With much love and affection, this book is dedicated to

Aunt Glenda, who enthusiastically showed me the other

side of the world and shared her endless curiosity.

My sincere thanks go to the following: Leslea, for not abandoning me to marry a Chinese man; Callie, for sharing her personal phobias of big fish and murky water; and Jo George, aka Mom, for taking me to China as your “paid companion.” To Mike, for your love and support and for understanding your wife’s wanderlust. Uncle Andy, for giving me a glimpse of what it’s like to work in China. As always, my agent, Karen Solem, who may well be the smartest woman on the planet, and Natashya Wilson, who’s definitely an editor prodigy. To the Wet Noodle Posse, may the publishing gods smile on each of you that you may sell bountiful books. And many thanks to my older brother, Dan George, who turned me on to great music at a very young age. Rock on, bro!

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Coming Next Month

With the phone clutched in one hand and a mechanical pencil in the other, I stared at the sequence of numbers I’d just scribbled on an already crowded notepad. “This all looks to be in order, except for one thing. You say I have another checking account, at a bank in Kansas, with a balance of over two hundred thousand bucks.”

The nice lady at the mortgage company was getting less nice by the second. “It’s right here, on your report. Whitney Pearl, home address in Midland, Texas. You opened the account two weeks ago.”

“I’ve been in Washington, D.C., the past two weeks. How could I open an account in Kansas?” Why would I open an account in Kansas? I don’t even know anybody in Kansas.

“You can open an account on the Internet, or by mail.”

“There must be a mistake. They got the wrong social security number.”

“Could be, but I doubt it. I suggest you get this resolved. Anything not nailed down can be cause for the application to be rejected.”

Wondering why I’d been stupid enough to buy a house while I was on a consulting job over two thousand miles away from home, I told her I’d let her know, then hung up and dialed the Kansas bank. I got Shirley, in new accounts. Not sure, but based on the sound of her voice, I think Shirley started smoking at age twelve. I explained the situation, then listened while she pecked at the computer.

“Got it right here. Whitney Ann Pearl. Midland, Texas.” She asked for my social security number, verified it, then rattled off some other bona fides.

“How was the account opened?”

“Through the Internet.” She pecked some more. “Hang on and let me pull the signature card.”

I stared out my sixth-floor window of the Mills Building and watched the guards atop the White House, one block away. It had become a favorite pastime, ever since I started the engagement with CERF, the Chinese Earthquake Relief Fund. Thus far, I’d resisted buying a set of binoculars. Still, the tall one who worked the seven-to-three shift looked mighty fine, even from a block away.

“Here we are,” Shirley said. “Whitney A. Pearl.”

“And the balance is over two hundred thousand dollars?”

She pecked some more and I wondered what I was gonna have to do to get this straightened out.

“It’s $200,396.l4. There have been twelve deposits since opening, and four withdrawals.”

I’m a CPA. I know how these things work. Shirley was at a computer in a Kansas bank lobby, and there was no way she could give me any more information. “Thank you for your help,” I said as graciously as possible, in spite of being seriously annoyed. After all, it wasn’t Shirley’s fault. “I wonder if I could speak to someone in bookkeeping?”

“Hold, please.”

I watched the guards while listening to an elevator music version of Aerosmith’s “Dream On.” That was painful. Eventually, a woman named Courtney picked up. I asked for copies of the deposits, along with information about the withdrawals, and was pleasantly surprised when she said she’d fax me the information. Hmm. Maybe I really would open a bank account in Kansas. My bank in Midland would laugh me off the planet before they’d send me diddly squat.

Within thirty minutes, I had the copies.

And nearly had a heart attack.

Almost five hundred thousand dollars, and every single check came from CERF, the organization that had contracted me to act as accounting watchdog to ensure nobody stuck their fingers in the enormous amount of money the good people of the world donated to help the victims of the recent earthquake in China. I stared at the deposits in shock and total confusion. How had all that money ended up in a bank account with my name on it? Me, the CPA in charge of keeping an eye on the dough.

The checks were written to China Pearl, a Chinese company that manufactures generators and fuel pumps and other large equipment. I knew China Pearl was legitimate because I’d checked it out myself. Part of my job was to verify that invoices weren’t paid to phony companies.

The checks to China Pearl that were deposited into the Kansas bank account were endorsed “for deposit only” to the account number. China Pearl. Not so far from Whitney Pearl. My nickname is Pink and I occasionally get a check made out to Pink Pearl, which I deposit into my account named Whitney Pearl without any questions asked. Get that last name right and the tellers never blink.

I stared at those deposits and wanted to hurl. Somebody had opened an account in my name, then deposited the China Pearl checks into it.

Reaching for the withdrawal copies, I saw that all four of them were transfers into the account of Valikov Interiors. Bells started ringing and, honest to God, my skin crawled so bad it’s a wonder I didn’t become an instant skeleton. I grabbed the phone and called my mother’s cell, praying she was still in the airport, that she hadn’t boarded the plane yet. She had a one o’clock flight to Washington, on her way to accompany me to a birthday dinner for Steve Santorelli, a senator from California who’s a good friend of mine.

She answered on the fourth ring, breathless. “It doesn’t matter what else you forgot, Pink. I don’t have time to get it. They’re boarding the plane.”

“Just answer me a question. Yesterday, when you went over to my apartment to get my wool coat, remember the package you found on the doorstep that had an antique Chinese spider cage inside?”

“If you want me to go get it—”

“No. I just wondered if you remember where it came from.”

“I thought you decided it was a gift from Santorelli.”

“He told me this morning that it wasn’t, so I assumed it was just a mistake. Now I’m pretty sure it’s not a mistake. But I have to know who shipped it.”

Mom was quiet for a moment and I could hear the airport lady on the loudspeaker, calling the remaining passengers. “The company was in San Francisco, and the name was something Russian, like Vladivostok. ”

“Was it Valikov?”

“Yes, that’s it. What’s this about, Pink?”

Her Mom radar was kicking into gear, and I didn’t want to alarm her, so I said easily, “I was telling someone about it and they were curious who sells antique Chinese spider cages.”

“I’m about to miss the plane for this? Seriously?”

“Okay, so I have a reason. I’ll tell you all about it when you get here.”

“No way. I’ll call you from my layover in Dallas.”

She ended the call and I slowly replaced the receiver, my gaze frozen on those withdrawals. More than three hundred grand had been transferred out of an account with my name on it to the account of Valikov Interiors. And I’d received a package from Valikov.

I’m pretty much a linear thinker. Point A goes to Point B, to Point C, and so forth. Somebody set up an account in Kansas with my name and social security number. That person somehow got their hands on the China Pearl checks and deposited them into the Kansas account. They transferred money out of the Kansas account and into Valikov Interiors’ account. They sent a package to me from Valikov so it would appear I bought something from them. Whoever was behind it was very clever, except for one thing. Who the hell would believe I’d pay over three hundred Gs for a Chinese spider cage? Even an antique one.

To say I was pissed off would be like saying there’s a little bit of wheat in Kansas. I was so mad, my teeth hurt.

Gathering up the copies, I left my office and went down the hall toward the executive director’s. I rapped on his door frame to get his attention. He looked up from some papers on his desk and grinned at me, but as I walked in his office, his grin faded.

“Pink? What’s wrong?”

