Page 42 of Puzzle for Two

Which was a little off-subject, but he had reached the boiling point with Flint’s digs.

And Flint. Flint had the gall to smirk. “Yes, you will, Zachariah. Because it’s the logical thing to do and, mostly, you try to do the logical thing. Notwithstanding the occasional blip.”

“What blip?”

“For starters, the baby-blue vintage Mustang you’ve been trying to rebuild since you were eighteen.”

“How do you…”

Jeez, did he have to sound like a thunderstruck ten-year-old at a magic show? But how the hell did Flint know about Zach’s prized, er, hobby, or as Ben liked to refer to it:the rolling money pit in the garage.

“Once a year you haul the ’Stang out of mothballs and drive it over here, where you inevitably have to phone a tow truck to get it home. If you think everyone in the shopping center doesn’t notice a pristine, baby-blue Mustang on fire—”

“Itnevercaught on fire!”

Flint’s grin was slightly malicious. “No? My point is, even if that vehicle ran properly, it’s totally wrong for an investigator. You can’t park that on a street, let alone tail someone, without being instantly made. You know that, but you can’t quite let go.”

“I don’t plan on driving it while I’m tailing someone!”

Flint offered—and his tone really was that of someone who thought he was making a great concession, “I could keep you on as bookkeeper. Arlisse has threatened to quit if she has to spend one more tax season wading through my box of tax receipts.”

“Buddy, you couldn’taffordme as your bookkeeper,” Zach said shortly. His sympathies were entirely with Arlisse.My box of tax receiptsindeed! He could imagine only too well.

Flint shrugged. “It was just a thought.”

“Well, keep thinking.”

“I will. Anyway, we’re probably not going to be able to get into the hospital to talk to the car’s passenger yet. There’s no point trying. He’s still unconscious.”

“Get into the hospital?” Hopefully, Flint intended to follow the usual protocol for interviewing a hospitalized witness, and yet Zach could uneasily picture a scenario that included stolen scrubs and one of them—guess who—crouched in a laundry cart.

“So after we touch base with the cops, we pay a visit to the widow.”

“And why would we do that?”

“Because it’s what we’d do if we didn’t believe she’d knocked off her old man. We—you—would offer your sympathies and explain what you’d been working on and see if she wanted to continue the investigation. And while we’re trying to throw her off our track, we’d be interrogating her and everyone else we could lay our hands on at that estate.”

“That’s…not bad.”

Flint said gravely, “I’m honored you think so.”

“No, you’re not. You think I’m stupid and inexperienced and I just got my client killed. And I agree. Which is why I think maybe we should try to do this your way.”

Flint frowned. “We need to be clear on something. I don’t think you’re stupid, and I don’t think you got your client killed. Furthermore, I get why you want to hang on to the business your dad built. Okay? I didn’t have that relationship with my old man, but I get it.”

Zach wasn’t sure what to say.

Flint wasn’t waiting for his input, in any case. “Believe it or not, you can trust me. I’ve put it all out there. I’m not hiding anything. I don’t have an ulterior motive. I’m helping you because I intend to take over your business—I plan on paying you a fair price—and that’s all there is to it. If you want to try to do this on your own, have at it. But thatwouldbe stupid.”

Given current events, yeah, it probably would. Anyway, just because he was working with Flint—accepting Flint’s help—didn’t mean he had to sell his agency to Flint. Surely, Flint recognized that if theyweresuccessful, it would help Zach avoid selling? At least for a while longer.

Not that Zach was quite as enthusiastic about the agency or his ability to run it as he’d been twenty-four hours earlier. The idea that he was at least partially responsible for Alton’s demise was about as demoralizing as it got. He couldn’t help feeling he should maybe shutter the shop before anyone else got hurt.

Flint snapped his fingers a couple of times. “Hello? Zachariah? Still on the line?”

“Still here,” Zach clipped, and Flint gave another of those evil grins.

“Just checking. You have that glassy-eyed look again.”

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