Kitabı oku: «Lust, Loathing And A Little Lip Gloss»

Praise for the Sophie Katz novels of
KYRA DAVIS

SEX, MURDER AND A DOUBLE LATTE

“Part romantic comedy and part mystery, with witty dialogue and enjoyable characters…the perfect summer read.”

—The Oregonian

“A thoroughly readable romp.”

—Publishers Weekly

“A terrific mystery. Kyra Davis comes up with the right mix of snappy and spine-tingling, and throws in a hot Russian mystery man, too.”

—Detroit Free Press

PASSION, BETRAYAL AND KILLER HIGHLIGHTS

“A witty and engaging blend of chick lit, pop culture, and amateur-sleuth whodunit [that] will appeal not only to female readers but to any mystery fan who has an offbeat sense of humor…. Laugh-out-loud funny.”

—Barnes & Noble

“Davis spins a tale full of unexpected turns and fun humor.”

—Romantic Times BOOKreviews

OBSESSION, DECEIT AND REALLY DARK CHOCOLATE

“Wry sociopolitical commentary, the playful romantic negotiations between Anatoly and Sophie and plenty of Starbucks coffee keep this steamy series chugging along.”

—Publishers Weekly

KYRA DAVIS
LUST, LOATHING AND A LITTLE LIP GLOSS

This book is for my son,

who has taught me more than I thought it was possible to learn.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 26

CHAPTER 27

PROLOGUE

I DIDN’T ALWAYS BELIEVE IN GHOSTS. MY SKEPTICISM WAS BASED ON MY religious and philosophical beliefs. I believe that there are only three things that we can count on to make this world bearable: good friends, a loving family (even when they’re as crazy as mine) and certain mood-altering substances, mainly caffeine and vodka. I also believe that God is good. So why would a good God force the souls of the dead to stick around in a world where they can no longer talk to their friends, be comforted by their families or drink espressotinis? That just doesn’t seem right.

But now I’m beginning to question myself. What if the souls of the dead don’t need to exchange words with those they love in order to be comforted? What if ghosts have access to better drugs, ones that don’t lead to insomnia or hangovers? And ghosts don’t have to deal with mortgage payments. Perhaps heaven is free quality housing.

Then again maybe good people get to move to a more celestial address and it’s only the bad people who become ghosts. Is it possible that it’s the souls of the evil that are forced to stay here, doomed to an eternity of loneliness?

If that’s true then I have a problem because I think the house I just bought might be haunted. That’s what I get for making a deal with the devil, aka my ex-husband, Scott Colvin. He’s the Realtor who sold me my beautiful San Francisco Victorian.

But whether this place is haunted or not, I’m not leaving. I love my house. It has oak floors, crown moldings and, most importantly, two-car parking. This is my home now and I’m willing to fight to the death to keep it.

Unfortunately, I think it might come down to that.

1

There are men worth dying for and others who really just need to die.

—The Lighter Side of Death

WHEN OUR MARRIAGE ENDED TEN YEARS AGO, I FIGURED THAT WAS IT. I would never see Scott Colvin again. I certainly didn’t expect him to be at the open house for this Marina District $1.4-million fixer-upper. But there he was, standing right in the middle of the living room, making it impossible for me to concentrate on the water-stained ceiling or broken light fixture. His body was angled away, so I could only make out a partial profile, but I had no doubt about his identity; that was Scott and the very sight of him brought on a slew of conflicting emotions. One of them was hope. Hope that someone had secretly dropped acid in my Frappuccino and that the thing that looked like Scott was nothing more than a messed-up hallucination.

I had taken hallucinogenics once before, during my freshman year in college. Perhaps if I hadn’t allowed a magic mushroom to trample all over my brain cells I might have had the presence of mind not to get married at nineteen. Fortunately my brain cells were working again by my twenty-first birthday and I celebrated their recovery by getting a divorce.

But this moment didn’t have the feel of a hallucination. The Frappuccino in my hand tasted real. The hopelessly out-of-date faux-wood paneling looked real. The mildew on the windows smelled real. And Scott looked like a real real-estate agent trying to convince a real middle-aged Japanese couple that the house we were all here to see really wasn’t contaminated with asbestos. People on drugs see diamonds in the sky and riders on the storm; they don’t see real-estate agents and overpriced four-bedroom houses that need new flooring. That meant that what I was hearing, seeing and smelling was all horribly real.

But the good news was that he hadn’t seen me yet. I pivoted and tried to lift my wedge heel off the floor so I could quietly tiptoe out.

“Are my eyes deceiving me or is that the beautiful and talented Sophie Katz?”

Shit! I turned around again and was confronted by Scott’s teasing smile. “What do you know, it is you!” he continued. The Japanese couple was now climbing the creaking staircase to check out the second floor. “Of all the open houses in the world you had to walk into mine.”

I grimaced and made a sweeping gesture with my hand. “You’re the agent representing this mess?”

“Apparently you didn’t read the ad I ran in the paper.” He handed me a promotional flyer detailing the house’s few saving graces. “It’s not a mess, it’s an opportunity.”

I almost smiled. Almost. “Save your BS for the couple upstairs. I’m out of here.”

Once again I turned to leave, but Scott quickly jogged in front of me so that I had to stop to keep myself from slamming into his chest. “Sophie, we haven’t seen each other in over ten years. You can’t still be angry at me.”

“I’m pretty sure I can be.”

“Nah, you just think you are.” Scott’s hazel eyes were twinkling with mischief. That’s usually what they did when they weren’t red from getting stoned. “You’re really mad at the old Scott. The kid you were married to. But we’re both grown-ups now, old enough to understand the value of forgiveness. Remember, grudges always have a greater effect on the lives of those who carry them than on the lives of those they’re carried against.”

“Wow, that’s pretty deep, Scott,” I said solemnly. “So let me think about this. During the time that I’ve been holding this grudge, I’ve become an internationally published bestselling author. I have wonderful friends. My family is healthy and reasonably happy. I have a fantastic cat and a boyfriend whom I adore. I’d say this grudge is working pretty well for me. I think I’ll keep it.”

“Don’t you want to know why I’ve been calling you?”

After ten years of no contact, Scott had, as of five months ago, taken to calling me every few weeks and leaving messages on my answering machine. Of course I wanted to know why, but I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of admitting to my curiosity. Instead I shrugged and retorted, “Don’t you want to know why I haven’t been returning those calls?”

