Flash

and get into the driver's seat. A terrible sense of certainty settled into her stomach.
    "Melwood's house is that narrow, two-story one on the left. You don't suppose… ?" She could not finish the question.
    "Be a hell of a coincidence, wouldn't it?" Jasper switched off the engine, pocketed the keys, and got out of the car. "I'll be right back"
    With his usual air of quiet authority, he started toward the nearest uniformed officer.
    Olivia shoved open her own door and started after him. She paused when she overheard a nearby conversation among two onlookers.
    "…wasn't paying attention. Never even saw the car. Hasn't been himself lately, you know."
    Olivia stopped. Jasper was already talking to the cops. She might as well see what the neighbors had to say.
    "What happened?" she asked a middle-aged woman.
    "Hit-and-run," the woman said. "No one saw it, but we heard the most ghastly thud. My husband is the one who called nine-one-one."
    "Who was hit?"
    "Melwood Gill." The woman pointed at the unlit windows of the narrow house in the middle of the block. "Lived over there. He always takes his walk at this time of night in the summer months. Regular as clockwork."
    Olivia tightened her grasp on the strap of her shoulder bag. Jasper had finished his conversation with the officer. He was walking back toward her.
    "
Lived
?" Olivia repeated carefully. "Past tense?"
    The woman looked at her. "I heard someone say poor Melwood was killed instantly."

    Forty minutes later, Jasper parked Olivia's car in her slot in the condominium building garage. The deeply troubled look on her face made him uneasy. She had said very little since learning of Melwood Gill's death. He knew she was going over the various possibilities and coming to the same unpleasant conclusions that he had reached.
    They walked to the elevator in silence. A short while later they stepped out of the cab into the hall. He took the key from her hand and shoved it into the lock.
    "I think we both need a drink," he said.
    He went into the kitchen to rummage through her cupboards. He knew he had seen a small bottle of cognac in one of them.
    Olivia stood watching him from the other side of the counter. "I still can't believe it. Hit-and-run."
    "Yes." He found the cognac and opened it. "There will be an investigation. But if the driver doesn't turn himself or herself in, it could be a long time, if ever, before the cops locate the owner of the car."
    "You're thinking what I'm thinking, aren't you?"
    "Probably." He finished pouring the cognac into two small glasses and turned to face her. He met her shadowed eyes through the opening above the kitchen counter. "But we could both be wrong. It really could have been an accident."
    She nodded slowly. "There's a general consensus of opinion that Melwood hadn't been himself for a while. He might not have been paying attention when he took his evening walk tonight. A drunk driver might have hit him and then fled the scene. Accidents happen."
    "So do coincidences," Jasper said quietly. "But I don't trust them. Gill was an embezzler and possibly a blackmailer. He could have been deliberately run down by someone who had a reason to want him dead."
    Olivia took the glass of cognac from him. It trembled ever so slightly in her hand. "Someone like you or me or Aunt Zara, you mean."
    "Not you and not me." He leaned back against the counter. "We have each other for an alibi."
    "Not Zara, either," Olivia said with absolute conviction. "I know it wasn't her. She didn't have a clue that we suspected Melwood. She's still hoping that the blackmailer is one of her old rivals."
    "What we don't know is how many other people might have been on Melwood's list of blackmail victims."
    "True." She took a sip of the cognac and looked at him very steadily. "But if he was getting the damaging information from Uncle Rollie's files, then we have to assume that, if there were any more victims, they're either family or closely tied to Glow, Inc."
    "Could be a long list."
    Olivia put down her glass and propped her elbows on the counter. "I realize I'm biased, but I honestly cannot imagine anyone in my family resorting to murder to stop someone like Melwood Gill."
    "It doesn't have to be a family member. As you said, it could be someone who is somehow tied to Glow, Inc. Someone with whom Rollie did business, perhaps."
    She met his eyes. "What are we going to do now?"
    "The first step," Jasper said, "is to take a look at Melwood Gill's personal