“We are talking about sex, not a ‘social life.’ ” I tried not to shudder. “And I would tell you that same exact thing, if it was your mother. But you know you’d feel weird about it, no matter what anyone said.”
Sue leaned back in her chair and didn’t answer. She knew I was right, and I knew she knew.
“Maybe,” she said. “So can you fix this computer thingie or not?”
I scooted my chair in front of her terminal, nudging her aside. The display was frozen, a jumble of number and nonsense character combinations scattered across the screen.
I went to work, pulling out the tricks I’d learned the hard way while running a software security business. There were back doors into almost any system, if you knew where to look. My job, the job of Samurai Security, had been to close those doors, and lock them tight. We’d been good at what we did, until Blake Weston and his cronies took my company away from me.
But I still knew where to look.
It took about twenty minutes for me to find and fix the bug Sue had picked up. At first, Sue watched over my shoulder, although there was little for her to see. Most of what I did appeared on the display as unintelligible machine codes that made sense only to other computer nerds.
Sue was definitely not a computer nerd, and she quickly became bored. She wandered out front. I could hear her arranging shelves, restocking the neat rows of doggie shampoo and flea dip, hanging grooming combs and clippers in their assigned places, and sweeping the already spotless floor. If I hadn’t known about the precarious mountain of paper on her desk, and the overflowing file folders in the cabinets, I would have thought she was as meticulous as my mother.
Fortunately for our friendship, I knew better.
Sue came back in to the office as I was finishing up.
“By the way,” she said. “I forgot to ask, in all the talk about your mother’s love life—”
“Which we will never speak of again,” I interrupted her. “Never.”
“Okay. Whatever.”
I wasn’t sure she really meant that, but I let it slide.
“Anyway, in all the talk about that subject we aren’t talking about, I forgot to ask if Gregory Whitlock had an address for Miss Tepper.”
I tapped a few more keys, restarting Sue’s computer. “I don’t know if he asked the Gladstones, but he says he doesn’t,” I answered.
“And you don’t believe him.”
“Did I say that?”
“Your tone certainly did.” Sue shoved a chair up next to me and plopped down. “It’s working again?” she asked, reaching for the computer keyboard.
For once, I was grateful for Sue’s verbal gymnastics. I was trying not to think about Martha Tepper, and what might have happened to her.
“Not so fast.” I held on to the keyboard, keeping it out of her grasp. “There are a few things you need to know about this system, if you want to avoid more problems.”
I gave her the standard Samurai Security speech, the one I had insisted my techs use with every client. Sue didn’t know it, but she was getting a top-notch computer security consultation for free; the benefit of some very expensive lessons I learned in the cutthroat trenches of Silicon Valley.
By the time I was done, her eyes were wide, and her expression was awed. “Holy cow!” she said. “You really know this stuff, don’t you?”
“What do you think I did before I came back here?” The words were out of my mouth before I thought about it. I was taking the conversation in a direction I didn’t really want to go.
Sue stopped trying to reach for the keyboard and looked hard at me. “I wish I knew, Georgie. I visited you once in San Fran. That was it.”
She looked away. Her voice was so soft, I had to lean in to hear her words. “After that, there was always some reason you didn’t want anyone to come down. So, I don’t really know what you did before you came back to Pine Ridge.
“You’re my best friend, Georgiana Neverall. You don’t want to talk about it, we don’t talk about it. But you’re kind of a mystery, y’know?”
“Oh.” For a minute, that was all I could say. Sue’s choice of words was a little too close to what Wade had said.
“I didn’t mean to be a mystery, really. There was business stuff, and I was working about a hundred hours a week. Some days, I had to have a dog walker come because I didn’t have time for Daisy and Buddha.”
I sighed. “Maybe some night, when we’ve had a few too many margaritas, I’ll tell you the sad, boring tale of my high-tech life.” I figured it was a safe promise. Sue wasn’t likely to have “a few too many” of anything, and I could always leave out the parts I didn’t want to talk about. Which was most of it.
It was my turn to change the subject. “So, how about a deal? You promise not to rat me out on the computer skills, and I’ll keep your system running right.”
Sue looked greedily at the clear screen. “Deal. As long as you let me trade you grooming for the computer work.”
I nodded and we shook hands. It was the cheapest security contract I’d ever taken, but it felt good. I had to admit, I’d actually enjoyed digging into her aging and overloaded system and making it work. Deep down inside, I was still a computer nerd.
“So, to get back to Gregory, and Miss Tepper . . .”
I burst out laughing at Sue’s words. I was having trouble with the idea of Gregory and my mother, true. But the image of Mr. Too-Smooth and the retired librarian together was too much for me.
“You know what I mean.” Sue tried to keep a straight face, but soon she was snickering, then laughing out loud.
“Seriously,” she said, stifling another outburst of giggles. “You don’t believe him when he says he doesn’t have an address for her?”
I thought about her question for a minute, while I sorted the computer discs that were scattered across her desktop. “Next week, we’re getting you a couple flash drives. Then you won’t have all of these thrown around.”
