LITMIR.BIZ

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had already completed his daily three-mile run, showered and was looking forward to breakfast. Ramón wasn’t much of a cook, but he could put together a hell of an omelet. Since he watched his diet carefully, he ate a light lunch and dinner was most often a steak and fresh vegetables at the Big Tex Steak House two blocks from his house.

      With a flick of his thumb, he scrolled through messages on his cell phone while eating, replying to those that required a response, deleting a bunch of spam. The three days he’d spent in Acapulco with his brother had put him behind schedule, but now that he was back in Houston, it was time to get on track and back to work.

      After he finished reading and responding to his e-mails he shifted his focus to the workday ahead. He had two commercial estimates to prepare, a whole-house installation to inspect and equipment to pick up at the electrical supply house. But before he did any of that he wanted to drop by the assisted living center and say hello to his dad.

      While plotting his day, his cell phone rang and he quickly recognized Lori’s name and number.

      “Vida-Shield Security,” he said, using his business greeting and tamping down his excitement over the fact that she was calling.

      “Ramón Vidal, please,” Lori said.

      “This is Ramón.”

      “Oh, great. This is Lori Myles…from the airplane. Remember me?”

      “Of course. How could I forget?” Ramón responded, intentionally lowering his voice in an attempt to sound relaxed and calm. “Glad you called. Wasn’t sure you would.”

      “Well, before you get too excited…I have to tell you, this is not a social call. I need your help.”

      Ramón squinted at the sliding-glass door leading onto his patio, where hanging baskets of ivy and ferns created a lush, quiet retreat. He considered her remark and decided that it was better to be needed than ignored. At least she’d turned to him. “Okay…shoot. What can I do for you?” he offered as casually as possible, thrilled that she wanted his input on whatever was on her mind.

      “I’m not sure where to start. I’m still so angry I can hardly talk about what happened.”

      Ramón’s initial pleasure at hearing from Lori quickly shifted to alarm. She sounded so intense. So frightened. And so different from when they’d chatted on the plane. Something terrible must have happened. “What’s going on?” he asked, listening as she described the scene that greeted her when she arrived home. He got up from the table and began to pace his kitchen, frowning at the floor, disturbed by what she was telling him.

      “All right. I know you’re upset, but try to calm down,” he encouraged, sensing how nervous she was. During the flight to Houston, she had been the epitome of calm, a poised professional woman who was totally in control of her emotions, but now she was rattling on in a nervous sputter that sent off bells of alarm. “Are you okay?” he wanted to know when she finally paused to catch her breath.

      “I’m fine,” Lori assured Ramón.

      “Where’d you sleep last night?”

      “Next door…at my neighbor’s house.”

      “Good. How do you feel today?”

      “Shaken up and mad as hell. I don’t understand why my burglar alarm didn’t alert the police when the vandals broke in.”

      “Do you have a wireless alarm?” Ramón inquired.

      “Yes, I think so,” Lori replied.

      “That means your keypad, circuit board, backup battery and siren were most likely all in one unit,” Ramón added.

      “Yeah, probably so. It came with the house, so I never paid much attention to what kind of system I had,” Lori said.

      “Well, the burglars could have completely disabled your unit before it had time to send a signal to the police.”

      “Really?”

      “Yeah,” Ramón confirmed. “Happens all the time.”

      “The detective who came out to take the report was nice,” Lori added. “But he wasn’t very encouraging. He said there’ve been a few incidents like mine since school let out. Local kids who are bored, he thinks.”

      “Yeah, sounds like that,” Ramón agreed. “But that doesn’t make them any less dangerous than hard-core criminals. If I were you, I’d take this seriously.”

      “I plan to. That’s why I called. The vandals destroyed my system. Smashed the control box and stripped all the wires. Think you can you fix it?”

      “I can try, but if you have an all-in-one unit, I’d replace it. They’re extremely vulnerable and create a false sense of security. What you need is a hardwired cellular system that communicates an alarm signal in less than thirty seconds. Let me take a look at what you have and we can go from there. I can come over this morning, if you want,” Ramón offered, surprised by how easily he was agreeing to rearrange his schedule and how much he already cared about Lori.

      “Would you?” Lori asked.

      “Of course.”

      “Great. The crime scene investigators were here at daybreak. They got what they needed and left. Now I need to find someone to deal with all this paint,” she went on, voice raw with indecision. “This mess is gonna require a lot more than a mop and a broom. Paint is everywhere. My mirrors are shattered. The carpet is ruined. I can’t…I don’t…”

      When Lori’s voice cracked and the phone went silent, Ramón flinched, stung by Lori’s frustration, as well as her shock over what had happened. He’d been in the home security business long enough to sense how she was feeling right now. She was hurt, stunned and confused about what to do.

      “First thing you need to do is call your insurance company,” he offered.

      “I did. They’re sending someone out today,” Lori said.

      “Good. I can give you the name of a restoration company I’ve used. They do a good job and accept whatever insurance pays.”

      “That would help a lot,” Lori replied, clearly relieved.

      “Be sure to take pictures before the cleaning service deals with the paint, too,” he added.

      Having been inside vandalized homes more than a few times, Ramón could visualize the scene: precious treasures trashed, carefully appointed décor ruined. In an instant, everything that had once been clean and shiny was now dirty and ugly, sullied by an intruder’s touch. The emotional toll that such an incident took could be very heavy.

      “Okay, I’ll bring some plywood to board up your broken window,” he told Lori, wanting to do whatever he could to ease her anxiety. No way was he going to let her go through this alone.

      “What’s your address?” he asked, grabbing a pen to scribble the street name and number on the back of a dry-cleaning receipt as he calculated how far away she lived. “Hold it together, okay? I’ve got a quick stop to make and then I’ll call you when I’m nearby.”

      Tomás Vidal wiped a tear from his eye and then looked at Ramón, who was seated beside him in the recreation room of the assisted living center. “What a wonderful thing to witness,” Tomás whispered in a quiet tone. “My boy is now a federal judge. Amazing, but not surprising. He worked hard to make it, you know? I remember when your mother and I left Mexico and came to Texas. Xavier was just a boy. And now he’s a big-shot judge. I only wish your mother could have lived to see this day.”

      Ramón closed the DVD player they had been viewing, set it on the coffee table and looked at his father, his mind suddenly turning back to the days they had spent together deep-sea fishing in the Gulf. Setting out before dawn, looking forward to a day at sea and a huge catch to bring home had been wonderful. But those days were gone forever. Never again would he go fishing with his father, whose health was deteriorating

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