Parker Davis could easily be in the movies, he’s that good-looking. He’d always get the part of the backup guy for Gene Hackman, the faithful, handsome, blond, blue-eyed assistant who blindly trusts Hackman’s sneaky, evil character. Maybe I think so because Parker is married to a senator, and he’s totally devoted to her. Not that Madeline Davis is anything like a Gene Hackman character. But Parker’s unfailing support and willingness to take a backseat to his wife’s career always make me think of those trusting souls in political thrillers.

“I just found out that I’m an embezzler.” I tossed the papers onto his desk and briefly explained.

Looking like a diver whose equipment just failed, Parker leaned back in his chair and read through the papers. His face paled in spite of his golfer’s tan. While he fiddled with his watch, a nervous habit I’d seen a hundred times, he mumbled “Oh, my God” over and over.

“We have to get to the bottom of this, immediately,” I said. “Not only because CERF is getting ripped off, but because I don’t wanna spend my childbearing years locked up with hundreds of other ovaries for something I didn’t do.”

He picked up the phone and punched in three numbers. “Taylor, I need to see you, right away.”

Oh, man. Things were about to get infinitely more complicated. And aggravating.

Within a minute, Taylor Bunch sailed into Parker’s office on a wave of too-strong perfume and in a lime green suit. I noted that she’d put her pale blond hair up in a snazzy little twist. Maybe I would have liked her, if I hadn’t disliked her so much. I just don’t feel the love for people who are mean, nasty and sneaky. If they made a movie about Taylor, they’d make her a man and get Gene Hackman to play the part.

In my other life, which ended last summer, I was a senior manager at a Big Important worldwide CPA firm in Dallas. That career, and that life, were over after I blew the whistle on one of our largest clients. Turned out the partners at my firm were all in on the cover-up to hoodwink investors—and that was the end of Big Important.

Taylor Bunch was promoted to my job the day I got fired for blowing the whistle. Regrettably for Taylor, she only got to crow about it for a few short weeks. After that, she was beating the streets for a job, and just like me and all the other CPAs who’d been in management at Big Important, she couldn’t find anyone who trusted her enough to hire her. I ended up moving back to my hometown of Midland, Texas, and taking a mercy job as a forensic accountant at my mom’s CPA firm. I’d gotten my watchdog stint at CERF through a contract with Mom’s firm.

As for Taylor, she eventually found a job in the Texas state welfare system, churning out financial data for bureaucrats. That was how she met Parker Davis. He was the director of a children’s advocacy group and came to speak at one of those lunch things that no one would go to except for the free lunch and an extra hour off work. When Parker was tapped to head up the relief fund after the China earthquake, he called Taylor and asked her to step in as treasurer. Soon after, Parker hired me to keep an eye on things, unaware of the animosity between Taylor and me.

I can only describe the expression on Taylor’s semipretty face as joyful as she looked over the copies I’d brought to Parker. She couldn’t have seemed more happy if she’d won the lottery, had a proposal from Brad Pitt and earned the Nobel Prize, all in one day. Yeah, I hated her guts.

She looked at me and raised one perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “Why should we believe you didn’t do this?”

I ignored her and said to Parker, “I want your authorization to investigate and find out who’s behind this.”

Taylor stepped into my line of vision and said smugly, “Parker didn’t get where he’s at by being stupid. Why would he allow you to look into it when your name’s on the account?”

Looking genuinely confused and freaked out, twisting his watch round and round, Parker glanced from me to Taylor and back to me. “She’s got a point. I’m sure you’re not behind this, Pink, but whatever comes to light, it will look mighty weird if you’re the one who finds it.”

Still ignoring Taylor, I stepped away from her. “Maybe so, but if you put Taylor in charge of investigating, they’ll lock me up and throw away the key. She hates the ground I walk on.” It was the first time I’d openly acknowledged the bad blood between me and Taylor. If only I hadn’t squealed, she figured, she’d still be in a peachy position at Big Important. She never quite got that if I hadn’t blown the whistle, I wouldn’t have been fired, and she wouldn’t have had the position. All she could see was that she’d lost her job, and it was all my fault. Never mind that thousands of people lost their life savings and retirement funds. It was all about Taylor.

“Are you saying I’d fail in my responsibility, all because of some personal vendetta?” Taylor sounded righteously offended.

“Gimme a break.” I looked straight at her. “After I got promoted, you told everyone that you saw me going into the Crescent Hotel with the managing partner, effectively making my success a sexual exclamation point. You took pictures of me at Laura’s bachelorette party, while I was modeling lingerie and dancing with a male stripper, then made sure those pictures showed up at the office, where they were passed around to everyone, including the managing partner. And let’s not forget how the Bellington audit files disappeared from my office and turned up at the coffeehouse down the street. That made me look like a complete moron and could have gotten me fired, except that I happened to have gone to the emergency room that day because a friend was in a car wreck.”

I folded my arms across my chest and stared her down. I was on a roll. “You despise me, which isn’t my problem—unless you’re the only thing standing between me and prison.” Looking back at Parker, I said emphatically, “I am not going to prison.”

Clearly at a loss, he focused on Taylor. “If you dislike Pink so much, how can you look into this with any kind of objectivity?”

Taylor glared at me as she spoke. “Obviously, someone is stealing from this organization. My concern isn’t for Pink, but for all those unfortunate people in China who need this money to rebuild their lives. I can be objective because of them, because it’s important to stop whoever’s doing this.”

She said the magic words. Parker is one of those people whose goal in life is to save the world, to alleviate suffering, to make certain that truth and justice prevail. And he’s incapable of believing the worst in anybody. He practically beamed at Taylor. I knew I was toast.

“Pink,” he said patiently, “I believe Taylor is up to the task, and I’m certain she’ll leave no stone unturned to find out who’s behind this. In the meantime, let’s carry on as usual and keep this between the three of us. If the media get wind of this, CERF will be a distant memory. No one will send any more contributions, and even though we’ve got a lot to work with, we need a lot more.”

I didn’t have much of a choice but to accept his decision. The only alternative was to call the cops, and that was definitely not in my best interest.

With conflicting emotions that ranged from fear to fury, I made my way back to my office and did my best to concentrate on work. Thirty minutes later, Mom called from DFW airport and demanded to know what was going on. I told her.

And she wigged out. Mom is something of a pessimist, although she claims only to be a realist. She went off on me about prison, that Taylor would sell me down the river, that whoever was behind it had clearly set it up for me to be the scapegoat. “You have to look into this yourself, Pink. I’ll help.”

“It’s out of my hands, Mom.”

“That’s a load of BS. Somebody framed you. For all we know, it could be Taylor, and there’s no way we’re leaving this up to her. If Parker Davis wants to argue about it, we’ll sic Ed on him. And speaking of Ed, have you called him?”

“Ed can’t do anything, Mom. Why freak him out?”

“He’s your attorney, Pink. And you like him.” She was quiet for a moment, then asked, “Have you talked to Ed since you’ve been in Washington?”

“Once.”

“You’ve been gone over two weeks. What’s up? Is this about that stupid billboard thing?”

No use lying. It would only prolong the misery. “I was so certain it was Ed who bought the billboard. After Steve Santorelli gave me a Mercedes, Ed made it sound like a contest, like he had to one-up Steve. A few days later, I see a Midland billboard that says Marry Me, Pink. Who wouldn’t think it was Ed?”

“You should have found out for sure before you went over to Ed’s and said no.”

“Gee, thanks, Mom.”

“No need to be sarcastic.”