He chuckled, apparently finding humor in my irritation. “I think the answer to your question is a lot more obvious than the answer to mine,” he said.

I hesitated a moment and studied the countenance of this new “grown-up Scott.” He had the beginnings of crow’s-feet, but other than that he looked exactly the same. He had the same blond wavy hair that was always a little mussed, and of course he still had one dimple in his left cheek and that golden skin tone that suggested he spent his days surfing off China Beach. Once upon a time I had thought that his looks were the perfect complement to my darker, more exotic appearance. My father was black and my mother has the fair complexion common to her Eastern European Jewish ancestry. People were always confused and delighted by my ethnicity. They usually don’t know exactly “what” I am yet they find my very existence to be a sign of hope for the improvement of race relations everywhere. However, the attention I get now is a pittance compared to the attention I got when I was with Scott. Together we were a walking Benetton ad. Of course I get a certain amount of attention when I go out with my current fair-skinned, Russian-born boyfriend, Anatoly Darinsky. But our differences are less visually dramatic thanks to Anatoly’s dark hair and brown eyes.

“I got your latest book, The Lighter Side of Death. It’s good.” He inched a little closer. “I’ve also been reading about you in the papers. Sounds like you’ve become quite the amateur sleuth. According to the Chronicle you apprehended your own stalker, you helped figure out who killed your brother-in-law, and you even had a hand in bringing down the guy who killed that political aide in Contra Costa County.” He gave me an approving once-over. “Sounds like you’ve turned into a real-life Charlie’s Angel. Of course, you’ve always been an angel in my eyes….”

“Ugh.” I wrinkled my nose in disgust. “I think I’ve just been slimed. I’m going now.”

I started to walk around him, but Scott quickly sidestepped in front of me. “What if I told you that I had a brand-new listing for a recently renovated Ashbury Heights three-bedroom Victorian.”

I hesitated. “How recently renovated?”

“Five years ago.”

Only five years ago? Not bad. “Floors?”

“Hardwood. The owner has a thing for Persian rugs so the floors have been covered and protected.”

“Seriously?” I was still focused on the door, but my feet didn’t follow my gaze. “Okay, I’ll bite. Who’s the owner, and why is he selling?”

“The owner’s name is Oscar Crammer, and he’s selling because he thinks the place is haunted.”

“Why’s that?” I asked. “Was anyone ever murdered in the house? Because if it’s a site of a recent homicide it should be selling for at least ten thousand below market.”

“Sophie, the owner’s only asking for $980,000.”

I broke out in a full laugh. “Yeah, right, a renovated, three-bedroom Ashbury Heights Victorian selling for under a million? Tell me, Scott, does it come with its own leprechaun, too?”

“I know it doesn’t sound possible, but it’s true.” He hesitated before adding, “I think the guy selling may have the beginnings of Alzheimer’s.”

“You want me to take advantage of some guy with Alzheimer’s?” I snapped.

“It has a two-car garage, Sophie.”

My heart skipped a beat, but my sense of morality would not allow me to be tempted by this alluringly wicked proposal. “I won’t scam a sick man, Scott. Not even for parking.”

“Oscar’s old money. He’s got at least ten to twenty million in the bank and his son, Kane, has made millions more in the stock market. He sold off his investments in 2007, before the Dow got squirrelly. Plus I know for a fact that Kane has been trying to get Oscar to sell the house and move into a retirement home ever since the old man became a widower. So by buying this place you’d be doing everybody a favor.”

I turned all of this info over in my mind. It still wasn’t ethical to take advantage of an old man with a possibly fatal illness but…it had a two-car garage!

The Japanese couple came down the stairs and headed into the kitchen just as an Armani-clad gentleman stepped into the entryway. Scott smiled at the latter and nodded at the former before leaning in a little closer and whispering, “I just got the listing this morning. If you want to be the first to see it we could meet there at eight-thirty tonight.”

“Eight-thirty?” I asked in a voice much louder than his. “What kind of real-estate agent shows houses at eight-thirty at night?”

“One who is trying to get his ex-wife to give up an outdated grudge,” Scott said. “Tomorrow I have to tell all my other clients about this, and at that price you know they’re going to descend upon it like a bunch of hungry hyenas. But since I do kinda owe you…”

“You kinda owe me?” I parroted. “While we were married you spent my entire inheritance on gambling, alcohol and the various sluts you were screwing. You more than kinda owe me.”

“I’ll show it to you before anyone else,” Scott continued, ignoring my brief tirade. “If you’re the first to make an offer the old man might take it before a bidding war has a chance to break out. The guy is motivated with a capital M.”

I chewed on my lower lip and glanced at the Armani guy who was now knocking on one of the walls—probably testing to see if it could withstand the impact. This is what $1.4 million could buy you in San Francisco. I had written six New York Times bestselling novels and yet I could barely afford to buy this moldy rat hole with a view. With that in mind how could I not take Scott up on this once-in-a-lifetime offer?

Another couple walked in and Scott flashed them one of his most charming smiles while whispering through his teeth, “So, we on for tonight or not?”

I squeezed my eyes closed and forced myself to make the only rational decision available to me. “We’re on. Give me the address and I’ll be there at eight-thirty.”

I drove my Audi through the residential streets of Ashbury Heights. Victorian after Victorian blurred into one another as I sped by. There were few pedestrians out although there were probably more than you could count several blocks over where the local shops and restaurants populate Cole Street. I was tempted to turn my car around and head that way now. I could play quarters with some bartender and laugh at the knowledge that my evil ex was standing around an empty house waiting for me. It would be petty, though perversely sweet entertainment. But as I brought the car to a halt at each stop sign, my mind came screeching back to the conversation Scott and I had earlier. I didn’t have a problem with being petty, but stupidity was not something I was comfortable with. I had to at least see the place.

It was 8:40 p.m. when I found the address Scott had given me. He’d told me to park in the driveway, but for a moment I found myself idling my car in the middle of the quiet street and staring at the building to my left. The windows were all dark, but the streetlamp illuminated the details of the exterior. It was no bigger than the houses to the left or right, but still, it was superior. Unlike its neighbors, this house was not painted in pastels, but in a color that hovered between tan and a muted lilac. Its gabled shingled roof shielded its angled bay windows from the hazy evening sky. It was beautiful and oddly familiar. I must have passed it before and somehow taken notice of it. As my eyes traveled from the roof to the foundation I spotted Scott huddled between the Greek-styled columns bordering the front entrance. Watching me and toying with the zipper of his insulated brown suede jacket, his presence surprised me. When I had been married to Scott we had both considered punctuality a dirty word. Slowly, I pulled into the driveway, which was so narrow that it barely accommodated the width of my car.

