“Only people who have things to hide.”
Maybe he did have things to hide. Or at least, things he didn’t want every random stranger to know about. Was that so wrong?
“So no one is allowed to have a secret?” he argued. “Everyone has to be completely up-front about every single part of their past, every single thought that goes through their heads?”
“I believe in honesty,” she said.
“You don’t have any secrets, then.”
She hesitated a beat. “No.”
“Nothing in your past that you’d prefer people didn’t know about.”
“I’m not ashamed about anything I’ve done.”
“How many men have you slept with?”
“Billy! Good God, that is none of your business.”
“Wow, must be a lot.”
“I don’t believe you! How could you even— That is so inappropriate—” She sputtered to a stop.
“I’m just trying to prove a point! Everyone is allowed privacy—in their homes and inside their heads.”
“And I say if it’s on their face or in their gestures or their posture, and I’m adept at figuring it out, then the information is fair game. Everyone reads expression and body language. I just happen to be better at it than most people.”
“And I’m better at not being read than most people. So that means I’m dishonest? Lady, where do you get off?”
“There, right there. That is the first honest emotion I’ve seen from you. You’re in perfect congruence—chest thrust forward, arms splayed to take up as much room as possible in a classic male territorial display—”
“Stop reading me!”
“And you just crossed the line from irritated to really angry.”
“Ya think? And yet you don’t stop.”
“I can’t help it.” Her eyes inexplicably filled with tears.
“Here,” he said gruffly. “Read this.” He leaned across the gear shift, pulled up the parking brake and kissed her.
* * *
CLAUDIA’S SENSES SWAM as she leaned in to the kiss. Billy might have thought he was unreadable, but she’d seen the kiss coming a split second before he’d carried through with his intention.
And she’d welcomed it.
That was just crazy; she was mad at Billy. They were having an argument. And yet she’d felt this insane need to connect with him. He’d shown her only a tiny sliver of his true self just then, the self he wanted to protect from her prying eyes, and all at once she’d felt simultaneously guilty and turned on.
She believed very few people had seen what she’d just seen—the real Billy Cantu. And she wanted more.
He reached up to tunnel his fingers through her hair, settling his hand on the back of her head so he could hold her a willing prisoner.
She inhaled sharply as his tongue invaded her mouth. Of course his kiss would not be tentative. Billy didn’t have a tentative bone in his body.
Or maybe he did; what the hell did she know? He was a mystery she desperately needed to unravel. How could she feel such a profound attraction to someone she didn’t even know?
Though she would have been happy to make out in the front seat of her car for the rest of the morning, Billy gradually pulled away, ending the kiss with a series of gentle nibbles. They separated, but only by an inch or two, and she studied his eyes, trying to figure out his motive here.
Was this a display of dominance? Or had he really wanted to kiss her?
His pupils were dilated. She thought she saw desire there, but maybe she was seeing only what she wanted to see.
“Can you read me now?” he demanded.
“No.” The word came out a whisper.
He released her and sat back in his seat, and she almost whimpered at the loss of his touch. “Good. ’Cause you’d probably slap me.”
“Are you going to tell me what that was about?”
“No. You need to be off balance once in a while. For your own good.”
He was wrong about that. She’d spent the first half of her life off center, shuffled into the care of one ambivalent adult after another, never sure if the new place would be a safe haven or a house of horrors.
Off balance wasn’t where she cared to be.
And yet…the excitement generated by her uncertainty felt good in a deeply visceral way.
She pulled herself together, straightened her hair, blotted away the smeared lipstick with a tissue and added fresh. Finally she got back to the business of driving, following the instructions of the by-now-impatient GPS.
“Destination on the left,” the bland voice informed them as Claudia cruised slowly past.
Theresa Esteve obviously hadn’t achieved the level of wealth her sister had. This nameless neighborhood wasn’t nearly as grand as Pecan Grove. The small ranch houses had probably been built in the 1960s, and the residents here likely mowed their own grass and trimmed their own bushes.
But there was something wildly askew about Theresa’s house. The front window was boarded up with plywood.
Claudia double-checked her Day-Timer. “That’s the house, 1642 Baxter Avenue. What do you suppose happened here?” She turned the car around, pulled up to the curb and stopped.
“Stay in the car.” Billy manually unlocked his door. “I’ll check it out.”
Claudia ignored him. “It’s a vacant house. I doubt we’ll face any gunmen here.”
As they approached the front porch, Billy took a detour to examine a flash of yellow he saw on the picket fence that separated the house from the one next door. “Hey, Claudia, look at this. Crime scene tape.”
“Oh, my God. This might explain why Theresa won’t answer Mary-Francis’s calls.”
“I’m going to call a buddy of mine that works for the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Department. Maybe he can tell us what happened here.”
Claudia nodded and sat down on the edge of a brick planter filled with thirsty-looking azaleas. What was going on here? What had started as a simple request from a condemned woman had turned into a crazy scavenger hunt featuring a drug addict, her gun-toting boyfriend and a lost million-dollar coin collection. And now another possible crime victim.
She did not envy Billy his job right now.
Maybe it was time for her to wash her hands of this mess. She had dutifully turned over the information she had to Project Justice. She could write up her final report tonight, including data from both interviews. Once she finished that, the ball was in their court.
Except…except she was still the only person who was sure Mary-Francis didn’t kill her husband or know of his current whereabouts. The poor woman had no one to fight for her now. Certainly not her daughter, and now it appeared something had happened to her sister.
Antsy, Claudia stood again. She walked to the driveway, which was empty except for a few oil spots. The garage door had no windows, so she couldn’t look to see if there was a car. She ambled to the side of the house, where a short section of weathered wooden privacy fence guarded the backyard. But one of the slats was broken, and she peeked in.
A woman dressed in a bright pink track suit was busy digging around in a parched, overgrown garden. Could that be Theresa? It would explain why no one had