I sighed and broke a pencil in half. “I’m sorry. Just thinking about that day makes me queasy.” It didn’t help that my first reaction was elation. Ed wanted me to marry him, and how awesomely romantic to ask on a billboard. I remembered feeling euphoric, my mind skipping ahead to what life as Mrs. Ed Ravenaldt would be like. We’d live in Ed’s quaint fixer-upper on the east side of old Midland. We’d get a cat. We’d meet at home during lunch and make crazy, passionate love to each other.

Then, less than twenty-four hours after seeing the billboard, reality set in. Bad memories from my disastrous first marriage moved in on all those squishy, happy thoughts and ruined everything. My ex-husband was a flaming philanderer. Ask any woman who’s been involved with a cheater and she’ll verify, it’s next to impossible to trust another man. I knew I couldn’t take it, the wondering every time Ed was out of pocket. I could hang out with Ed, sleep with him, spend entire weekends with him. But I couldn’t marry him. So I went over there and told him. When he said he wasn’t the one who bought the billboard, it was way beyond awkward.

Ed was pretty pissed, and who could blame him? I mean, what a bummer to get turned down before the question is asked. He was also pretty unhappy that Steve Santorelli was wowing me with romantic billboards. I had only myself to blame for that. Before I said no to Ed, I went on and on about how the billboard was awesome, how much it meant, and how clever. Blah, blah, blah. After that, Ed said he needed some space, that maybe it would be better if we didn’t see each other for a while.

It wasn’t just the billboard, and I knew that. As much as Ed and I are a perfect fit, our relationship from day one, when I hired him as my attorney during the whistle-blower thing, has been one of extremes. We’re either completely in tune with each other, or metaphorically facing each other over pistols at dawn.

Three days after the billboard fiasco, a catastrophic earthquake hit China, killing over two hundred thousand people, with thousands more injured or missing. Mom’s sister, Frederica, had spent nine years in China and still has a lot of friends there. Within twenty-four hours of the quake, she’d talked me into going with her to China, to help the survivors. After two weeks of horrors I’d never believe if I hadn’t seen them with my own eyes, I came back to the States. I’d scarcely unpacked before I got a call from Parker, asking me to come to Washington and help out at CERF.

Within the week, I was living in a small furnished loft in Washington, D.C., working for CERF, feeling like I was following my destiny. After what I saw in China, I was as passionate as Parker. Maybe more so.

“Call Ed,” Mom said now. “You’re in a bad spot, Pink, and he can help you. Whatever personal problems you have with Ed are irrelevant.”

She had a point. “He may tell me to go to hell.”

“No, he won’t.” She cleared her throat. “I need to go. I still don’t know why I let you talk me into this. The whole thing is making me antsy.”

Cripes. For at least the fortieth time, I wished I hadn’t convinced Mom to accept the invitation to the birthday dinner Steve’s dad was hosting. She was driving me nuts about it.

Mom grew up on a dirt farm in a family of ten kids, poor as Job’s turkey. She married right out of high school, had me, and became the ultimate hausfrau. When I was in college, she got up from her doormat position and told my dad to stick his autocratic belligerence where the sun don’t shine. She divorced him, went to college, and became a CPA. She’s a pretty woman. She’s a barracuda in business. But deep inside, she’s still a poor kid from the sticks, only one step away from her white-trash roots. Or so she thinks. On top of that, she has real issues with men. Now the thought of a romantic relationship flips her out, I guess because she’s afraid she’ll go back into doormat position. She avoids serious romance as diligently as she avoids IRS audits for her clients.

The birthday dinner posed a double threat. There would be senators, diplomats and Washington bigwigs there, and even though Mom can be as polished as the best of them, that kind of company scares her to death.

The other threat came from Steve’s dad. Despite my assurances that she was invited to the party as a courtesy, her romance antennae had gone haywire because Lou Santorelli called her to offer the invitation long before the invitations were mailed.

Okay, the truth is, Lou did ask Mom because he’s got a thing for her. But Mom couldn’t possibly know that. As far as she knew, she’d never met the man.

A few weeks earlier, Lou was in Midland, working undercover for an antiterrorist group, looking for terrorist financiers. He happened to meet Mom, who had no clue who he was, or even that he was male, because he was disguised as a very large woman. Lou’s pretty wacky. He was a POW in Vietnam, and like so many of those guys, it did something to him. Rules? Who needs ’em? He got it bad for Mom and asked her to the dinner via telephone, I think so he could talk to her as himself. It’s kinda cute, in a weird way. And I was dying to see how they hit it off.

“Mom, you’re a kick-ass CPA, and you can hold your own with überconservative businessmen. This is no different. Just be yourself.”

“Don’t you get it? Being myself is the bad part. I cuss like a sailor, have a tendency to bite heads off, and I’m way too opinionated. Besides, when I get flustered, this damn hick accent comes out so strong, people think I just fell off the cotton truck.”

“You just don’t get it, do you, Mom? All of that is what makes you so remarkable. You’re unique, interesting and funny.”

“And neurotic. Don’t forget neurotic.”

“So? Everybody’s a little neurotic. Just go to the party and relax. If nothing else, look at it like you and I will have a chance to catch up.”

“That’s true.” She sighed into the phone. “Promise me you’ll call Ed.”

“Fine! I promise.”

By the time Mom and I got to the dinner party, I was ready to put myself up for adoption. All the way to Steve’s Georgetown town house, she twisted one emerald earring and muttered about how she shouldn’t have left Midland, that she had a million things to do, that her clients would suffer because she was gadding about the nation’s capital, going to some idiotic dinner party with people she didn’t know and probably didn’t want to know. That led into a diatribe about politics in the United States, and it was at that point that I tuned her out.

Regrettably, the cabbie didn’t tune her out, and by the time we arrived, they were in a hot debate about the state of the union. I guess Lou was awaiting our arrival because he opened the door of the cab. Mom didn’t notice until after she’d summarily told the cabbie he was a socialist radical and if he hated America so much, why didn’t he get the hell out?

Then Lou leaned in and handed the cabbie his fare and I honestly thought Mom would keel over in a dead faint. Her face was the color of a ripe strawberry. She took his hand and he helped her out of the cab, and while we stood there on the sidewalk, I introduced my mother to Lou Santorelli. It hit me that the two of them looked alike, with dark hair and eyes, and skin that leaned toward olive.

Lou didn’t smile, didn’t attempt to be gracious and welcoming, which I naturally expected because he was our host. Instead, he said in a curious voice, “If a man has a problem with how things are, does it make him a treasonous bastard who has no right to live here?”

It took her exactly twenty-three seconds to recover. I know because I counted, while I was praying she wouldn’t turn around and walk off.

“If all he can do is blame the government for every stinkin’ problem in his life, and insist how much better it is everywhere else in the world, then no, he doesn’t deserve to live here. He should take his pissy, whiny attitude across the ocean. Any ocean.”

Grasping her arm, he turned and walked her into the house. “It can be difficult to get a leg up, so maybe his pissy attitude is a result of struggling to make ends meet.”

Mom appeared to have forgotten her neurosis. “It is not difficult to get ahead, if a person is willing to work hard. Especially if that person is a thirty-year-old white male, with no disability of any kind except pure laziness.”

“Are you a feminist, Jane?”

Mom pulled her arm away from him. “I’m a hardworking professional woman who’s got no time for labels and bullshit.”

I’m still not sure why, but that struck Lou as funny. He laughed out loud, grabbed Mom’s arm again and walked her into a wide living room with soaring ceilings and quite a few expensive-looking antiques. Steve’s town house is beautiful, if a person is into the museum look.