“How long have you been waiting?” I asked as I slipped out of the car and trotted up the front steps.

“Got here at eight-twenty.” He got to his feet and brushed some nonexistent dirt from his jeans. “I figured you’d be late, but I thought I should get here early just in case you’d changed.” He smiled, bringing his dimple into view. “I’m glad to see that you’re still the same ol’ Soapy.”

I let out a disdainful puff of air. Soapy was the pet name he had assigned to me after we had gotten into a soapsuds fight while washing my old car. It brought back irritatingly fond memories.

“Let’s see the house,” I said coolly. As front doors went, this house had a pretty nice one. Tastefully carved without being too ornate or flowery. “Where’s the owner staying?”

“Hotel Nikko,” Scott said as he fiddled with the key.

“Really? Why doesn’t he just stay here until it sells…oh, Scott!” I exclaimed as he opened the door to reveal the foyer. “Are those crown moldings?”

“Better believe it, baby. Crown moldings fit for a queen.” As we stepped inside he sniffed the air suspiciously. “That’s Pine-Sol,” he said slowly. “Oscar must have cleaned before leaving.”

I barely registered Scott’s comment. I was in the living room looking at the bay windows and the lovely upholstered window seat. The furniture wasn’t my style, very flowery in a Victorian kind of way, but I wasn’t buying the furniture. The gorgeous built-in mahogany bookcases though, those would be mine!

“That’s strange.”

I turned at the sound of Scott’s voice behind me. I had almost forgotten he was there. “What’s strange…wait, that doesn’t look fake.” I pointed at the fireplace behind him. “It’s not just decorative? It’s real? A real honest-to-God fireplace that you can set fires in?”

“Gas starter, too,” Scott confirmed. “But that’s not what’s weird. What’s weird is that Oscar seems to have rearranged all the furniture. This place has been totally redecorated since this morning.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s weird…is that a formal dining room?” I ran past Scott into the next room. Sure enough, it was a dining room, and it was stunning. Not huge, but certainly bigger than anything I’d ever had. Right now it contained an antique oak sideboard complete with carved winged griffins and a beveled mirror. It also held a table that was long and rectangular and covered with a white lace tablecloth. In fact, the table was set as if someone had been preparing for a dinner party of six. There were two beautiful silver candleholders holding long, tapered cream candles, and each place setting shone with Victorian rose-patterned fine china.

“He set the table?” Scott choked.

“Guess he thought that setting the table would give the place a little more ambiance or something,” I muttered, glancing over at the door that led to the kitchen. There had to be a problem with the kitchen, right? No house was perfect.

I carefully stepped inside and broke into a grin—a totally charming kitchen. The cabinets were white, and while I usually prefer a natural wood finish, this white actually worked well with the Victorian ambiance. There wasn’t a huge amount of counter space, which would be a problem for Anatoly, who loved to cook almost as much as I loved to eat, but I could always put in an island or something.

The thought tickled me. Last month, Anatoly and I had been on the Marina watching the ferries riding over the bay. He had kissed my cheek and then my neck while mumbling about the way the salt water tasted on my skin. Then, out of the blue he had taken my hand and suggested we move in together. He wanted to wake up with me in the morning…every morning. Only a year ago he had expressed discomfort with the level of commitment implied by the words boyfriend and girlfriend and now he wanted to share his life with me. It had almost made me cry.

Almost. The truth was that I didn’t want to move him into my apartment, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to move into his. I have come to believe that domestic partnerships have a higher chance of success when they exist within spacious houses. Conversely, cramped quarters and limited closet space is a recipe for domestic violence. But Anatoly made significantly less money than I did, so if my dreams of romance and elbow room were going to come to fruition I was going to have to find a house that fit my budget. He could help me with the mortgage if he chose (and I knew he would), but the down payment was a burden I would have to bear alone. I hadn’t detailed my objections for Anatoly, knowing that he would have dismissed them. Instead, I had stalled for time with whispered abstract promises of future arrangements. He hadn’t argued, but he hadn’t been happy, either.

I glanced at a paned glass door in the back of the room and was hit by yet another wonderful revelation. “Scott, this place has a yard? Why didn’t you tell me?” I ran to the door and flung it open. Yes, the yard was about the size of your average master bathroom, but in San Francisco any house that came with grass was a huge commodity.

“He took his small appliances with him.” Scott was now standing in the doorway. “The man took his appliances to the Nikko.”

“Or maybe he moved them into a storage unit,” I suggested, not really caring what had happened to some soon-to-be ex-owner’s toaster oven. I walked across the room and opened a door discreetly adjacent to the pantry. “Or maybe he put them in here with the washer and dryer.”

“Huh?” Scott peeked inside and noted the coffee machine, blender and a few other basic kitchen tools on the floor of the laundry room. “Why would he do this?”

“Why are you so freaked out by it? The guy wants to sell his house so he spruced it up a bit. That’s normal, Scott. As a real-estate agent I would think you would know that.”

“Sophie, the reason I got this listing is because I know the owner. Oscar and I…travel in some of the same circles.”

My eyes slanted in suspicion. “You, the man who once speculated that life after sixty wouldn’t be worth living—you travel in the same circles as a seventy-year-old with the beginnings of Alzheimer’s.”

“He’s a friend of…a friend. He called me at, like, six this morning all agitated and upset, insisting that I come over immediately and help him sell this place. I made him wait until eight and then I sat and listened to him rant about the ghosts who were driving him out of his house. He’s not well, Sophie. In addition to the mental stuff he’s got a heart condition. There’s no way he has the physical strength to move the furniture around. This is just weird.”

“Maybe he just called another friend…someone who travels in his eclectic circles, and asked him to help fix the place up. Really, Scott, for a man who has mastered the fine art of lying you sure don’t have a very good imagination.” I shut the door to the laundry room. “Show me the bedrooms.”

Scott’s expression morphed again, this time into something that made my stomach churn. “Soapy, I thought you’d never ask.”

He showed me the one downstairs bedroom (which would make a great office) and half bath, then led me up the staircase and brought me to the second bedroom and full bath. They were both beautiful. The house was so underpriced it was sick. But sick in a good way. I could deal with this kind of sick.

