“I found her.”

“And?”

“Hang on to yourself, Hunter,” I told him. “I found Alison, and two minutes later someone shot her. She’s badly hurt.” The pause was so long, I was compelled to ask, “Are you still there?”

“How bad?” he asked. “Will she live?”

I told him I didn’t know and why.

“The sheriff assaulted you?!” Truman was clearly outraged. “The bastard assaulted you?!”

“Kinda makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”

“Fuck, yeah,” he said. A moment later, he added, “Shit, Taylor, what’s going on?”

I told him my only theory. “It wasn’t Alison who was shot—”

“Not Alison?”

“What I mean is, I think whoever shot her was shooting at Michael Bettich, the person she’s pretending to be.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, but it might be connected to a small resort she’s building across the highway from a proposed Indian gambling casino.”

“She’s building a resort?”

Truman was asking too many questions; my head started to throb violently.

“I’ll tell you more after I have a chance to get back up there and poke around,” I told him, hoping to end the conversation. “Assuming I can avoid the county cops.”

“Fuck ’em!” Truman said so loudly it hurt my ear. “You get your ass back up there; I’m officially authorizing you to do that. You find out what you can about Alison, and if the cops get in the way, we’ll sue the shit outta the whole fucking lot of ’em.”

“Whatever.”

I was pleased that Truman was still paying, but even if he had pulled the plug, I would have gone back.

“When are you leaving?” he asked.

“Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?! Why not today?”

I told him I had to go and quickly hung up the phone. My head couldn’t take any more.

“Hi, Desirée. Cynthia Grey, please,” I told her office manager-cum-Doberman about an hour later. I hadn’t been able to reach Cynthia at home, so I tried the office.

“Whom may I say is calling?”

“Holland Taylor.” As if she didn’t know.

“Miss Grey is in meetings all day. However, I will inform her that you called.”

“Please don’t do this, Desirée; I need her.” I wondered if my voice sounded as pathetic to her as it did to me. Probably, because she put me through.

“Holland?” Cynthia asked. “Are you okay? Desirée says you sound funny.”

“If you really want a laugh, you should see how I look,” I told her.

“What’s going on?”

I gave her the short version, lingering on my injuries only long enough to solicit her sympathy. When I had finished, she told me, “Come home. You did your job. You found her. Now come home.”

“I can’t,” I told her. “I have to know—”

“If you’re responsible?” she finished my sentence. “Don’t give me any of that male-pride bullshit,” Cynthia added earnestly. “And I don’t want to hear how a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do. You come home. Right now. You come home to me before you get hurt again.”

“Will you take care of Ogilvy for me?” I asked. “Make sure he has plenty of alfalfa and water?”

Cynthia hesitated before saying, “Of course.” Then she added, “I hope he eats your Nolan Ryan autographed baseball.”

That hurt.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” I promised.

“Please do.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“I know.”

“It’s personal now,” I told her. “Maybe it always was.”

“I know.”

I hung up the phone and stared out the window. Every muscle and bone in my body hurt. Even thinking hurt. “Run it off,” my coach used to say. That had been his cure for everything. “Run it off, sweat it out.” During those few brief years when I had the audacity to consider myself an athlete, I would follow his advice like it had come down from Mount Sinai. I wondered what had become of him as I crawled back into bed and pulled the blankets to my chin.

Dean Bernelle can’t cook. He was one of those older-generation gentlemen who bought into the theory that cooking, that anything to do with the kitchen, was women’s work. But he made a valiant effort nonetheless, whipping up fried eggs, toast, and canned chili for a late lunch. I thanked him profusely even though the toast was burned and the yolks of the eggs were rubbery.

The death of his daughter, Laura, and his granddaughter, Jennifer, had hit him especially hard. Yet he never discussed it. At least not that I was aware of. But it was always there, just below the surface.

“I’m putting in a wall of blueberry bushes near the shed,” he told me. “I remember Jenny used to love picking blueberries. She’d eat a berry for every one she dropped in the bucket, then come home with her mouth and fingers all purple. Laurie would get so angry at us.”

“That was just for show,” I told him. “Mostly she didn’t mind at all.”

“Guess you’re right,” he agreed, then rapidly changed the subject. “Are you in trouble?” he asked. “Do you need help?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You look it.”

“I admit I could have used a hand yesterday.”

“Cops beat you up, is that right?”

I nodded.

“They used to do the same thing when I was young. They see a guy they thought was trouble, they’d smack him around a little just to keep him in line. I saw that a lot when I was young. I bet you did the same when you were a cop.”

“No, not at all,” I assured him.

Dean just smiled. I don’t think he believed me.

“You’re going back, aren’t you?” he asked.

“Back where?”

“Back where they beat you up.”

“I suppose,” I admitted.

“Yeah, I knew it. I remember telling Laurie when she first started bringing you around, ‘One thing about Taylor,’ I said. ‘He’s no quitter. He’s not going to quit on you. He’s like a marine. You can kill him, but he’s not going to quit.’”

“Did you really say that?”

“Yes, I did.”

“No wonder it took her so long to accept my marriage proposal.”

“Don’t give me that,” he said. “If you only had the guts to ask, she would have married you the weekend after you two met.”

“Really? She said that?”

Dean nodded.

The things you learn.

The warm sun played peekaboo behind white, fluffy, daydream clouds—perfect weather for lake watching. I descended the long, steep flight of stairs that led from the Bernelles’ home on top of the hill to the lake below, carrying three cans of beer that I’d found in the refrigerator. About halfway down I realized I was overburdened and stopped for a half hour to drink one of the beers. My load reduced, I continued to the L-shaped dock, making myself comfortable on the bench at the base of the L.

Like most forms of human endeavor, lake watching can be elevated to an art form in the proper hands. Me? I’m the Monet of lake watching. I can do it for hours, thinking about nothing and everything, whereas less dedicated artists grow weary and bored after thirty minutes or so. The difference is that most people look for answers in the gently rippling waves while I search only for questions.

“I wonder how much that cost?” was one of the questions. It was directed at the sailboat moored to the stem of the L. I remember the day Phyllis had launched it. Dean and Laura had both asked, “Where did you get it?” I asked, “How much did it cost?” I wondered what that said about me.

I was tempted to pollute Phyll’s lake with the empty beer cans, thought better of it, and set them on the dock. A short time later Phyllis herself came down the stairs. The sports jacket was gone. In its place were pink shorts and a white tank top. She was a fetching woman, my mother-in-law. Like her daughter.

She sat next to me and looked out over the lake. She asked me how I was feeling, and I said I was okay and asked her how the meeting went, and she said the customer bought all five lots. The exchange pretty much exhausted us, and we sat there without speaking for a good half hour. Finally, Phyllis took my hand, gave it a tug, and asked straight out, “Have you found anyone yet?”