The birthday boy was in the far corner, talking to a man with snowy-white hair whose back was toward the room. Looking at Steve, dressed in one of his beautiful suits, his short black hair a bit messy and his large, slightly hairy hand curled around a highball glass, I got that strange jumpy feeling in the pit of my stomach that I always get when I’m around him. It’s not unpleasant at all—just unnerving. I’m afraid to put a name to the feeling because I’m fairly sure it would be something like intense, unquenched sexual desire. And as much as I like Steve, as much as I admire him and like being with him, I know it would spell disaster if I ever slept with him.

For one thing, any chance of ever making things work out with Ed would be over forever. And I wasn’t ready to give that up. Not yet. For another, Steve is the antithesis of the kind of men I always assumed moved around Washington. He’s a widower who lost his beloved wife, Lauren, to cancer almost three years ago, and since then, he hasn’t gone out with anyone. Until me. I can’t figure it out, but Steve seems to think I need to be the next Mrs. Santorelli. And that’s without ever sleeping with me. If I did sleep with him, I just know he’d manage to get me to marry him. Imagine my trust issues with a senator. Yeah, it would never work.

After I figured out he was the one who bought the billboard, I told him thank you for the offer, but no. He wasn’t surprised, he said, but he also wasn’t giving up.

When he caught sight of me he waved me over, and I left Mom with Lou, which she failed to notice because they were really getting into it about women in America while the bartender mixed her a whiskey sour.

I was almost to Steve when I realized the old man was Richard Harcourt, a retired Speaker of the House. Steve took my hand and folded it into his, then kissed my cheek and introduced me. “Richard, this is Whitney Pearl, but she goes by Pink. We met when she testified before the senate finance committee during the Marvel Energy investigation.”

Richard shook my hand and smiled warmly. “I watched it all on C-SPAN. You’re a true hero.” He dropped my hand, but continued smiling. “Interesting nickname you have. Lotta redheads get dubbed Red, but I’m not seeing why they call you Pink, especially with all that blond hair.”

“I’m a CPA, sir. Because my last name is Pearl, people started calling me Pink Pearl, like the erasers.”

“Ah, I see. Very clever, that! Mind if I call you Pink?”

I returned his smile. “Be my guest.”

“Good, and you should call me Richard.” He winked. “Or Very Handsome and Wonderful Old Man, if you prefer.”

I couldn’t help laughing, and decided I liked Richard Harcourt.

“Steve tells me you were in China for a couple of weeks just after the earthquake.”

Of late, it was my favorite subject and I admit, I got kinda wound up about it. When I was done, and after I’d made the case for people to donate money to CERF, Richard chuckled and said in a pseudowhisper, “You’re preaching to the choir, Pink. I wrote a check with a lot of zeroes on it just last week.”

“I beg your pardon, sir, and thank you.”

He lost a bit of his joviality and said, “Pretty damn good speech you’ve got there. I suggest you spin it to a few well-heeled people who’ve convinced themselves your boss should be the First Gentleman. Tell them their money’s better spent on the Chinese relief effort than a lost cause.”

“Sir?”

He harrumphed loudly. “Didn’t you know Madeline Davis is planning to run for president?”

“I hadn’t heard, no.” Why hadn’t Parker mentioned it? I glanced at Steve. “So a woman’s going to run for president, and she’s got some big money behind her. Imagine that.”

“Will you vote for her?”

“Well, she is a smart woman.” I turned again to Richard. “Who’s supporting her?”

“Top of the list is Bill Mulholland.” At my puzzled expression, he added, “Old New York family. Got money dating back to the Mayflower, no doubt. Sits on lots of corporate boards and hobnobs with royalty.”

“And you think I should call and ask him for a donation because you’re convinced any campaign money he gives to Madeline is wasted?” Maybe I didn’t like Richard so much. I drew myself up a bit. “You’ll pardon me, sir, if I decline to follow your suggestion. Insinuating that Madeline hasn’t a prayer of winning without knowing who else might run can only indicate a gender bias I obviously don’t support.”

Instead of taking up the gauntlet, Richard laughed as though I’d just told a great joke. He leaned close to Steve and said, “She’ll do, son. She’ll do just fine.”

Then he was gone, and miraculously, Steve and I were alone in the corner. But not for long. An entire flock of guests were descending on us from across the room. I quickly asked Steve, “What did he mean, I’ll do?”

He grinned at me. “Richard is convinced I should throw my hat in the ring for president. He says the first thing I need is a wife, and he thinks you’re just the ticket.”

I was speechless. Seriously. Maybe it was the whisper of the thought of becoming First Lady of the United States of America, or maybe it was the thought of sleeping with the leader of the free world on a nightly basis, or maybe it was thinking about living at the most primo address in the country.

“What’s wrong, Pink? Don’t you think you’re up to being First Lady?”

My mom’s neurosis can sometimes be mine, as well. “Steve, I’m a CPA from a dusty oil town in West Texas. I went to a public university. I don’t even have china. Come to think of it, after my apartment was broken into and ransacked last month, I don’t have any dishes at all.”

“The guy living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue right now is from your hometown. In fact, so is the First Lady. If you ask me, it’s sort of cosmic. And by the way, they have plenty of dishes at the White House.”

I didn’t have a chance to respond, because the gaggle of guests were upon us. The rest of the cocktail hour, Steve guided me around the room, introducing me to senators and representatives, high-ranking military personnel, the IRS commissioner and the Mexican ambassador. After that we went for dinner in a dining room large enough to land a plane, where I was seated next to Steve at the head of the table and Mom was seated next to Lou about half a mile down at the far end. I was excited when the Chinese ambassador, Mr. Wu, was seated just across the table from me.

Steve noticed my enthusiasm. He leaned close and said quietly, “Most men give flowers and jewelry. You get the Chinese ambassador.”

Startled, I looked into his dark Italian eyes. “You invited him just for me?”

He nodded and gave me a funny little crooked smile. “Now’s your chance to ask him about Mrs. Han and the China brides.”

That bizarre jumpy thing in my stomach morphed into a warm, intense feeling that was as foreign as Mr. Wu. I swallowed hard. “Thank you.”

His smile kicked up a notch. “You’re welcome.” He turned to greet Mr. Wu, then introduced him to me.

Wu’s English was perfect and we talked a great deal about the relief effort. After a while, I felt comfortable enough to ask him about something that had bothered me while I was in China. “I helped a survivor there, a pregnant woman named Mrs. Han, whose husband was killed. She was naturally very distraught, but it struck me as odd that the main cause of her distress was that she wanted to go home. The woman looked Asian, but not Chinese, and she spoke very little Chinese. It turned out her primary language was Russian. She told a story about being taken out of Siberia and brought to China as a bride. She said there are others like her, living in China, brought there to be wives to Chinese men because there’s such a shortage of females. I wondered if this is something the government sponsors.”

Mr. Wu looked shocked. His soup spoon clattered against his plate. “This woman, where can I find her?”

China clattered from behind the ambassador. I glanced back to see one of the waitstaff, a striking blond woman whose name tag read “Olga.” When she noticed me watching her, she quickly turned and headed for the kitchen.

I redirected my attention to Mr. Wu. “Unfortunately, while I was looking for a policeman to help us, she disappeared, and I was unable to locate her again.”

“This is most disturbing. Did she give you any indication who brought her into China?”