With each room Scott made another comment about how everything was different from this morning. When we looked at the second bedroom he shook his head and pointed to a ceramic vase that hadn’t been there before. “It’s weird,” he insisted again. “It’s like he tried to make this place look more…” He snapped his fingers a few times as if trying to command the word he was looking for to pop into his mouth. “Victorian,” he finally said. “He made the place look more Victorian.”

“It’s a Victorian house, Scott. What did you expect? That he would try to make the place look art deco?”

“I didn’t expect anything, that’s the point! I thought he was just going to leave and let me deal with fixing it up for the sale. You should have seen him this morning. He didn’t even feel comfortable hanging around here to talk. Now I’m supposed to believe that he spent the day here redecorating and cleaning?”

“Are you going to show me the master bedroom or are you going to just stand here flipping out over a vase?”

“Right, the master bedroom…let’s just hope he didn’t get rid of the bed, I’d really like to show you that….” But the flirtation lacked conviction. Oscar the redecorator had thrown Scott off his game.

The door to the master bedroom was closed and for a second I entertained a disturbing thought. “You don’t suppose he’s in there, do you? Maybe he’s been sleeping the whole time we’ve been wandering around his house.”

“Oscar assured me that he would be out of here by six at the latest.” He reached forward and opened the door to reveal a charming, if somewhat foul-smelling, room with delicate moldings and paned glass doors that were left open to reveal a pretty little deck—and there was Oscar…sitting on the bed…mouth wide-open…face tilted up toward the ceiling. It didn’t look like a natural position and he didn’t acknowledge us.

He didn’t move at all.

“Oscar?” There was a slight tremor in Scott’s voice.

I crept toward him. “Hello?” I whispered, although I had an ugly suspicion that I could scream and not get a reaction out of Oscar. Something crinkled under my foot and I realized that I had just stepped on a bunch of antique photos. They had that lovely golden glow that always made me think of horse-drawn wagons and Ellis Island immigrants. But these photos weren’t of people, they were of rooms. I was tempted to take a moment to examine them more closely, but I knew that was just my natural inclination to put off the inevitable. “Oscar? I’m Sophie…can you hear me?” I got a little closer and very carefully checked for a pulse. Nothing.

I pulled my hand away and stared at the two white prints the pressure of my fingers had left on the corpse’s flesh.

“Scott, I think he’s dead.”

“You think?” Scott asked.

I looked down at Oscar’s lower half and realized his pants were wet with urine, which explained the smell. “He’s definitely dead.”

I waited for Scott to respond and when he didn’t I turned to look at him.

“Scott?”

He held up a finger as if to indicate that he needed a minute, then ran to the attached bathroom where I could hear him promptly regurgitate whatever it was that he’d had for dinner.

And now I was alone with a dead stranger. Hesitantly, I turned back to Oscar. I didn’t see any blood or sign that he had struggled with someone, although the expression on his face was anything but peaceful. He looked kind of horrified, like he had seen the grim reaper. My eyes traveled to his left hand. His fingers were curled around a piece of jewelry. I leaned over, not wanting to touch him again, and realized that the jewelry was actually an antique brooch with a cameo. Little goose bumps materialized all over my skin and I tried to suppress the anxiety building within me. I wished Scott would pull himself together and handle this. But I expected that would take a while. Scott liked to deal in fantasies and what-ifs. Death was one of those things that was just too real for him.

I turned my back to the body. Actually, this was a little too real for me, too. With shaky hands, I gathered up the photos I had stepped on. One Victorian room after another…a bedroom, a dining room…this bedroom, this dining room. These were pictures of the house as it once was. The furniture had been different, obviously, but not the placement. Oscar had rearranged his furniture to fit the images in these pictures. Even the table setting was similar. Mechanically, I turned back around.

“How did you die, Oscar?” I whispered. I reached over and tentatively touched the brooch in his hand. It was cold, colder than the dead hand holding it. The colorless depiction of the woman on the cameo was surely meant to be flattering, but to me her sharp chin and unseeing eyes appeared sinister. It was then that I became vaguely aware that I was frightened.

At that moment Scott stumbled out of the bathroom and looked purposely at the floor. “So,” he said in a scratchy voice, “do you still want the house?”

“Report this,” I said pointing to the phone on the nightstand closest to Scott. “Dial 911 and tell them we found a dead man.”

Scott looked up at the phone, noted its proximity to the bed and then quickly looked away. “Didn’t I read that you discovered a body in Golden Gate Park a few years back?” he asked hopefully. “You have more experience with this kind of thing. Why don’t you call?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, be a man, Scott,” I said, once again inching away from the body.

“I am a man! I just happen to be a man who suffers from necrophobia.”

“What?”

“I have a fear of dead things. I’m working on overcoming it. Still, this,” he waved toward the bed without looking at it, “is a bit much for me to deal with.”

“You weren’t necrophobic when we were married.”

“Yes, I was, we just didn’t talk about it. Remember how upset I got when we went to that restaurant and they served us the fish with its head still on? That was a traumatic moment for me, Sophie.”

“Wow, Scott. I didn’t realize. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. Now suck it up and call the police.” I stared at the floor. The urine was getting to me. The smell had been bad when we first entered the room, but now that I knew what it was and why it was there, it had become unbearable. I had to get out of the room.

Scott swallowed hard and then pulled his cell phone out of his jacket pocket. “I’ll call from this.” He walked over to the bedroom door and motioned for me to exit with him, which I gladly did. I left the pictures where I had found them.

As we walked down the stairs Scott dialed 911 and I used my cell phone to dial Anatoly’s number.

“Hey there.” The lightness of Anatoly’s tone was jarring considering my circumstances. “I was just thinking about you. A minute ago I accepted another case and it turns out my new client is a huge fan of your books.” Anatoly was a P.I. and lately it seemed that everybody in San Francisco wanted his services. Businesses wanted to prove that their employees were stealing, wives wanted to prove that their husbands were cheating and so on and so forth. But right now all of those problems seemed paltry and inconsequential.

“Anatoly, I’m in Ashbury Heights.” It was amazing how I could keep my voice smooth even as my hands shook. “A Realtor was just giving me a tour of this Victorian he’s representing and—”

“Now? It’s almost nine o’clock.”

“Yeah, I know it’s unusual, but that’s not why I’m calling. Listen, the owner’s here and he’s sort of…dead.”

