper of a crystal decanter almost as if he planned to drink some of its contents without wasting time looking for a glass before plunking the decanter down on the bar and facing them once more. “A really, really bad idea.”

      Jessica looked at Jolie. “Funny. I always used to like him. Oh, Sam-u-el—I’m a journalist, remember? An investigative journalist? And Jolie’s a…um…Jolie, you want to help me out here?”

      “I’m a quick study,” Jolie gritted out from between her clenched teeth as Sam rejoined them.

      “And now yippee for you,” Sam said tightly. “But in the real world, sweetheart, the bad guys don’t use blanks.”

      “Nobody’s getting shot at,” Jolie protested, thinking it might be time she headed for the wine decanter herself. “Why are you always such a pessimist? No, Rockne, lie down, sweetie. You can bite him later.”

      “A pessimist? You want to enlarge on that, Jolie?”

      She closed her eyes, took a steadying breath. Now was no time to remind him that he’d said only one of every ten thousand hopefuls who flock to Hollywood in any given year ever end up with even a small part in a movie. “Never mind. Jade, let’s hear about thecases.Youknowyou’redying to tell us.”

      “No. Don’t do that, Jade. You’re not going forward with this, so we don’t need to hear about any old cases,” Sam said quickly. “Look, I know the three of you are devastated by what’s happened. I would be, as well. I mean it. It’s a tough pill to swallow—that Teddy would ever hurt anyone or that he’d kill himself. But you

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