I shook my head. “As I said, she didn’t speak Chinese, and the woman who translated knew only rudimentary Russian. After Mrs. Han disappeared, the CERF contact in Beijing, Robert Wang, said it’s not uncommon for people to be disoriented after something like an earthquake.” Remembering the poor woman, her tear-streaked face, swollen belly and woeful dark eyes, I felt a knot form in my throat. Where was she now? And what of the others? Mrs. Han said she’d been brought into China with five other young women from her village in Siberia.

Watching Mr. Wu process the idea, I said, “During my visits to China I’ve been proposed to several times by men in search of a bride. There’s obviously a need for women.”

He relaxed a bit, darted a glance at Steve, then leveled his gaze at mine. “It is true that the female-to-male ratio in China is shrinking, which leaves many of our young men without the opportunity to marry. It’s an unfortunate result of our law allowing only one child in a family. Because of our custom that parents live with their son in their later years, a couple who has a son is assured of a home. Those with a daughter do not have that option.”

“Because a daughter goes to live with her husband’s family?”

He nodded. “Many women abandon their baby girls at birth, then try again until they have a son. Despite this, the one-child law is good, because without it, there would not be enough natural resources to support the population. The side effect is the shortage of females. I suspect that an enterprising person has been recruiting women from outside of China to fill the gap.”

Olga returned and collected our soup bowls. When she asked Mr. Wu if he was done, I noticed her heavy accent. I thought she sounded Russian. Of course, to my West Texas ears, anyone from an Eastern bloc country would probably sound Russian. And I did have Russia on the brain.

“Thank you for alerting me to this problem, Miss Pearl,” Mr. Wu said. “First thing tomorrow, I will contact someone who can look into this unfortunate business.”

“If you hear any word on Mrs. Han, I would very much appreciate the information.”

Olga hurried off with the tray of dirty soup bowls, then reappeared with the salad course. She set a plate in front of Steve, then looked a little flustered and snatched it away. He shot her a confused look, to which she smiled and mumbled an apology. “I have forgotten the garnish. Please excuse me.” Before he could protest, she turned, still clutching the salad tray. She stumbled as she rounded the table and one of the salads slid off the tray and into my lap.

It took a bit to clean up the mess—this in the midst of Mr. Wu tut-tutting and Steve glowering at Olga, who looked ready to run away. Or burst into tears. Feeling for her, I hastened to assure her there was no harm done.

“But, miss, you’ve spots on your pretty pink dress. Please, come to the kitchen and I will clean?”

I didn’t see much point. The dress was destined for the dry cleaner. But Olga was beside herself, and Steve looked uncharacteristically annoyed, so I followed her to the kitchen. Just as I suspected, club soda didn’t faze raspberry vinaigrette. I thanked her anyway, assured her it was quite all right and escaped back to the table.

As I took my seat, I noticed Mr. Wu’s forehead was wrinkled in concentration, his gaze fixed on a spot somewhere behind my shoulder. “Sir,” I said, “my apologies if what I said has upset you.”

He looked at me and shook his head. “Nothing of the kind, Miss Pearl. I am glad to have the information.”

When Olga returned with a fresh set of salads and set his before him, he picked up his fork and started eating. He seemed upset, and even though I was relieved to know he would do something to investigate the China brides, I felt guilty for bringing it up.

He ran a finger along the inside of his collar as though it was too tight, then gave me a weak smile. “This earthquake is a bad, bad thing. So many homeless, and so many without families. It will take many years to recover fully. Thank you for helping my country.”

“You’re welcome, Ambassador Wu. I’m glad to be of any help, especially because I’m very fond of China and her people.”

After all the salads had been served, the conversation turned to other topics.

The ambassador’s attention was on the guest to his left, and Steve said under his breath, “You’re fantastic.”

“Not hardly. Just nosy.”

He smiled at someone down the table, then his gaze moved to my cleavage, then to my eyes. “Nice dress, Pink. Even with salad dressing.”

“Thank you.” My stomach started that weird jumpy thing again. Oh, man. My first bite of salad didn’t go down well, so I set aside the fork and concentrated on the wine.

“Now that the finance committee is adjourned for a while, I’ll have a lot more free time. You’ve been here two weeks and I’ve only been able to see you twice.”

“I’m pretty busy myself, Steve.” And I was about to be a lot busier, searching for the rotten dog who set me up. I wondered what Steve would think about it, and how he’d feel about marrying me if he knew I could potentially ruin all future political races. Even if I didn’t intend to marry him, I wanted us to be friends, and I prayed all over again that the culprit would be nailed before anyone else found out about it. Even being friends with Steve would be impossible if word got out about the bank account with my name on it, and five hundred thousand of CERF’s dollars deposited in it.

“Is something wrong?”

I gave him a reassuring smile. “Not at all. And you’re right, it will be nice to spend some time together.”

Olga appeared at my elbow and pointed at my plate. “The salad is wrong?”

“No, it’s fine,” I said, wishing the woman would leave off being so attentive. She looked like somebody who had just realized she’d boarded a plane to Cleveland instead of the one to Paris. “I’m just not very hungry.” Blame it on Steve, making my stomach do that squiggly thing.

Olga nodded and picked up my plate, then moved to the next guest.

As happens at all dinner parties, the ebb and flow of conversation created a dull roar, with no voice particularly audible. Until I heard Mom.

“You arrogant son of a bitch! You invited me and the IRS commissioner so you could get your own agenda front and center.”

“The only reason you’re so angry is that you know I’m right. Without people like you, CPAs on the front lines, standing up and demanding a simplified tax law, nothing will ever change. It’s your duty to do so, and your life is wasted if you shrug off the responsibility.”

“My life is a lot of things, buster, but it sure as hell isn’t wasted! I’m calling a cab because there’s no way I’m listening to any more of your bullshit. You’re crazy, Mr. Santorelli.”

I leaned forward a little bit and saw that she was no longer in her chair. Neither was Lou. Yet, I could hear her distinctive West Texas twang, along with Lou’s deep, clipped voice. Where were they?

Steve touched my shoulder and I turned to look at him. “This is a very old house and the ventilation system’s pretty rudimentary. I think they must have gone into the study, at the front of the house.” He glanced up at a register close to the ceiling of the dining room. “It’s like a P.A. system.”

Lou said, loud and clear, completely audible now because everyone in the room had fallen silent, “I’m probably crazy, but you should know I didn’t invite you because of the damn tax law. That was strictly shooting from the hip. We’ll discuss it later.”

“No, we won’t. I’m calling a cab. Where the hell’s the phone?”

“You’re not leaving, Jane.”

“Oh, no? Hide and watch me. Now get out of my way.”

There was a moment of silence, followed by the distinct sound of a slap. “Who said you could kiss me? Oh, my God! I have got to get out of here. If you don’t step aside I’m gonna scream, and won’t that be embarrassing for you!”

“I’m never embarrassed.”

“Yes, I can see how that might be. You’re too arrogant to be embarrassed.”

Ignoring the chuckles around the room, I rose from the table, intent on saving Mom from what would surely be the most embarrassing moment of her life, but before I could step away from my chair, Mr. Wu made a strange noise. I looked across the table and saw that his face was bright red and he was sweating profusely.

“Sir, are you okay?” I asked, moving around the table toward him.

Steve stood, calling for a towel from one of the waiters, while I loosened the ambassador’s tie.

“I…can’t…breathe,” he croaked, clawing at his throat.