There was a moment of silence followed by a Russian curse. “You found another dead body.”

“It would seem that way, yes.”

“Are you safe?”

“Yeah, I’m here with the real-estate agent and he’s calling 911.” Scott and I had now reached the bottom of the stairs and he was standing by the bay windows answering some dispatcher’s questions. “The owner was old so he probably died of natural causes. Still, could you come over? I mean, it’s not like I’ve never been through something like this, you know that and…well, you’d think it would get easier, but…”

“Tell me how to get there and I’ll come over immediately.”

I looked up at Scott. He was describing the state of the body to someone on the phone and gagging between sentences. Thank God for Anatoly because I was pretty sure Scott wasn’t going to be that big of a comfort to me.

2

Smart Agoraphobics Invest in Real Estate.

—The Lighter Side of Death

LESS THAN FIVE MINUTES LATER, A POLICE CAR AND AN AMBULANCE arrived. The paramedics and one of the two officers immediately went upstairs to check out the body while the other officer, a sergeant with salt-and-pepper hair and a face like Paul McCartney, lingered in the living room to ask Scott and me a few questions. He introduced himself as Sergeant Poplar, but in my head he was Sergeant Pepper. After giving him a quick rundown of why we were there and what we had found, his partner (a cute blond woman who looked more cheerleader than cop) appeared at the top of the stairs and said something about it looking like “natural causes,” at which point Sergeant Pepper asked us to stick around while he took a look for himself. Once both officers were out of sight, Scott and I simultaneously collapsed on the couch and stared up at the vaulted ceiling.

“Well,” Scott said dully, “I’ve never had a house showing like this before.”

“Did you know Oscar well?” I asked. The cushions on the couch were overstuffed to the point of discomfort, but neither Scott nor I moved to find a better seat.

He shook his head and ran his fingers through his hair. “He’s more Venus’s friend.”

“Who’s Venus?”

But before he could answer Anatoly burst through the door. His hands were still encased in the thick black gloves he so frequently wore while riding his Harley, and he creased his forehead in concern. Without a second thought I went to him and he received me with a tight embrace. “You seem to have a talent for being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he scolded, but his tone was gentle and comforting.

“I just wanted to see the house,” I said, my words muffled by his shirt.

Anatoly pulled back slightly and took in his surroundings. “Nice,” he noted before his eyes landed on Scott. “I take it you’re the Realtor?”

Scott nodded and wiped his palm sweat on his designer jeans before extending his hand to Anatoly. “Scott Colvin, Sophie’s Realtor, friend and ex-husband.”

Anatoly’s smile of greeting froze midhandshake.

“He’s lying,” I said quickly. “At least about being my Realtor, or my friend for that matter.”

“And the ex-husband part?” Anatoly asked, keeping his eyes on Scott. He hadn’t let go of his hand yet, and judging from Scott’s expression, Anatoly’s grip had gotten a little tighter than necessary.

“That part’s true.”

Anatoly released Scott and turned to me. “You came to this house in the middle of the night with your ex-husband?”

“Eight-thirty’s the middle of the night?” Scott asked. “Guess you must be an early-to-bed guy. Sophie and I have always been night owls.”

“We haven’t seen each other in ten years, Scott,” I hissed. “You have no idea what my sleeping habits are like now.” The cool damp breeze coming in from the open door was beginning to get to me and I rubbed the back of my arms in an attempt to increase my circulation.

Scott cocked his head to the side, and shot me the first real grin since we had discovered Oscar. “There’s no way you’ve turned into an early bird. Not my Soapy.”

“Soapy?” Anatoly raised his eyebrows.

“You didn’t tell him about that nickname?” Scott chuckled and refocused on Anatoly. “Man, you’re going to love how she got it. We were washing her car and she was wearing these Daisy Duke shorts and this sheer white tank top—”

“They were regular denim shorts and the tank was not sheer,” I snapped. “I can’t believe you’re trying to play juvenile head games while the paramedics upstairs are trying to determine the cause of death of one of your friends.”

“Whose friend is dead?” a Kathleen Turner–type voice demanded.

We all turned toward the front door and standing there was a human hanger.

Actually “human hanger” was my friend Dena’s term. She used it for runway models and those who looked like them; in other words, women who were too skinny, angular and narrow in the hips to look sexy in lingerie, but managed to make clothes look fabulous. This particular hanger was hanging a delicate off-white long-sleeve top under a spaghetti-strap charcoal-gray empire wool dress. The outfit would have made me look like a matronly dwarf. She, on the other hand, looked ethereal. She glided over to Scott and wrapped her arms around his neck.

“Scott, darling, who’s dead?”

“Venus, what are you doing here?” he croaked.

She pulled back, her height enabling her to look him in the eyes without tilting her head. “Perhaps you didn’t hear me, darling. I asked you who was dead. That is what you said, isn’t it?” she asked, whirling around to look at me. “You said that there were paramedics upstairs determining the cause of someone’s death.”

“I think you should answer your girlfriend’s questions, Scott,” Anatoly suggested. “This woman is your girlfriend, right?”

Scott nodded mutely.

“Then why don’t you explain to her what Sophie was talking about. Fill her in on what’s happened and what it was you said that got Sophie so irritated.”

“Your name is Sophie?” Venus asked. She truly was beautiful. Her skin was a creamy-white and her chestnut hair, which was pulled into a loose, low ponytail, had enough sheen to make an Herbal Essence model jealous. Her features were kind of perfect, to the point that I had to wonder if she had been crafted by genetics, or a very talented plastic surgeon. When I stared directly at her I could see that she was wearing makeup, perhaps a lot of it, but everything was so perfectly blended and the tones so muted that it managed to look natural. The only things that didn’t quite fit were her hands, which were a little too big to match an otherwise delicate figure. However even this inconsistency served her well, making her seem a bit more powerful than her heart-shaped mouth would suggest.

But she wasn’t nice. I could just tell. Something about the icy sheen in her green eyes hinted at a foul temperament.

“What’s your last name?” she demanded, not waiting for me to answer her first question.

I inched a little closer to Anatoly. “My last name is Katz.”

“This is your ex-wife, Scott,” Venus said slowly. “How interesting.” Her mouth curved into a wry smile. “Now, someone is going to tell me why we’re all here and why there’s a police car and ambulance outside. I know Oscar’s staying at the Nikko tonight so—”

Scott put a firm hand on her shoulder and turned her back around to face him. “Venus, Oscar didn’t get to the Nikko.”

