Hot Rocks

weren’t we, Darla?”
    “We certainly were.”
    “No need.” With something like panic, she willed Jenny to come back in. The interlude with Max had driven the grief and the worry over Willy out of her mind. Now, it was flooding back. “I’ll get those things I have on hold for you as soon as I’m finished here.”
    “Don’t you rush.” Carla was already angling her head so she could read the destination on the shipping form. “Our Laine prides herself on good customer service,” she told Max.
    “And certainly delivers. Ladies, you are a two-scoop treat for the eyes.”
    They blushed, in unison.
    “Your card, Mr. Gannon, and your receipt.”
    “Thank you, Ms. Tavish.”
    “I hope your mother enjoys her gift.”
    “I’m sure she will.” His eyes laughed into hers before he turned to the Twins. “Ladies.”
    The three women watched him walk out. There was a prolonged beat of silence, then Carla let out a long, long breath and said simply, “My, oh my.”
    Max’s smile faded the minute he was out on the street. He had nothing to feel guilty about, he told himself. Having a drink with an attractive woman at the end of the day was a normal, pleasant activity, and his inalienable right as a healthy, single man.
    Besides, he didn’t believe in feeling guilty. Lying, prevaricating, pretense and guile were all part of the job. And the fact was he hadn’t lied to her—yet.
    He walked half a block down where he could stand and look back at the spot where Willy had died.
    He’d only lie to her if she turned out to be part of this. And if she was, she was going to get a lot worse than a few smooth lies.
    What worried him was the not knowing, the not intuiting. He had a sense about these things, which was why he was good at his work. But Laine Tavish had blindsided him, and the only thing he’d felt was that slow, sugary slide of attraction.
    But big blue eyes and sexy smile aside, the odds were she was in it up to her pretty neck. He always went with the odds. Willy had paid her a visit and ended up splattered on the street outside her shop. Once he knew why, he was one step closer to the glittery end of the trail.
    If he had to use her to get there, those were the breaks.
    He went back to his hotel room and took the receipt from his pocket, carefully dusted it for prints. He had good ones of her thumb and forefinger. He took digital pictures and sent them to a friend who’d run them without asking irritating questions.
    Then he sat down, flexed his fingers and went to work on the information highway.
    He plowed through a pot of coffee, a chicken sandwich and really good apple pie while he worked. He had Laine’s home address and, between the phone and the computer, the information that she’d bought her home and established her business on Market four years before. Previously, she’d listed a Philadelphia address. A bit more research located it as an apartment building.
    With methods not strictly ethical, he spent more time peeling away the layers of Laine Tavish and began to get a picture. She’d graduated from Penn State, with her parents listed as Marilyn and Robert Tavish.
    Funny, wasn’t it? Max thought, tapping his fingers on the desk. Jack O’Hara’s wife was, or had been, Marilyn. And wasn’t that just a little too coincidental?
    “Up to your pretty neck,” he murmured and decided it was time for more serious hacking.
    There were ways and there were ways to eke out tidbits of information that led to more tidbits. Her business license had been, according to law, clearly displayed in her shop. And that license number gave him a springboard.
    Some creative finessing netted him the application for the license, and her social security number.
    He stuck with it, using the numbers, intuition and his own insatiable curiosity to track down the deed to her house through the county courthouse, and now he had the name of her lender should he want to break several laws and hack his way to her loan application.
    It would be fun because God knew he loved technology, but it would serve more purpose to find out where she’d come from rather than where she was now.
    He went back to the parents, began a search that required a second pot of coffee from room service. When he finally pinpointed Robert and Marilyn Tavish in Taos, New Mexico, he shook his head.
    Laine didn’t strike him as a flower of the West. No, she was East, he thought, and largely urban. But Bob and Marilyn, as he was thinking of