“He’s choking!” someone yelled.

Hauling the man to his feet, Steve moved behind him and performed the Heimlich, but when Mr. Wu vomited it became apparent he wasn’t choking.

“Is he having a heart attack?” someone asked.

An attractive woman hurried toward us, shooing people out of her way. “I’m a nurse. Let me see.” She took one look at him and said, “Get him to the couch, and somebody call an ambulance.”

Steve and one of the generals carried the heavyset man into the living room and laid him on the couch, where he promptly threw up again. Dinner forgotten, the entire party crowded around the couch, anxiously watching. I noticed that Mom and Lou were there, but with everyone’s attention on the ambassador, they didn’t realize how public their private conversation had been.

I felt a tap on my shoulder, and when I turned, Olga was gesturing me toward the kitchen. Evidently I had a phone call. As if I cared right now! But recalling her persistence in cleaning the salad dressing, I followed her to the kitchen. As I reached for the wall phone, I wondered who would call me at Steve’s. I said hello over the noise of the waitstaff, the cooks, water running and dishes clinking together.

“What do you want?” I heard Taylor Bunch say on the other end of the line.

“Shouldn’t I be asking that question? You called me.”

“Pink, what are you up to? I didn’t call. You did. So what’s this about? If you’re calling to apologize for this afternoon, save your breath. You’re going down, sister, and soon. When I got home from the office, I found a package on my doorstep that’s gonna put you away for the rest of your natural life.”

Thoroughly confused, I stared at a stack of plates. “Taylor, I’m at a dinner party, and I didn’t call you.”

“Well, somebody did. Told me to hang on, and here you are.”

I glanced over my shoulder but didn’t see Olga, or anyone else who looked out of the ordinary. The kitchen was a hive of activity and frantic chatter about the ambassador, and no one appeared to notice me. Turning back to the stack of plates, I asked, “What was in the package?”

“Everything I need to prove you ripped off CERF. I’m about to call Parker. Then I’m calling the police. Maybe the FBI.”

“I don’t know what you’ve got, or where it came from, but if it points to me, it’s fake. I didn’t do it, Taylor.”

“Yeah, well, tell the judge.” She hung up.

I returned the phone to its cradle, my mind leaping ahead, wondering what on earth Taylor could have that would hang me. And who had left it on her doorstep. Things were quickly spiraling out of control and I suddenly panicked. I felt an overwhelming need to see Taylor, to find out what she had, to talk her out of calling Parker, or the police.

Turning to leave the kitchen, I noticed Olga as she slipped out the back door. She wore a light jacket over her uniform and had a backpack slung over her shoulder, and an alarm went off inside me. I asked the waiter closest to me, “Why is Olga leaving?”

He looked confused. “Who’s Olga?”

“One of the waitstaff.”

“She’s not with us. Must be a regular of the senator’s household help.”

She wasn’t with the household staff. Steve had a housekeeper named Carla and a driver named Bill and that was it.

One of the catering staff rushed into the kitchen to announce that Mr. Wu was dead, probably from poisoning. I gasped.

My gaze went to the door where Olga had disappeared. Could she have had something to do with his death? Was that what the whole salad thing was about—she’d given Steve the wrong salad?

The thought made me breathless with terror.

I glanced at the telephone. Olga had to be the one who called Taylor, then brought me to the phone. Why? What did that have to do with Ambassador Wu?

My mind raced with possibilities, and it occurred to me that the quickest way to get answers was to ask Olga.

Not stopping to explain, or even to grab my handbag from the dining room, I took off after her, through the back door, through the garden gate and into the alleyway behind the row of houses along Steve’s street.

Running has never been my strong suit and my strappy high heels took my pathetic athletic ability to new lows. Taking them off on the rough ground would slow me even more, so I hauled it as best I could out into a side street, looking both ways. I caught a glimpse of a dove gray jacket turning the corner. I ran after Olga, my mind churning through what had happened, and no matter how I sliced it, I kept coming back to wondering if I was supposed to be Olga’s hit. Had my discovery that morning marked me as a dead woman?

I thought of the salad, of how disappointed Olga was when I failed to eat it. Had my salad also been poisoned? If so, it was no wonder that Olga had been upset. Someone had sent her to off me, and I had to go and be goofy over Steve, killing any desire to eat. I sent a quick thank-you to God for making me crush on Steve Santorelli.

Two blocks later, I had to admit defeat. Olga had vanished. Probably just as well, I decided, if the woman was out to kill me. Nobody but a fool chases death.

I kept walking until I came to a major thoroughfare, where I hailed a cab and gave him Taylor’s address. I knew she lived in a condo complex a block over from my loft, because I’d seen her leaving a couple of times when I passed the building on my way to work. When we arrived I realized I had no money, which naturally annoyed the cabbie to no end.

“Look,” I said, trying to mollify him, “if you’ll just wait here, I’ll be right back with some money.”

“Do I look stupid, lady?”

Taking in his hairy face and hard eyes, I shook my head. “You’ll just have to trust me.”

“Hurry up about it, will ya? The meter’s gonna keep running.”

In the lobby, I signed the guest book, but when I explained that I had no purse and no ID, the security guard waved me on, barely looking at me as he read a magazine.

At Taylor’s door, I sucked in a breath of courage, raised my fist and knocked.

“Come in!”

I reached for the knob, opened the door and was instantly hit with a sense of seriously bad karma. I’m not psychic or anything like that. I just get this bizarre feeling of impending doom sometimes, and it never fails to pan out.

Inside, it was gloomy, with only one lamp lit in the far corner of the living area. The wooden blinds were closed, blocking any light from the city outside. “Taylor? Where are you?” It felt strange walking into someone’s home without that person there to greet me. Strange, hell. My hair was standing on end.

She didn’t answer, so I went toward the only other light, streaming through the doorway to the kitchen.

I found Taylor. On the kitchen floor. With a telephone cord around her neck. Her wide green eyes stared up at me without blinking. Maybe I wasn’t a fan of Taylor’s, but Jesus, I didn’t want her to die. I felt sick to my stomach seeing her there, so twisted and dead, a look of startled fear frozen on her face.

It hit me then. If Taylor was dead, who had called out for me to come in? The voice had been muffled and indistinguishable.

I turned quickly, just in time to see the front door closing. I booked to the door, jerked it open and saw the sleeve of a dove gray jacket just before the fire-exit door slammed shut. I nearly fell several times rushing down the concrete steps in my heels, but I didn’t want to stop long enough to take them off. Maybe I should have. By the time I reached the ground floor, the outside exit door was closed. I ran outside, into the alley, but it was pitch dark and I knew it was way past stupid to continue any farther.

Unfortunately, the damned exit door locked behind me and I couldn’t get back in. I had no choice but to walk down the alley, in the dark, and hope I made it to the street alive.

For approximately one nanosecond, I considered jumping in the still-waiting cab and gettin’ the hell outta Dodge. But I knew it would bite me in the ass later. I’d signed in at the front desk. I’d probably left something in Taylor’s apartment, like a hair, or carpet fibers from Steve’s house. Hey, I watch CSI. I know about those things.

There also was that pesky problem with the Kansas bank account, and all those people who saw the catfight between Taylor and me that afternoon.

Running from the problem would not make it go away. It would only make me look more guilty. Deciding to face it head-on and be completely honest, I made my way around to the street side of Taylor’s building, winded and pissed off because I hadn’t caught Olga. At the security guard’s desk, breathing heavily, I said, “You need to call the police. I went up to see Taylor Bunch and she’s dead. Whoever killed her ran out the fire exit in back.”