I slipped the discs into an empty drawer. Apparently, Sue kept everything on top of the desk. It was the one place where I was more organized than she was, an artifact of my years in the high-tech world.
“As for Gregory, I don’t know what to think. It just seems strange that he and my mother would be working on this deal with the Tepper properties, and not have any way to get in touch with her. He said he sends everything through the Gladstones, but he did say he’d check in his office. I haven’t heard anything from him, though, and I really don’t expect to.”
I reached in my pocket, where the cameo rested, waiting for its return to its rightful owner. “I’m tired of carrying this thing around. I wish I could just send it somewhere.”
“Why don’t you just put it in that drawer?” Sue pointed at the top drawer of the desk. “There isn’t anything in there, and maybe it won’t bug you so much if you’re not carrying it around.”
I put the brooch away there and hoped she was right.
Whitlock Realty was turning up the pressure to finish the Tepper house. Sandra had already called Barry three times on Friday morning before she turned up at the house with Rick and Rachel Gladstone in tow.
I hadn’t been impressed when I met the Gladstones the first time so I was relieved when Barry went to greet them, leaving me to work on replacing the valves under the bathroom sink.
The pipes were original to the house, which had to be at least sixty years old, and heavily corroded. At first, we thought we could shave a few bucks off the bill by refurbishing the faucets and installing new gaskets. Gregory Whitlock had made it clear to Barry that he wanted the job done as cheaply as possible.
But cheap and fast are sometimes mutually exclusive, and we had finally decided to replace everything from the wall out. In the end, it was the best, and fastest, choice. Though not the cheapest.
From my usual vantage point, looking at shoes, I watched the procession through the door as they surveyed the house. I could identify Barry’s battered work boots and Sandra’s styl
ish—and expensive—stilettos. The brown wingtips were Rick Gladstone’s. They were almost a cli ché for a small-town lawyer.
That left Rachel’s khaki-colored negative-heel clogs. Probably not leather, I decided. Her matchstick skirt swirled around her calves, and from my position I was finally able to confirm what I had suspected since the first time I saw her. Those legs had never seen a razor.
The group came back out of the bedroom and stopped in the hallway near the bathroom door. They were apparently talking about the schedule, and I heard Rick’s voice raised in protest.
“I know we said we’d have Martha’s things packed up, but we have a couple issues.”
“We had no idea you would move this fast. We’ve hired a crew from the Second Chances shelter,” Rachel said. “But the storage unit didn’t become available until yesterday.” Her voice was flat and nasal, and she sounded whiny. “There was a waiting list, and we had to do some pretty fast talking to get put at the top.”
Something in her tone made me think her fast talking probably included the name Jackson, or possibly Grant. I doubted she would have gone so far as to mention Franklin.
Rick cut in, his voice smoother than his wife’s. I couldn’t see him but I could imagine an ingratiating smile and a confident pose. Under his soft voice, though, I could hear a hint of distress.
“This is a small house, but Martha has a lot of large furniture. And there’s the problem of the truck,” he added. “Rentals are at a premium right now. I don’t know exactly why, but that’s what they tell me. The earliest we could get something large enough to haul this furniture is a week from Monday.”
Sandra’s sharp voice interrupted Rick’s explanation. “I really don’t care about your problems with storage units and trucks and the like,” she snapped. “We’ve already given you a substantial deposit, and we need to keep the work moving on this place. For us, time is quite literally money, and every day we wait costs us.
“Unless”—her voice rose—“you would like to reimburse us now for the lost time on the project?”
Barry’s heavy boots came into the bathroom, and he poked his head under the sink.
“Getting out of the line of fire?” I whispered.
He grinned. “If anybody asks, I was just checking on your progress. But yeah, I figured I didn’t need to be part of that discussion.”
Barry scooted under the sink, and we worked on the new valves for a few minutes. The discussion continued in the hallway, but neither one of us commented on what was being said. We were just there to do the work, and as long as someone was committed to paying our bill, we didn’t have a dog in this fight.
Rick Gladstone’s voice had dropped to a silky purr, the words indistinguishable from the next room. Rachel was noticeably quiet, as Rick and Sandra continued their negotiations over moving the furniture.
A few minutes later, Sandra’s high heels tapped their way down the hall and into the bathroom. She stood in the doorway, demanding Barry’s attention by her presence.
Barry gave me a wink, and stuck his head out from under the sink. “Be right with you, Mrs. Neverall.” He turned back to me. “Good work, Georgie. Just finish tightening those connectors, and we’ll be ready to turn the water back on and test them in a couple minutes.”
I mouthed, “Thank you,” grateful for the compliment in front of my mother. Barry was a sweetheart of a boss.
“Now then, what can I do for you?” Barry said. He walked toward the door and I saw Sandra’s stilettos move back, making room for him to move into the hallway.
I tuned out their conversation and concentrated on the sink. Barry would fill me in on the arrangements after Sandra and the Gladstones left.
I tried to feel reassured that Miss Tepper’s move was going forward. I wanted to take this as a positive sign. So why was my stomach still tying itself in knots?
I waited until I heard cars on the gravel. From my sanctuary it was hard to recognize the purr of Sandra’s Escalade, but after several minutes without hearing her voice, I ventured out from my hiding place.
