Will took a deep breath and then let it out forcibly through his nose. “You’d better get to work fixing Tobe’s face,” he advised. “I think you’re going to have a shiner, but let’s try to minimize the damage as much as possible.”
Jane carefully examined the cut, cleaning the broken skin. Then she covered it with a layer of ointment and topped it with a little bandage. “Try icing it as much as possible,” she advised, “just don’t rest anything cold on the eye itself. And if you feel sick or dizzy, go see a doctor. A people doctor,” she added with a strained smile.
“The other thing—you want to pick someplace where you fell, unless you want to say you walked into a door.” Will’s eyes were keen as he looked at Tobe. “Did anybody see this happen?”
Tobe shook his head. “It was a quiet street, and Jane bundled me into her car pretty quickly.”
“That’s good,” Will said. “Just decide on your story and stick to it. Now I have to get Sunny home. Then I’ll come back and drive you to Portsmouth.”
“You don’t have to do that,” Tobe said. “I can call a cab.”
“Sure you can,” Will told him, “if you want a witness and a record. Do you have a house or an apartment where people will see you?”
“Nope, I just closed on a house.” Tobe shifted the improvised ice pack again. “So that’s lucky.”
“Yeah.” Will looked from Sunny back to the front door. “We’d better get going.”
The air outside was getting cold again, but it was even frostier inside Will’s pickup. They drove in silence for a while, until Sunny finally cracked. “I didn’t want to tell you unless I had to,” she said. “I was trying to keep you from falling into this nonsense.”
“Uh-huh.” Will’s voice was toneless “I figured I’d better get you alone in case there were any other surprises you had for me. Stuff that Jane’s lawyer shouldn’t hear.”
“No, that’s it, I promise,” Sunny assured him. “And from the way you’re acting, you can see I did it for your own good.”
He made a wordless noise, then glanced over at her. “Well, I guess this trumps taking you out and then—what was the word?—‘whining’ over an old girlfriend.”
Sunny jerked up straight in her seat. “You’re keeping score now?”
Will gave her a rueful smile. “Apparently, it’s the closest I can come to keeping track of you.”
They arrived at Sunny’s house, and she gave him an impulsive kiss on the cheek. “I really am sorry.”
Will looked at her for a long moment. “I wish you could expand on that.” Sunny wasn’t sure whether he meant the apology or the kiss. Then he went to open the door. “Got to ferry Tobe home.”
Sunny laughed. “There’s a ride where I’d like to be a fly on the wall. Don’t give him a shiner on the other eye.”
Will waited till Sunny was in the doorway. She waved good-bye and came into an empty downstairs. As he always did when Sunny went out, Mike had gone up early, leaving the living room lights on. Lately, though, when she’d come home from a date, Sunny had found a reception committee. Shadow had always greeted her.
*
The next morning, Sunny groaned as she got out of bed. She’d hit the hay early enough, but her mind had kept racing around in circles. And then she’d had weird dreams, where Olek got in a fight with Shadow, and Shadow had knocked him down.
When Sunny came down the stairs, she found that Mike had made breakfast—a good thing. But he obviously hoped to hear something about last night. Sighing, Sunny gave him the whole story.
Mike stared. “You know, I’ve lived here all my life, and I never met people like you’re talking about.”
“Well, you were away a lot.” Sunny dropped the flip reply when she saw the look on her dad’s face. Yeah, thanks to his job Mike hadn’t been around for a lot of things . . . like the accident that took his wife’s life. “I mean, you’ve been lucky, Dad. These are people you wouldn’t want to run into. Besides, they’re Portsmouth people.”
The appeal to local pride won out. “Portsmouth,” Mike said in dismissive tones, as if that explained everything.
Sunny arrived at the office and settled into the usual Friday routine, where crowds of shoppers and couples called in with last-minute checks or disasters en route, and Sunny did her best to help them.
In a way, it was a comforting routine. Sunny was just sort of puttering mindlessly along when the office door opened and Dani Shostak came in. She sat, gawking, as he came up to her desk.
“The police, they start now to ask questions about the Dr. Rigsdale’s money,” he said. “Very soon now, I have to go somewhere like Montreal. I’d like to have my money back before I go there. Much less trouble.”
He tilted his head a little, his long, thin face contemplating Sunny. “You think whoever it was killed the doctor, they took the money? I keep on thinking it might still be in his house or office, but Olek says no. For a fellow with his size, he is very good at getting into places.”
