Rachel Goddard 01 - The Heat of the Moon

would never willingly give me. The file might be in her office, but I couldn’t get into her office. I had to hope it was in her study at home, the off-limits place where I’d never before had reason to trespass.
    I shifted my schedule so I’d be free on a Wednesday, Rosario’s day off. That morning I left the house before Mother and Michelle, with the explanation that I’d promised to visit several rehabbers and examine the animals they were working with. I did, in fact, drive over to Vienna and examine a blue jay with a broken wing and a litter of orphaned baby rabbits. When I finished, I returned home.
    I felt sneaky, pulling into my own driveway just before ten o’clock. I got out and stood by the car for a moment, the sun’s heat pressing along my arms and cheeks. A cacophony of bird song rose in the humid, still air, and I concentrated to pick out a Carolina wren and a song sparrow.
    I was stalling, with no good reason. No one would be home until Michelle came in around three. I took a deep breath. My heart thudded. Do it.
    Inside, I sprinted up the stairs and pulled the lock book from under my mattress and the little brown sack of tools from my desk drawer. I thumped back down the steps, grabbed the flashlight from a kitchen drawer, and crossed the hall to Mother’s study.
    Sunlight glared through the wide windows, flashing off the desktop and the slick-jacketed books that filled a wall of shelves. The scent of lemon polish hung in the air. Overhead I heard the distant roar of an airplane.
    Sitting cross-legged on the beige carpet, I opened the lock book to the right section, then shook out the sack’s contents. Paper clips. A length of stiff wire cut from a coat hanger. A putty knife. Two flathead screwdrivers, a set of slender miniature screwdrivers, a long metal nail file.
    All right. I rose to my knees to study the oak filing cabinets. Four drawers in each cabinet, a lock on every drawer. The book made lockpicking seem easy, and I was certain someone with my manual dexterity could do it even with crude tools.
    But faced with the reality of bolts and tight drawers, I fumbled and struggled.
    If these were ordinary metal cabinets I might have been able to maneuver them open. But Mother had invested in expensive units with strong locks and drawers that fit perfectly flush. I couldn’t get a screwdriver between the cabinet face and a drawer, much less pull a drawer out enough to insert the coat hanger wire behind it and ease back the bolt.
    One by one I tried each of my tools in the keyholes. Coat hanger wire, paper clip, mini screwdrivers. With my ear close to the lock I listened for any faint sign that the bolt was yielding.
    I was startled by the slap of metal against metal, racketing down the hallway from the front door. I froze. Who? The plop of mail falling through the slot to the foyer floor left me limp with relief.
    Swiping at the moisture on my upper lip, I got to my feet, rolled Mother’s red leather chair from under the desk and sank into it. What had possessed me to think I could do this quickly and easily? I’d thought it was like surgery, requiring only a knowledge of the parts involved and a deft touch. But I hadn’t learned surgery from a book, and I couldn’t learn lockpicking by reading about it. Even if I had the right tools, I’d probably have to practice for hours or days before I could do it.
    I swiveled to my right. The desk had two file drawers. Expecting resistance, I yanked angrily at one of them. It flew open and banged my right knee, making me yelp. I saw a collection of file folders. With one hand I rubbed my throbbing knee—I’d have a nasty bruise—and with the other I searched the folders. Clippings from psychology journals and newspapers. Drafts of papers Mother was writing.
    I swung around and tried the other big drawer. It held only half a dozen folders, all of them containing what appeared to be final drafts of articles.
    My disappointment was irrational, since I couldn’t expect to find anything sensitive in an unlocked drawer, but knowing that made no difference in how I felt. Idly, certain it was useless, I slid open each of the desk’s small side and center drawers. Pencils, pens, index cards, sticky notes, all neatly arranged, a place for everything and everything in its place. I was about to close the center drawer when I caught a glint of metal in a rear corner. I reached back and pulled out a key ring.
    Most of the dozen keys had familiar shapes.