“That’s Nick,” Delia answered from the living room, dragging her naked Barbie around by the hair. “He’s a friend of Aunt Georgia’s.”
“Oh, yeah?” Steven’s smile was bitter under his ball cap, his tight fists punching an outline through the pockets of his sweatshirt.
“He and Mommy are dating.”
My eyes flew wide as I realized how this must look to him. I couldn’t remember the last time Steven had seen me wear makeup. Or anything other than pajamas, for that matter. I gestured to Nick. “We’re not… I mean, he’s not…”
“This is the attorney?” Steven glowered, his blue eyes raking over Nick with a look of disgust.
“No,” Delia said. “He’s a policeman. Like Aunt Georgia.”
I pulled Steven aside and said in a hushed voice, “You know Delia. She has no idea what she’s saying.”
“Why do you all keep saying that?” Delia huffed.
“Don’t forget to feed Christopher,” I called back to her.
“Christopher?” Nick asked, leaning close enough for his breath to warm the shell of my ear as Steven glared at him.
“Her goldfish,” I answered.
Delia padded into the foyer and tugged on her father’s sleeve. “Can we go get Sam today?”
Steven screwed up his face. “Who’s Sam?”
“The doggy at the shelter.” She gazed up at him with pleading eyes. “Aaron told me I could adopt him. But Mommy said since Christopher already lives here, Sam will have to live at Theresa’s house.”
Steven gritted his teeth. “She did, did she?”
“We should go,” I said, surprised when Nick’s hand found the small of my back on the way to the door. He smirked, making a grand gesture of holding it open for me as I blew kisses to my kids and told them I’d see them on Monday. I saw Steven’s face watching us through the window as Nick opened the passenger-side door for me. In my rearview mirror, Mrs. Haggerty’s curtains fluttered like a ghost. Nick got in and started the car.
“So,” he said, “tell me about this attorney.”
I spent most of the drive to the lab dodging Nick’s questions about my love life. Everything that came out of my mouth was the truth; I wasn’t dating an attorney. Not technically. Technically, I wasn’t dating JulianorNick. But knowing Nick, he would probably investigate my claims himself. And I hoped that investigation wouldn’t take him back to The Lush.
By the time we pulled into the parking lot, I was grateful for the distraction. Nick clipped a visitor badge to the collar of my shirt, then clipped one to his.
“What are you expecting to find?” I asked as we crossed the bright two-story lobby of the regional forensics lab.
Nick headed for a set of long, winding stairs, nodding at the lab techs as we passed and greeting them by name. He waited until they were out of earshot before answering. “When we tailed Feliks and Theresa, they drove to four different properties without stepping foot on a single one of them. They never even stopped the car. But there was soil and grass stuck to the undercarriage of Feliks’s Lincoln that day. Which means they’d been off-roading somewhere pretty recently.” Nick’s pace quickened as he climbed the stairs, his focus sharpening. “My guess is he’s found a piece of land already, or at least one he’s seriously interested in. If I can figure out where it is and how it’s zoned, I can probably guess what he’s planning to do with it. Or at least be one step ahead of him when he buys it.”
“Why?”
“Feliks never records the deeds in his own name. He uses straw men or dummy corporations, which makes his holdings harder to find. If I know what name he’s using as a front when he buys this lot, I might be able to use that information to track down a few others.”
“And do what?”
“Raid them. See what kind of dirt I can turn up.”
“What does that have to do with Theresa and Harris Mickler?”
“Maybe nothing. But I’d love to find a reason to bring Feliks into the station, stuff him in an interrogation room, and find out.”
Nick’s long legs ate the stairs two at a time, his pace eager as we neared the top.
“And the guys in the lab can figure all this out with a piece of dirt?” I asked, struggling to keep up.
“I wasn’t sure. It seemed like a long shot, but the call I got this morning sounded promising.” Nick pushed open a door and held itopen for me. He led us to a lab at the end of the hall and rapped on the window glass. A tech in a white coat waved us inside.
