Page 51 of Café Diablo

Ah ha! Triumph feathers my cheek. Bluff called! Olivia sure likes to push my buttons, but obviously she prefers to spar and stay in the game. It looks like if I wait her out, she gets impatient.

I look at my watch. I have to go.

Ned:I’ll be done here at the courthouse at five. Let’s meet after.

Ned:Please note, that gives you SEVERAL hours to bathe and get every last fleck of demon confetti permanently removed.

Olivia:Are you asking me out, Edwin?

Ned:Not if you’ll be covered in glitter later this evening.

Olivia:Fine. I’ll indulge you your glitter hatred this one time, but I get to pick what we’re doing.

I shake my head. Of course, she does.

Ned:Send me the address and I’ll call you when I’m done at the courthouse.

A link pops up on my phone and I open it, clicking on the pin she’s dropped on the map. The location is somewhere on the far side of the island that I don’t recognize. There’s no address or establishment listed, so I zoom in via satellite imagery, but the ground view only looks like an empty field.

Ned:Mysterious.

Olivia:All answers shall be revealed in time.

Ned:I have to go.

Olivia:Me too. I have to go get naked and wash off all this glorious glorious …

Another image pops up on my phone. It’s a picture of her legs—her naked legs, from her thighs down to her toes, and they’re wearing nothing but shimmery dust and sparkles.

Ned:Devil.

Olivia:I just want you to know what you’re missing.

Ned:I’m officially turning my phone off. I have to work.

Olivia:The next one’s going to be a video …

Ned:Goodbye, Olivia.

I click off my phone, my collar burning and my suit jacket too hot. I walk back into the courtroom way too turned on for being at my job, and that was a damn text message conversation! This woman is one hell of a distraction.

22

Ned

It’s about forty minutes to get from the city to the North Shore. I follow the GPS instructions leading to the pin Olivia sent. The directions start out normal, running up the coast, but then the directions turn up a side road and now I’m in the middle of the tropical jungle driving down a dirt road that probably leads to some secretJurassic Parkdinosaur farm on a hidden side of the island.

Eventually, the trees clear and the road opens up to a field, which is distinctly farm-like, with long stretches of grass and a barn. Thankfully, I see Olivia’s mint-green moped parked in a small driveway up ahead, so at least I’m in the right location.

I pull up next to her scooter and park, getting out and looking around. Olivia is nowhere to be found.

In front of me is a small house with a chain-link fence surrounding the perimeter that includes several acres behind the small home. I peer around the side to see what looks like a plant nursery. There are several greenhouses and hundreds of different exotic flowers and vines individually planted in buckets. Only, nothing is upkept. There are weeds and wild growth all over the place, patches around the buckets and house, grasses growing out of a pile of compost, and tall lines of underbrush breaking through some parts of the fence.

“Oh my, you are big!”

I turn to the voice to see an old, Asian woman wearing reading glasses and a yellow apron coming out of the house and walking toward me.

“Um, hello,” I say, greeting her. “I’m looking for Olivia.”

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