I couldn’t see Venus’s face, but her body had gone absolutely still.

“I’m so sorry, love. We found him in his bed and—”

“Stop.” Venus’s voice was shaky and discordant. She moved away from Scott and farther into the house, pausing before the fireplace. As skinny as she was she still had the presence to fill up the spacious room. “I don’t want to hear this from you. I want to hear it from Oscar.”

Anatoly and I gave Scott a questioning look. “Right…” Then Scott looked longingly at the door. “Venus, um, sees dead people.”

“Feel,” Venus corrected. “I can feel them. The circumstances in this room aren’t right for a ghost to actually make an appearance right now.”

Anatoly stared at her for a few seconds before pulling me closer so my ear was near his lips. “Why don’t I take you home and we’ll let your ex deal with the crazy woman.”

“I heard that,” Venus called over her shoulder. She turned around again to face us, her posture upright and her head high. A single tear trickled out of the corner of her eye and she allowed it to slide down her cheek, unchecked. Most people are uncomfortable with the idea of shedding tears in front of strangers, but Venus wore hers like a badge of honor. The effect was disconcerting because instead of making her seem vulnerable, the pride she seemed to have in her own grief made her appear stronger and maybe even a little bit unnatural. She reached a hand out to Scott and he was instantly by her side as she whispered, “I knew he wasn’t well, but I thought he had more time than this. It was a…natural death, wasn’t it? No one did him harm?”

“I think it was natural,” Scott said quietly. “Venus, why did you come here?”

But before she could answer, the police and the paramedics came down the stairs. The paramedics went out to the ambulance to fetch a stretcher while the police officers stayed to talk to us. “It was most likely a stroke or a massive heart attack,” Sergeant Pepper explained after establishing Anatoly’s and Venus’s identity and collecting all of our phone numbers and addresses. “We’ll need to do an autopsy, but there’s no evidence of homicide here.”

“Someone needs to tell his son,” Venus said. “Poor Kane will be devastated. I don’t believe he’s ever even recovered from the death of his mother.”

“Do you know how we can reach Mr. Crammer’s son?” the female cop asked.

“I have his number stored in my cell phone.” Venus glanced down at her hands as if expecting to find the cell there. “I must have left it in the car.” She gestured toward the door and a moment later she had Scott and both officers escorting her to her parking spot.

“So if Scott isn’t your real-estate agent, why did you come here with him?” Anatoly asked as we stepped aside to allow the paramedics to come in with a stretcher.

“He was the agent representing the open house I went to this afternoon,” I said once the paramedics were upstairs again. “It was a total coincidence.”

“That still doesn’t answer my question, Sophie.”

“He told me about a house that just went on the market this morning and when he described it I knew I had to see it. I mean, look around you! This place is so me!”

Anatoly scanned the living room with disinterest. “Real-estate agents usually don’t give tours after dark.”

“He wanted to show me the house before anyone else and I agreed because he said that if I made the first bid I might be able to get it for nine-eighty.”

Anatoly’s head snapped in my direction. “This house is worth a million-seven easy.”

“Oscar wanted out of the house.” I walked over to the bookcases and fingered a hardbound edition of Jean-Paul Sartre’s plays. It was the most contemporary of all the literature held by the mahogany shelves. “He said it was haunted.”

Anatoly snorted. “Didn’t Scott tell him to up the price?”

“My guess is he was planning on making the suggestion, but probably not if I was the prospective buyer. Apparently Scott grew a conscience in the ten years since our divorce and now he wants to make up for all the wrongs he’s committed against me by setting me up in my very own Ashbury Heights three-bedroom.” My voice faded off at the end of my sentence. I had been so disturbed by the discovery of Oscar’s body I hadn’t yet thought about how his death was going to affect the deal. This house now belonged to Oscar’s son. What if he didn’t want to sell it? And even if he did, he probably wouldn’t want to do it for only $980,000. My hand moved from the book to the bookshelf and I clutched it so hard my thumb began to cramp, as if I could make this house mine if I just held on to it.

“It’s for the best,” Anatoly said, correctly reading my thoughts. “If you were to buy this place it would come with strings attached. By not convincing Oscar to sell at market, Scott was giving up on at least $20,000 of commission. Men don’t make those kinds of sacrifices because they want to make amends for the past. Those kinds of sacrifices are only made when men think they will be repaid with power or sex.”

“Well, obviously.” I spun around to face him. “That’s what makes my possible inability to buy this house all the more painful. How fabulous would it have been if I had been able to cheat Scott out of a huge commission and then turn around and reject him? Do you have any idea how much I wanted to inflict that kind of pain and suffering on that bastard? He used my distress over my father’s death as a way to worm his way into my life and then he screwed me over in every way you can think of. Do you know that he sold a diamond pendant my father gave me to a pawnshop just to keep some bookie from breaking his legs? And the bookie’s name was Vinny! Everybody knows you’re not supposed to borrow money from bookies named Vinny! He was not only a bastard, but he was a stupid bastard!”

Anatoly opened his mouth to respond, but then abruptly closed it when the paramedics reappeared. They were carrying Oscar on the stretcher and his body was covered in a white sheet. With his face hidden, the corpse took on an anonymity that scared me. The body being carried down the stairs could have been anybody. In fact, my father’s body had looked just like that when they put a sheet over him and carried him out of my parents’ house twelve years ago.

That isn’t my father, I reminded myself. I pulled up the image of Oscar’s countenance and held it in my mind as Anatoly and I watched the stretcher go out the door. This was the body of a stranger who had been foolish enough to rearrange all his heavy furniture despite his age and reportedly bad health. No wonder he had a stroke.

My eyes moved to the couch. When I had first seen it all, I could think of was how unstylish it was. But I hadn’t thought about its mass.

I walked over to the armrest and threw all my weight into trying to push it forward. It moved, but only a half of an inch.

“What are you doing?” Anatoly asked.

“I couldn’t move this,” I said slowly. “Not by myself.”

“So don’t,” Anatoly wisely suggested.

“I won’t, but Oscar did. He had to have had help.”

“Excuse me.” Sergeant Pepper was standing in the doorway looking bored and irritated. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you both to leave the house.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because it’s not yours,” he said. “If you stay you’ll be trespassing.”