“Barry? You in here?” I called out.
“Down here,” he called back. “You ready for me to turn the water back on so we can check those valves?”
I was going to say yes, but suddenly there was a strange woman standing in front of me. All that came out of my mouth was a startled squeak.
“What are you doing in my house?” she demanded.
I sputtered. I’m not proud of it, but this apparition with stringy gray hair, a wrinkled housedress, and dirty feet stuffed into shapeless bathroom slippers completely unnerved me.
She clearly wasn’t Martha Tepper, and yet she seemed to think this was her house.
It took a moment for me to recover my voice. The intruder bumbled around the dining room opening and closing drawers, as though searching for something.
“Me?” I finally managed to squeak out. “Who are you? This is Miss Tepper’s house, not yours. What are you doing here?”
I practically shouted the last few words. My voice had returned, but I was having a little trouble with the volume control. It could have something to do with the adrenaline surging through my body, or my racing heart. Fight or flight had kicked in, and I had obviously chosen fight.
“I know it’s Martha’s house.” Her voice was controlled, unlike mine. “Lived here with her the last six years, didn’t I? My home, too, until she got it in her head to run off to some godforsaken desert without so much as a kiss-my- patoot!”
She pushed past me and headed down the hall toward the bedrooms. She passed the bathroom and Miss Tepper’s bedroom, and opened the door at the end of the hall, into what I had thought was a guest bedroom.
She rummaged through the drawers and closets as I watched from the doorway, unsure of what to do next.
I could certainly stop her. I was at least thirty years younger, six inches taller, and probably had twenty pounds of muscle on her. Not to mention eight years of martial arts training. I could take one little old lady if I had to, but it didn’t seem like a good choice right now.
She didn’t seem deranged, exactly. She was muttering to herself as she dug into the bottom of a drawer, pulling out a stack of neatly folded cotton pajamas.
“Throw me out of my own house! Least they could do was let me take my clothes. But oh, no! Miss High-and-Mighty tells me I have to get out right now, can’t take anything, ’cause she doesn’t know what’s mine.”
She grabbed a pillow from the bed, stripped the pillowcase off, and began stuffing clothes into the makeshift laundry bag. “Thought I didn’t know she left the door open, didn’t she? I saw her drive away, in that big car of hers.”
I had a sinking feeling that Miss High-and-Mighty was someone I knew well, but I wasn’t about to ask.
She whirled around and looked at me, as though she had just remembered I was there. “I’m only taking what’s mine,” she said. “My clothes, and my books. I’ll bring the pillowcase back when I’m through with it. Wouldn’t want anyone to think I was taking advantage of dear Martha Tepper.”
The venom in her voice when she said Miss Tepper’s name made me take a step back. Hurt and anger battled for control of her expression as she turned her back on me and continued her ramshackle packing.
By now I was convinced she was mostly harmless, but I still didn’t know who she was or why she thought these things were hers. She was grabbing clothes out of the dresser, and stuffing another pillowcase.
“Georgie?” Barry’s voice floated up the stairs. “Are you ready for the water?”
When I didn’t answer immediately, I heard his heavy footsteps on the basement stairs. The loose stair three treads from the top creaked as he stepped on it, and I turned around.
Barry shot me a quizzical look. “You didn’t answer. What are you doing—” He stopped, his gaze moving past me to the whirling dervish in the guest bedroom.
“Who? What?” He sputtered, too. I was secretly relieved to know I wasn’
t the only one. But Barry recovered a lot quicker than I had.
“Pardon me, ma’am.” Barry’s natural courtesy resurfaced as he crossed the room. He walked around the woman until he was facing her, and she looked up at him.
“Can’t you see I’m busy?” she snapped.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you,” he said. Reaching over, he took the pillowcase out of her hand and set it on the bed. By now, he had her complete attention.
“Why don’t you tell me what you’re doing, and maybe we can help.”
She looked from Barry to the pillowcases on the bed and back again. She reached her hand toward the stuffed pillowcases, and for a moment I thought she was going to grab her bags and make a run for it. I was trying to decide if I would have to block the hallway and trap her, or if I should just let her go.
Slowly, she drew back her trembling hand. She laced her fingers together to control the motion, and looked back at Barry, indecision furrowing her brow.
“I’m getting my clothes.” She drew herself up, pulling her shoulders back, as though reclaiming all the remnants of her lost pride. Her voice steadied and grew stronger, and she seemed more in control.
She appeared to come to a decision. Her posture improved, her spine stiffened, and she took on a tone of confidence. There was still anger in her words, but she was calmer. “I’m just getting the things that are mine. Your precious Martha Tepper left me high and dry, and that woman refused to let me take anything out of the house.”
I winced at her “that woman,” knowing she meant my mother.
“This was my home until dear Martha decided to run off,” she continued. “These are my things, I need them, and I’m going to take them. I suggest you just stay out of my way, and I’ll be done in a few minutes.”
Barry glanced over at me and flicked his eyes toward the bathroom. I took the hint and backed away. I stepped into the bathroom with my tools and waited while Barry continued talking to the woman.
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