Naturally, Mr. Macho didn’t believe me. He had to go up and see her dead body for himself. As soon as the elevator door closed, I looked at his guest book to see who’d signed in within the past three hours. There were only two names. Mine, and somebody named J. Smith. Yeah, right. No doubt it was “J. Smith” I’d just chased down the stairs. I used the security guard’s phone and called the cops.

They arrived quickly and we all went upstairs to Taylor’s apartment, where we found the security guard wandering around, looking in closets and under the bed. Clearly, he hadn’t gotten it when I said the killer ran out the fire exit.

The two uniformed officers told him to go downstairs, said that they would question him later, then asked me to have a seat in the kitchen, which seemed odd to me since Taylor was there. It unnerved me, her body lying so close, her eyes staring up at me.

“Tell me what happened,” the taller of the two said as he took the chair opposite mine and the shorter one went off somewhere else in the apartment.

I’d already given some thought to what I would say, and it seemed to me that being honest was the best way to go. Start lying and I was bound to trip myself up. As briefly as possible, I told him.

He wrote it all down, then had me read it over and sign it. Several minutes later, a middle-aged, ordinary-looking man in a dull brown suit came in and walked around Taylor’s body, checking her out before he sat across from me.

“I’m Detective Schumski. I know you’ve already given your statement, but I’d like to hear it from you.”

He stared at me as I spoke, without asking any questions. When I was done, he got up and left the room, then came back and said, “Did you leave a cab driver downstairs without paying him?”

“I told you, I was chasing Olga and didn’t take the time to get my purse before I left.” I glanced at the entry to the kitchen. “Is he still there?”

“I paid him. You owe the city thirty-two bucks.”

“Thank you.”

He gave me another hard stare. “I’m taking you in, Miss Pearl. There are way too many questions I need answered, and there’s a dead foreign dignitary across town. Until I have a better handle on what went on tonight, you’ll be a guest of the city.”

So I went downstairs and rode to the police station in the back of a squad car. Once there, I sat around and waited aeons before Schumski and another detective came in and asked a thousand more questions. Not only did they have the deposit and check copies from the office, the ones I’d handed over to Taylor and she’d conveniently taken home, but they also had the contents of Taylor’s surprise package—multiple Valikov Interiors invoices made out to me, covering three hundred thousand dollars’worth of Chinese antiques and furniture. For ten thousand bucks, an antique fish pot with a wooden stand, and three pairs of Chinese wedding shoes, the tiny kind women wore when their feet were bound. A real bargain at twenty-two thousand dollars was a jade horse from the Yuan Dynasty. All of the invoices were for similar items, equally pricey.

I said to Schumski, “Why would a person embezzle money, then spend all of it on this kind of stuff? It seems to me a person would buy things like cars, or go on a trip, or maybe blow it on some expensive jewelry.”

He glanced at his partner. “You tell me, Ms. Pearl. Maybe you have a thing for Chinese antiques.”

“Detective, I am not behind this, and I didn’t murder Taylor. I’m being honest and forthright because I want you to find the woman who did do it. Besides, if I bought all of this stuff, where is it?”

“My guess would be that it’s in your home, either here or in Midland. That’s why we’re getting a search warrant for both places. We’re also going to get the signature card from that bank in Kansas, and I’ll bet it’s a spot-on match with yours.”

He was wrong about that. The signature card had to be my ace in the hole. I would have to remember signing a signature card. I’d hire the best handwriting expert in the country to prove it. I was not going to prison. Period.

Nevertheless, thinking of all the circumstantial evidence against me, including the phone call and the catfight, I felt my heart sink.

It sank further when Schumski implied I had something to do with Ambassador Wu’s death. After he spoke to the detective who’d been at Steve’s, he said I had the opportunity to put poison in the ambassador’s salad when I went to the kitchen.

“Why would I tell the man about the China brides, then kill him? That makes absolutely no sense at all.”

He didn’t see it that way, but he was stretching it to charge me with Ambassador Wu’s death, so he settled with suspicion of only one homicide, along with embezzlement and fraud.

A little while later, while I cooled my heels in the small interrogation room, they got statements from a couple of the CERF staff who’d seen Taylor and me shout at each other, and me warning her not to screw with me. They got a statement from Parker about what I’d found, and how I’d approached him about it and wanted to do my own investigation. Yeah, that didn’t look good. But the last nail in my coffin was when they matched my fingerprints to those on the Valikov Interiors invoices. I knew for certain then that someone had gone to an extraordinary amount of trouble to set me up, to use me as their scapegoat. I had no idea how my fingerprints had gotten on those invoices, but I was hell-bent on finding out.

I got to make one phone call and used it to call my attorney, Ed. After I told him I was in deep doo-doo, he sighed, like he couldn’t believe I was such a pain in his ass, and I decided I’d kill him if he said he wouldn’t help me. Luckily for Ed’s longevity, he said he’d be there as soon as he could get a flight out.

“Whatever happens, Pink, whatever they ask, or say to you, don’t say a word. Understand?”

Kinda late for that, wasn’t it? “I understand,” I said anyway. “Ed, I left Mom at a party hours ago. Would you call and tell her what happened? They won’t let me make any more calls.”

“Does she have her cell phone?”

“Uh, no. It wouldn’t fit in her purse. The party was at Santorelli’s.”

Dead silence. Then he said, “I’ll call.” And then, in a very cold voice, “Remember, say nothing.”

“I remember.”

But it was damn hard not to say anything at all, especially when they booked me for murder and embezzlement, took a mug shot, then locked me up in a room with a lot of extremely sorry-looking women. To be fair, I probably looked pretty lousy myself.

I sat there all night and ignored everyone. One chick tried to pick a fight with me, but I turned away and closed my eyes and she finally laid off.

It’s funny, the things we think of in times of major crisis. All that night, the only thing I could think about was Mrs. Han, and how much she wanted to go home, and how much I hoped that she’d gotten what she wanted. Maybe she was from Siberia, a very unwelcoming, cold place to live, but it was her home, and her people were there. I had people back in Midland, which was also somewhat unwelcoming—a long, dusty stretch of flatland, broken only by oil-lease roads and pumpjacks, covered with scrubby mesquite and cactus. I was determined to go back there, to be with my people. I vowed that I would, as soon as I found the bastard who framed me.

By nine o’clock the next morning, I had a sketchy plan. But it was a start. One thing was sure—no way I was gonna sit around and wait for the police or the FBI to find out who set me up. Why would they, when they already had a perfectly good suspect?

The guard, a hefty woman named Clara, came and let me out. She walked me down a long hallway, to a flight of stairs and another hall to a door with a window. Inside was Ed.

I almost hyperventilated. God, he looked good. Like salvation and sex. Dressed in one of his killer navy suits, with a red silk tie that was exactly like every other tie in his closet and his usually longish dark hair freshly cut, he could almost pass for another one of the millions of suits walking around Washington. But not quite. Something about Ed is unlike any other man. Maybe because I know what he looks like naked. Or maybe because he’s got an attitude that even the most expensive Brooks Brothers suit can’t disguise.

I’ve gotten in the habit of falling in and out of love with Ed, and at that moment I was dead dog certain he was the most supreme male on planet Earth. Overwhelmed with an emotion I never wear comfortably, I looked at Ed and wanted to marry him and have ten thousand of his babies.

