Sharon Riccardi, sitting on the porch steps of the main house at the Crawford compound, called to Huck as he headed up the brick walk after his dinner out, the night black under an overcast sky. Several lights were on in the house, but as he approached Sharon, he saw that she was drinking wine in the dark, wearing a long black, filmy sleeveless dress with a shawl and no jewelry. She tilted her head back and raised her glass at him. “I’ll bet the mosquitoes don’t dare to bite you.”

“I don’t know about that, Mrs. Riccardi.”

“You’re very fit, aren’t you?” She rose, somewhat unsteady on her feet; she wasn’t wearing shoes, although the night temperature was cold to go barefoot. “I like fit men.”

“Mrs. Riccardi-”

“ Sharon.” She sipped her wine, her black shawl falling into the crooks of her elbows. Her gaze drifted over him. “All that hard muscle. You’ll be an inspiration to the new men when they arrive.”

“Where’s your husband?”

“Inside, asleep.” She gestured toward a second-story window. “We get to live here in luxury. Don’t you think we’re lucky?”

“It’s a nice house.”

“Joe doesn’t even seem to notice. I think he’d be happiest living in a foxhole. All I’d need to do is drop in once in a while.” Her eyes raised to his. “Conjugal visits.”

Huck wondered how many glasses of wine she’d had and decided to keep asking questions. “He ever see combat?”

“I have no idea. I don’t know him that well.” She laughed at her own comment. “An odd thing to say, isn’t it? He’s a very private man. He was wounded by his first wife. Now he’s more careful about what he reveals.”

“You two seem to have a good thing going here with Breakwater.”

She gave a dismissive shrug. “Oliver always has something new for me to do. He’s had a rough time since he was kidnapped.” This time, she took a bigger drink of wine. “I remember those terrible days.”

“Did you ever lose hope?”

“No, I didn’t. He says he didn’t, but I don’t know. The kidnapping still haunts him. I believe it will until the day he dies. All he can hope for now is to see justice done.”

“The kidnappers-”

“Strange how fate works. We heard just this week that two of them were found recently in a remote camp in the Colombian Andes. They’d been tortured and executed.”

“Who found them?”

“A couple of emerald miners.” She tossed back her head, letting her hair curl down her back. “It looks as if the two thugs had enemies of their own.”

“Why were they tortured?”

“For information, I assume. Perhaps for the fun of it. Revenge. I don’t know.”

“You think they deserve what they got?” Huck said.

She raised her chin to him. “Yes, I do. Don’t you?”

“Absolutely.” Huck could feel his crab cakes, fries and coleslaw heavy in his stomach, but he’d stayed away from alcohol. “I’m not saying you torture and execute people for no reason. If these guys had useful information, why screw around? If they’re guilty of kidnapping, murder, drug dealing-hell. I’d pull the trigger myself.”

“Who would have to give the order?”

“I’m not a lapdog. I think for myself. I base my decisions on the situation and the existing options.”

Sharon Riccardi gave him a cool look. “What if the kidnappers had committed their crimes here, on U.S. soil?”

From his briefings, Huck knew what to say. “Doesn’t make any difference.”

“It’s not our job as private contractors to conduct interrogations and executions.”

He fixed his gaze on hers. If she wasn’t one of the vigilantes, she would have good reason not to put her trust in him. If she was-he needed to find out. “Law enforcement doesn’t have the necessary latitude to do what has to be done. They have to answer to politicians and protocols that don’t necessarily make any sense. We don’t.”

“We can’t break laws, of course,” she said, her tone difficult to read. As she adjusted her shawl, the V neck of her dress skewed to one side, exposing the soft curve of her breast. She smiled, touching the stem of her wineglass to her breast. “Oliver left us imported chocolate truffles. Care to indulge?”

Huck debated how to react. What if Sharon Riccardi didn’t give a rat’s ass what he thought about anything and just wanted to flirt? Or more, he thought.

But her husband walked out onto the porch. He was fully dressed and didn’t look at all as if he’d been sleeping. “ Sharon? What’s going on here?”

She didn’t so much as glance back at him. “We’ll have truffles another time, Mr. Boone. Enjoy the rest of your evening.”

“Thanks. I will.” Huck addressed Joe Riccardi. “We were just chatting. I’ll see you both tomorrow.”

When Huck got back to his room, he considered washing his mouth out with soap after all the nonsense he’d just spoken. His head pounded, and he dropped onto his back on his bunk, picturing ospreys and Quinn Harlowe’s quaint cottage and her pretty, hazel eyes, wondering what she was up to and why he didn’t think he and Diego had heard the last of her.

On a bright, warm Thursday ten days after Alicia had found her on the coffee-shop patio, Quinn took her espresso and almond biscotti out to the same table where she’d been sitting that beautiful afternoon. Returning was her way of signaling to herself that she was beginning to accept the reality of what had happened.

Alicia was dead, drowned, the autopsy on her body completed.

Her funeral had been two days ago in Chicago, a small, private affair. Alicia’s mother had all but asked Quinn not to attend, not out of any sense of animosity, she knew, but because they all would be tempted to rehash the last confused, troubled days.

“We want to celebrate Alicia’s life and remember her as she was.”

Nor, Quinn thought as she sank back in her chair in the warm sun, did anyone need to pretend that she and Alicia had remained all that close, the best of friends. The thaw that had started in March at Lattimore’s party had never had a chance to take hold. Now that the initial shock of Alicia’s death had eased, Quinn wondered how much borrowing the cottage had to do with her friend’s own ends and not with any conscious attempt to repair the strains in their friendship.

Yet, when she was frightened and melting down, Alicia had come to her, counting on the bond between them to see her through the crisis.

And I failed her.

As far as she was concerned, there were still unanswered questions-questions that she knew but couldn’t accept might never get answers.

Ivan, the coffee-shop owner, had told her that the mother and little boy hadn’t returned for their alphabet book. He said he’d heard about Alicia’s death and was sorry.

Quinn sipped her espresso but couldn’t work up any appetite for her biscotti.

The cherry blossoms had vanished, and the trees were leafed out, the shade welcome especially now as the temperatures climbed. With the afternoon temperature in the upper seventies, Quinn had worn sandals and a sundress-turquoise, another way to tell herself that she was better.

Someone pulled out the chair across from her, and she looked up, startled, as Steve Eisenhardt plopped down with an iced coffee. He gave her a disapproving sigh. “I go inside, I stand in line, I get my drink, I pay up-it’s a good thing you’re not a spy, Quinn. You never even saw me.” He grinned at her, his eyes crinkling in the bright sun. “I ducked out of work hoping I’d find you here. How’re you doing?”

“Preoccupied.”

“No kidding.”

“I’ve been spinning my wheels ever since I got back from Yorkville last week.” She drank some of her espresso. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I heard you’ve been invited to present a paper at an international crime symposium in Vienna.”

“That was easy. All I had to do was say yes, I’ll do it. It’s not until October.”