With that statement my potential loss hit me with renewed force. I had already fallen in love with this place. I wanted it, and I wasn’t good at walking away from things that I wanted.

3

One of the unfortunate side effects of my medication is that it hinders my ability to act crazy.

—The Lighter Side of Death

“HE DIED OF A HEART ATTACK. WHAT’S THE BIG DEAL?” DENA REACHED around the wood pole that held the yellow oversize umbrella above our outside table and handed me back the obituary that I had brought along for her to look at during our lunch date at MarketBar. She took a moment to peel off her fitted leather blazer before continuing. “You know you’re just obsessing over this to distract yourself from the fact that you might not get the house.”

“Bite your tongue,” I muttered, even though I knew she was partially right. It’s not that Oscar’s death hadn’t actually affected me. It had. I had seen Oscar’s pale, dead face in my dreams on more than one occasion since I’d found him. The cameo, the smell, the photographs…it all came together to create a scene that was as harsh as it was ominous. But I had seen worse and I had learned how to tuck my fears away into the dark corners of my mind that I rarely explored. But the house…that house had dominated my thoughts ever since I had laid eyes on it.

In a few minutes Scott would be here to tell me my future. Would I be buying the home of my dreams from Oscar’s son, Kane, at a price I could afford or was I fated to buy some $1.4-million-dollar rat hole on a fault line? I had called Dena and asked her to join me for lunch before this pronouncement of destiny, and to stay with me during its actual telling. My reasons for this were obvious to both of us. I needed my best friend for support and I needed her to help me stay grounded despite my agitation.

Dena took a sip of the cappuccino she had ordered in place of dessert and then licked the foam off her burgundy painted lips. “I don’t suppose you ever found out why Scott was calling you before?”

“Nope, and I’m not going to ask him about it.” I let my gaze linger on the clock tower that soared above us only fifty feet away. Time seemed to be passing slower than usual. “The goal here is to get the house and then get Scott out of my life—for the second time.”

Dena nodded and took a moment to ogle the cute Eurasian busboy who was clearing off a nearby table. He wasn’t really my type, although I recognized his beauty. He was tall and sinewy, almost feminine in his grace. She reached forward and emptied her previously untouched glass of water in three consecutive gulps.

“Okaaay.” I reached forward and tapped her empty water glass. “Are you suffering from diabetes or something?”

Dena smiled wickedly. “I have my reasons.” Just then the busboy crossed to our table to refill her glass. “Thank you,” Dena purred. “I was hoping you’d come over here and quench my thirst.”

The busboy looked up from the glass, surprised, and then, noting Dena’s expression, his eyes widened with understanding. “No problem,” he said uncertainly, glancing over his shoulder, presumably to ensure that he wasn’t the cause of the giggles coming from the women at the nearby table. But the women were deeply involved in their own conversation and he turned back to us with more confidence. “I’m Kim. Just call me over if you need anything else.”

“What a wonderful invitation, Kim,” Dena said. “It seems only right that I should reciprocate.” She pulled a business card out of her purse and wrote her home number on the back. “Obviously I’m attracted to you,” she said simply. “However I’m not looking for a serious relationship and I don’t tolerate chauvinists. If you’re okay with casual and you’re not a sexist then you can call me over and I’ll…show you what’s on my menu.” She slipped her card into his hand and added, “If you’re opinionated and smart I might even take you out for a nice dinner first.”

The busser flushed and then turned even redder after noting what it was that Dena did for a living. “Sole proprietor of Guilty Pleasures? Is that a…you know…a—”

“We sell upscale lingerie, sex toys and things like that,” Dena said matter-of-factly. “Some of it’s rather tame and romantic. Some of it would make Fergie Ferg blush.”

For a moment it appeared that Dena had rendered Kim speechless. “I think you may be the most amazing woman I’ve ever met in my life.”

Dena lifted her thick Sicilian eyebrows in amusement. “We’ve only just met.”

“Yeah, but you just basically told me that you want to…to…have an affair!”

“So all I had to say was that I wanted to mess around with you and I become the most amazing woman you’ve ever met? That doesn’t say a lot for your sex life, Kim.”

“No, I mean…most women are more coy and, you know…”

“I don’t do coy, and I don’t play games.”

Kim turned his gaze to me.

“Yes,” I said, reading the question in his eyes. “She’s for real.” Kim’s shock was a totally natural reaction. I should have been shocked, too. But I had become so accustomed to Dena’s brand of insanity that it honestly didn’t faze me anymore.

“Okay,” Dena said, running her hands through her short dark hair. “You have my number both literally and figuratively. What’s yours?”

“You mean my phone number or…”

“Who are you? What’s your story?” Dena clarified.

“Right,” he said grinning sheepishly. “I guess I’m sort of smart. I’m in my last year at SF State.”

“What are you studying?” Dena asked.

“I’m a radio and television major with an emphasis on audio production and recording.”

“Really?” Dena asked. “So what’s it going to be, radio or television?”

“I’m thinking about music production. I DJ a couple nights a week now and I’m always mixing my own stuff. I think maybe I can make a real career out of it. I’m going to try anyway. Either way it’s a hell of a lot of fun.”

Dena threw an arm over the low back of her chair and nodded approvingly. “See, that’s a conversation topic that could get us through a long dinner at a three-star restaurant.”

Kim lit up and then caught sight of a man watching him from the other side of the restaurant and immediately straightened his posture. “My manager’s watching me, but I’ll call you tonight,” he whispered. I noticed Dena didn’t bother leaning back when he reached for her plate, thus causing him to “accidentally” brush her right breast. He blushed again before hurrying away under his manager’s watchful eye.

“I arrived with the expectation of meeting with one incredibly beautiful woman, but here I find two!”

Dena and I both looked up to see Scott standing a few feet away. He stood with his left hand tucked away in the pocket of his dark denim jacket and the bulk of his weight on the corresponding leg, a still figure against the hustle and bustle of the sidewalk and street behind him. The passing tourists probably thought he was pausing to admire the outdoor café, but I knew he was posing for the benefit of the women in the area, and the knowledge made me queasy. Perhaps he noted my disgust because he broke into a self-conscious chuckle and strode over to our table. “Dena Lopiano,” he boomed, “I haven’t seen you in years.”

“Yeah,” Dena said wistfully, “those were great years.”

Scott laughed again and sat down between the two of us. “Any chance you two would agree to a few drinks and small talk before we get down to business?” he asked hopefully.

“No,” Dena and I said in unison.

