Page 143 of Almost Dead (The Cahills 2)

Dwayne picked cautiously through the salad with his fork. Apparently he didn’t believe we were raisin-free. “You got that e-mail I sent you about Hatchmere’s business partner?”

“I put in a call to Dr. Wu. He’s out of the country for a few weeks, working with a medical relief team.”

“Who’s in charge of the clinics while he’s gone?”

“No one person, apparently. They’re owned by a consortium,” I reminded him, though Dwayne was the one who’d secured that information in the first place. “I’ve been waiting for Wu to return.”

Dr. Daniel Wu was the head plastic surgeon of a group of four clinics previously owned by Roland Hatchmere, who had once been a very well known plastic surgeon himself until his personal cocaine use got in the way. With his license revoked Roland turned his talents to business, capitalizing on his still valuable reputation and garnering patients to his clinics in droves. Dr. Wu had become his business partner, though Roland held on to the lion’s share of the business until it was sold earlier this year to the consortium.

“Wu’s the one to talk to,” Dwayne agreed.

“It just means I’m stalled,” I said.

“Things’ll break.”

Like that advice was going to help me. I wanted to shout, “When? How? Would you stop looking through those damn binoculars?” Instead I just finished my meal. Dwayne was nice enough to thank me and even pay for the food. I tried to demur, but he smiled faintly and ignored me, so I pocketed the bills. I’m pretty sure I should be embarrassed by my cheapness, but I can’t stop considering it an attribute. Thriftiness is a good thing, right?

I watched him pick up the Review and start reading.

Feeling frustrated, I complained, “Wu’s not the only issue. I’m having trouble getting the Hatchmere clan to talk to me. I’ve left messages. I even dropped by Roland’s house once, but I got the door slammed in my face.”

“Who slammed it on you?”

“The daughter. Gigi Hatchmere. Or, wait…Popparockskill…”

“It’s still Hatchmere. Ceremony never came off when Roland didn’t show.” He shook the paper and opened to another page as he headed back outside.

“Have you got any bright ideas on what I should do next?” I called, but Dwayne was outside and either he couldn’t hear me or he didn’t care.

Annoyed, I pulled up my file on Violet and wirelessly sent its meager contents to the printer as I slid another look Dwayne’s way.

He’d put down the paper and was standing in the strange darkness created by the storm, staring up at the sky. I followed his gaze and saw a crack between clouds where sunlight spilled through, looking like a sheer, glowing curtain of white and yellow, the kind of odd illumination that, as Dwayne moved in front of it, surrounded him with a brilliant aura.

“Saint Dwayne,” I muttered.

“What?” he hollered.

Oh yeah, sure. Now he hears me? “Nothing.”

I headed to the printer, which is currently set up in Dwayne’s spare bedroom, and looked at the pages. It was disheartening how little progress I’d made. Nobody, but nobody, wanted to talk to anyone associated with Violet. I’d placed a few calls and gotten a few polite no’s and a few more “you’ve got to be kiddings.” One guy, some Hatchmere family friend known as Big Jim, just laughed like a hyena and hung up on me.

Gathering up the two pages of potential interviewees, I sensed a nub of anxiety tightening in the pit of my stomach. For all his inattention, Dwayne wasn’t going to wait forever. He would expect some hard answers. But Violet was anathema. And no one wanted to talk to a friend of Violet’s—friend being a stretch of the truth of our relationship—but I suspected Dwayne wasn’t going to see it that way.

“Come on out here, Jane,” Dwayne called, apparently sensing I’d returned to the living room as his eyes were once again glued to his binoculars.

He was back on the chaise longue, though I suspected there might be some moisture soaking into the seat of his jeans. The outdoor furniture and dock were still wet from the hail blast.

Squeezing back outside, I felt a frigid huff of wind whip beneath my black suede vest, press my shirt to my skin and generally bring me to goose bumps. Dwayne’s cowboy hat, never far from his side, was now scrunched on his head. His long, light blue denim-clad left leg, and encasted right one, stretched toward the small, slatted- wood table we’d knocked over on our scramble to get back inside. I righted the table and put it beside his chair. Apart from his shirt, there was no protection against the elements, but it didn’t look like he cared much.

My eyes followed the line of his legs and I felt a twist of sexual interest. I gritted my teeth. And him being a semi-invalid. What did that say about me?

“Take a look here,” he said, handing me the binoculars. “Straight over there is Rebel Yell….” He pointedat a white two-story house across the bay and a little to our left. I looked through the lenses. “Parents, two teenage girls, lots of drama.”

“You’ve named another one?”

“Named ’em all. It’s next to Tab A and Slot B, just to the west side.”

I gazed at Tab A and Slot B, where all fall the man and woman had been cavorting into every sexual position known to humankind, and tried to keep my mind off Dwayne. He and I had done a bit of that mating dance not so long ago, nothing too serious, and then Violet had entered our world. Sometimes, late at night, when my mind whirled on a repetitive track, I remembered those moments with uncomfortable inner jolts that seemed to hit my heart and parts down south as well. “We’ve watched them before,” I said neutrally.

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