“Hot, humid and full of husband-hungry widows,” he answered with a snort. “I love it,” he added with a gusty explosion of laughter. “How are things there?”
“About the same as usual. The shop keeps me busy. You know business is always good in the spring when people clean out their attics and basements.”
“Are you still dragging home abandoned crap?”
Libby laughed. “Anything that’s left unclaimed, and you know it isn’t crap. It’s history. Everything I bring home talks to me.”
“Huh, some men my age get grandchildren. I get a daughter whose furniture talks to her.” His gruff voice was full of affection. “What do you hear from that ex-husband of yours? Has he finally decided to leave you alone?”
“No such luck. As a matter of fact, there is a new detective sitting outside my apartment at this very moment.” Libby sighed. “Bill called me the other night wanting a reconciliation. He sounded like he’d had too much to drink. I think he figures I’ll get tired of being spied on and go back to him.”
“Will you?”
“Not a chance,” Libby answered without hesitation.
“You know all I want is for you to be happy. Well, I just wanted to check and see how you were getting along.” Vinnie began winding down the conversation and Libby smiled at the mental picture she had of him checking his watch and mentally calculating the cost of the long-distance phone call.
“I love you, Vinnie,” she breathed softly into the phone.
“I love you, too, doll. I’ll call you the same time next week.” With that he clicked off.
Libby replaced the receiver slowly, thoughtfully. She was glad her father was happy in Florida, but there were times when she really missed him. Since her mother’s death when she was three years old, it had always been Vinnie and Libby.
“Did you finish your gourmet supper?” she asked the cat, who strode regally across the floor from the kitchen and stretched out languidly on a colorful hook rug, his contented purring instantly filling the silence of the room.
Yawning, Libby stretched and looked at the antique clock that sat on the walnut bric-a-brac shelf. It was only a few minutes after eight o’clock, but she was exhausted. It had been a particularly busy day at the pawnshop.
She got up from the sofa with another tired yawn and went into the bedroom. She walked over to the wardrobe in the corner and pulled out a blue lace teddy. Laying it on the bed, she quickly undressed, pulling off the skirt and blouse she had worn to work that day. Slip and hose quickly followed, landing in a heap in the middle of the floor. She stepped into the teddy and pulled it up, pausing as her hand encountered the heavy gold necklace resting around her neck.
Going into the bathroom, she turned the necklace around and peered into the mirror above the sink, fumbling for a few moments with the sturdy, complicated fastening. Finally the necklace unclasped, sliding down her throat. She caught it and carried it into her bedroom where she set it on the table next to the bed.
It was a beautiful piece. It had been brought in only that morning by a diminutive old man. Libby had tried to talk him into pawning it, but he had insisted he wanted to sell it outright. He’d seemed anxious, in a hurry, and had accepted her first offer.
She turned down the blankets on her bed, a smile curving her lips as she thought of her conversation with Vinnie. Like the necklace, most of her apartment furnishings were items from the pawnshop, things that had never been reclaimed or items she’d bought outright. She tried to tell herself she brought them home for safekeeping, but the truth was she loved the curious mishmash of things people brought in to sell or to pawn for extra money.
On impulse, she walked back into the living room and shut off all the lights. She drew open her curtains and looked down on the street below. Still there… He was still down there watching her, spying on her. Her eyes narrowed as she saw the glow of a cigarette arcing away from the car window.
Good, let him stay down there all night, smoke a hundred cigarettes and develop a bad case of smoker’s cough. Maybe it would be cold tonight and he would be miserable in the confines of his car. Or better yet, let it rain…an arctic downpour that would chill him to the bones.
She turned away from the window with a smug smile of satisfaction, content that she had wished all the bad things she could think of on him. After all, it served him right. If he was going to intrude on her privacy, the least she could do was curse him to a horrible fate. She stifled a yawn with the back of her hand, allowing the curtains to fall back into place, then went back into the bedroom.
She crawled into bed and shut off the bedside lamp and within seconds she felt the bed depress beneath the weight of Twilight. Within minutes, Libby slept.
* * *
In the street below, Tony Pandolinni watched the light of the fourth-floor apartment go out. He slowly climbed out of the Buick and stretched his long, lean legs, almost enjoying the sensation of needles and pins that tickled at his feet, signaling that circulation had begun once again.
In all the advice, all the opinions he had solicited before leaving the police department and starting his own detective agency, nobody had mentioned the fact that the greatest risk a private detective faced was the loss of a limb from lack of circulation and/or death from perpetual boredom.
In the past year since beginning his own business, he had suffered plenty of both. While this particular assignment was proving quite boring, at least the subject was pleasant to look at. In fact, she was more than just pleasant—she was really very pretty.
His lips curved into a soft smile as he thought of the way she had waved her fingers at him just before disappearing into her apartment building. She had wanted him to know that she was on to him, that she was aware of the fact that he was following her. Her action had shown a certain amount of spunk. No wonder her ex-husband was reluctant to cut his ties with her. Pretty and spunky—it was an appealing package…
Tony shoved these thoughts from his mind. Keeping an eye on Libby Weatherby was merely a job. He’d give this particular job one more night and day, then he’d report back to the husband that Libby lived a boring, solitary existence. Then that would be the end of that.
He leaned back against his car and shook a cigarette out of the pack. Another hazard of this line of work—one tended to smoke too much. A nasty habit…he’d been trying unsuccessfully to quit for months. He lit the cigarette, his gaze going back to the darkened fourth-floor window. It was going to be a long, boring night.
* * *