“Very well.” He contorted his face into an exaggerated frown before relaxing back into his trademark Rembrandt-White smile. “Here’s the deal with the house. If Kane has to list it, he’s going to list it for $1.75 million with the expectation of having to reduce it to as low as $1.6. Personally, I think he stands a good chance of getting the full listing price.”

“Shit!” I seethed. I did some quick math in my head. I might be able to swing it if I got a really big loan from a bank at an extremely low interest rate. I gazed at my wineglass. Goodbye fine wines, hello cheap wine coolers.

“But if you buy it,” Scott continued, “and you make an offer right now, he’ll sell it to you for the original price of $980,000.”

Dena and I exchanged confused looks. This was fantastic news, but it didn’t make sense. “Scott, are you playing a game with me?”

“Kane is sentimental about that house. He grew up there, and when he heard his father had died, he briefly considered moving back in. But as it stands he’s already living in the house he inherited from his grandparents. He doesn’t want two houses and he doesn’t want to be a landlord or deal with property managers. Still, he doesn’t want to sell to just anyone.”

“But I’m just anyone,” I pointed out. “I’ve never met Kane. I have no relation to him. Nothing connects us at all.”

“On the surface, you’re right,” Scott said. “But Kane doesn’t see it that way. He knows that under normal circumstances I wouldn’t give a potential buyer a night tour of a residence. And normally you wouldn’t come within fifty feet of me, in the day or night. Hell, I haven’t even been able to get you to return my calls. But then, out of the blue, Oscar calls me up and tells me he wants me to sell his place ASAP. On that same day you show up at the open house I was holding in the Marina, and I convince you to come to see Oscar’s place at eight-thirty that night, the night Oscar died.”

“So?” Dena asked.

“So Kane thinks that means something,” Scott explained, still addressing me. “He knows you want the house, but he also thinks the house wants you.”

I brought my fingers to my temples in an attempt to massage away the headache that was beginning to form there. “If I understand you correctly,” I said, “you’re telling me that Kane is crazy.”

“Poor people are crazy, Sophie,” Scott corrected. “Kane is eccentric.”

“I see. Are his eccentricities ones that can be medicated?”

“Probably, although I don’t think Kane approves of drugs that aren’t recreational. But that’s neither here nor there. What’s important is that you can have the house, and you’re getting it for a song—at least by San Franciscan standards.”

“This is too good to be true,” Dena said. She was looking at Scott, but her eyes had become so narrowed with suspicion that it was questionable if she was able to see anything beyond her own eyelashes. “There’s got to be a major catch.”

“A major catch?” Scott scoffed. “He wants to sell you a house for over $600,000 below market. There are militant vegetarians who would eat a truckload of Big Macs just to get a crack at the deal I’m offering you. All Kane wants from you is a one-month escrow, your word that you’ll treat the house well and your commitment to become a lifetime member of the San Francisco Specter Society.”

“Excuse me?” Scott had said the last part so fast that I wasn’t sure I had heard him correctly. I certainly hoped I hadn’t.

On the sidewalk some man was screaming obscenities, but none of us turned to see what the problem was. “It’s not as bad as it sounds,” Scott said in a voice that was something less than convincing. “It’s a group of people who get together twice a month for about an hour or so just so they can hang out, schmooze and, um, try to talk to ghosts.”

Dena burst out laughing while I tried to digest this unexpected request. “Scott,” I said slowly, “please tell me this isn’t a deal breaker.”

“You won’t have to go to every meeting,” Scott quickly assured me. “Just go regularly for the first year or so and then if you can only make it to a meeting every two or three months after that I’m sure Kane will be okay with it. The group really isn’t as weird as its name implies. Venus is a member and so is Kane. Even Oscar came to a few meetings, although he hasn’t for a long time.”

“That’s what you meant when you said Oscar and you traveled in the same circles,” I said slowly as I pieced everything together. “Your current circles consist of a bunch of ghost-loving freaks. Really, Scott, isn’t it a little bizarre for a necrophobic to hang with people who are trying to raise the dead?”

“First of all, they’re not freaks,” Scott said defensively. “I’m not even convinced that all of the members believe in ghosts even though they all say they do. They just like listening to ghost stories. I’ve been to over twenty meetings with Venus and they haven’t been able to channel a single disembodied spirit. Trust me, if they had, I wouldn’t attend no matter how much Venus insisted. And Sophie,” he paused to wave a hovering bee away from his face, “it is a deal breaker.”

“But that’s ridiculous! Why is it so important to Kane that some stranger joins his precious society?”

“I keep trying to tell you, Sophie, Kane doesn’t see you as a stranger. He thinks your discovery of his father connects you in some peculiar way and he thinks…okay, try not to laugh, but he thinks that if he’s going to successfully channel his parents’ spirits the people who found his father right after his death need to be part of the séance.”

“Really?” Dena asked, her curiosity overcoming her mirth. “Is that some kind of Wiccan rule?”

“I have no idea,” Scott grumbled. “What I do know is that I’m stuck going to these meetings for at least another year. But really, they’re not that bad,” he said switching back into salesman mode. “And Enrico Risso is a member so we usually get to sample some dish that he’s thinking about adding to his menu.”

“Hold up.” Dena’s chair audibly scratched against the concrete floor as she scooted forward. “Are we talking about Enrico Risso, the executive chef at Sassi? The man who was just voted one of the nation’s twenty best chefs in Gourmet Magazine?”

“The one and only.”

Dena blinked and then turned to me. “I’m not saying you should join, but if you do you should invite me to one of the meetings. Enrico’s risotto is enough to make you cream your panties.”

Scott shot Dena a bemused smile. “You really haven’t changed at all, have you?”

“Before I agree to any of this I’m going to need to have a contractor come out and look at the pipes, foundation and whatnot,” I interjected. I really didn’t want to dwell on Dena’s panties remark.

“Naturally,” Scott agreed. “You can have a contractor come out anytime. Kane’s already moved all his father’s things into storage so it’ll be easy to check out all the floors and walls.”

“He’s already moved everything out?” I asked. “That was fast.”

“Kane’s efficient. But before you call a contractor you should take another look at the place. Make sure you really want it.”

Scott said the last words suggestively, implying that I might want more than just real estate from him. I didn’t. But I’ll admit I was pleased to know he still desired me. It put me in a position of power, and with Scott it was always important to keep the upper hand. “When can I look at it again?”