It’s probably a good thing he didn’t ask just then.

Not caring if he hated my guts—and that’s not to say he did—I walked to him, slid my arms around his waist and burst into tears. I was so bummed out, I wasn’t even embarrassed about losing it.

Being the supreme male he is, Ed wrapped me up and let me bawl all over him and get salty tears on his tie.

Eventually, he set me away from him and pulled a chair out from the small metal table. He handed me a tissue from the box on the table and said, “This is some bad shit, Pink. They’ve got enough to nail your ass but good. They didn’t find anything in your loft here in D.C., or in your apartment in Midland, but it turned out the manager in Midland had taken all the boxes delivered to your door and stored them for you. There’s enough stuff to open a small Chinese antique shop.”

I sniffled and watched him take the chair opposite mine, drag it around the table and sit next to me. “There were quite a few messages on your answering machine from a woman named Sasha, who was updating you about your plans to redecorate the house you’re buying.”

“I don’t know anyone named Sasha, and besides, why would I make plans to redecorate a house I don’t own yet?”

“You wouldn’t. It’s all part of the scam, Pink.” He leaned forward a little and looked directly into my face. “I want you to tell me everything, from start to finish. Don’t leave anything out. Got it?”

Nodding, I blew my nose, tossed the snotty tissue toward the wastebasket, missed, then turned back to Ed. I told him all of it, my tears drying up the longer I talked and the more pissed off I became. By the end of it, I could have put any televangelist to shame, I was so righteous.

In typical Ed fashion, he didn’t get too worked up about it. He reached out and smoothed my hair away from my face. “You look like hell.” His gaze dropped to the neckline of my dress, along with his hand. While his long, warm fingers dipped into my cleavage on the pretense of feeling the fabric, he said evenly, “Nice dress. I like that it’s pink. I bet Santorelli liked it, too.”

Turning away from him, I didn’t rise to the remark. “What does how I look have to do with anything?”

“You need to look more conservative to the judge for your arraignment.” He nodded toward a small bag next to the door. “I stopped at your loft after I left Santorelli’s.”

I shot him a startled look. “You went to Santorelli’s?”

“Your mother is over there. She spent the night.”

I stood and walked around the perimeter of the small room. “I hear about five stories in your voice. So let me have ’em. First, what did Mom say about this?”

“Lots, and most of it I can’t repeat because my mama taught me better.”

“So she’s just mad? She’s not crying? I can take anything so long as she doesn’t cry. I hate it when she cries.”

“Oh, she cried, then she went off on a shouting tangent, then she cried again.” He smiled wryly. “I’d like to beat up the senator and leave him for dead, but I gotta say, his dad is one cool dude. Did you know he was a POW in Vietnam?”

“Yes, I know.”

“It’s pretty weird, watching him and your mom. Can’t say I’ve ever seen Jane like that.”

I stopped walking. “Like what?”

Ed cocked his head to one side, as though he had to think about how to phrase his thoughts. Finally he said, “There’s some kind of strange chemistry there. On the surface, she can’t stand Lou. She must have told him to shut the fuck up at least five times, and I didn’t blame her because he kept coming up with wacked-out, commando ideas about how to help you. Jane said if we left it up to him, we’d all be in prison. Or dead.” Ed shook his head like he couldn’t believe it. “Lou is one of those guys who says exactly what he thinks, and to hell with being politically correct, or tactful, or whatever. He told Jane she couldn’t possibly be any help because she’s too damn emotional, that if she didn’t stop crying and shouting, he’d force-feed her a sedative.”

“Did the castration take long?”

Ed stared across the small room at me. “That’s the strange part, Pink. She agreed with him. Then she sat down and asked me what I planned to do to help you out of this jam.”

I told him what I knew about Lou and his attraction to Mom, and what we’d all overheard through the ventilation system before the ambassador became so sick. “I can’t believe, considering how she insisted she wanted to leave, that she spent the night there.”

“Naturally, after I called and told her you’d been arrested, she was upset. Lou wouldn’t let her take a cab and insisted on taking her home, but when they got to your loft, the cops were all over it and wouldn’t let her in. So Lou made her go back to Santorelli’s house with him, and she stayed all night. When I got there this morning, she was crying and he was fixing breakfast. Gave her a couple of fried eggs, bacon, sausage and toast with butter. Jane says, that’s a heart attack on a plate. Lou says, eat it now, dammit. And she picked up the fork and ate it.”

Oh, man. Mom was sliding into doormat mode. This was bad. On the other hand, it meant she was definitely not wishy-washy about Lou. All her shouting aside, Mom liked him. She wouldn’t be a doormat for a man she didn’t like. The problem was, how could she be involved with him and not become a doormat? Jeez, I wished Mom would get some counseling.

I glanced at Ed. “You’ve very carefully not mentioned Steve.”

Ed shrugged. “He’s upset, but then who could blame him? You’re the future Mrs. Santorelli. Possible First Lady. How’s it gonna look if you’ve got a parole officer following you around the White House?”

I moved back to sit next to him. “That’s not fair, Ed.”

He frowned at me. “You think I care about being fair? The guy bought you a Mercedes. He asked you to marry him on a billboard. He wants to make you First Lady. How the hell can I compete with that?”

“It’s not a competition.”

“You don’t know one damn thing about guys, Pink. It’s always about competition. Always.”

“So buy me a Mercedes and ask me to marry you on a billboard. You can afford it. Granted, you can’t get to that First Lady thing very easily, but you could run for mayor and I could be First Lady of Midland.”

“You’re not even kinda funny.”

“I’m not trying to be funny, Ed. I’m pointing out that what works for one guy won’t work for another.” I looked up at him. “As well as you know me, do you think I really give a hang about a car, or a romantic billboard, or living at the White House? I mean, seriously?”

He blinked a couple of times. “Hell, I don’t know. You’re a girl, and girls always go for that kinda stuff.”

“I said no. About the billboard, I mean.”

His laugh didn’t hold a lot of humor. “I know how that feels.” He leaned back in the chair until it rested on the rear legs. “Maybe you should say yes. I’m thinking being the fiancée of a Big Dog senator would get you a little more leeway. They might actually give it a shot to find who really did swipe five hundred Gs from CERF and who offed Taylor.”

Shocked and amazed, I gave him a scrutinizing look. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Damn straight.”

“So I should get engaged to Steve, then break it off after I’m exonerated?”

Ed shrugged. “I guess that would be up to you.”

“You really do hate his guts, don’t you?”

“Not true. I actually think he’s an okay guy. And it’s clear he’s got it bad for you, Pink. Crazy in love, even.”

“It would be incredibly selfish and cruel to say yes, then break it off. I’d be using him, and there’s no way I’ll do it.”

“Maybe you should suggest it. Be up-front about it.”

“Suppose I did, and he said yes. How would you feel about that?”

He dropped all four chair legs back to the linoleum floor. “For now, I’m willing to step aside, if it means keeping you out of prison.”

I jumped to my feet and started around the room again. “Why do you do that?”

“What?”

“Be all selfless and wonderful.”

“Yeah, I’ll show you wonderful. Take your clothes off.”

I stopped. “You can’t be serious!”

He stared at my cleavage. “As a heart attack.”

I began to pace again and he watched me for a while before he said, “All of our issues aside, I gotta say we’re unparalleled in the sack.”

“Gimme a break, Ed. It’s never been just about sex.”

He cleared his throat and stood. “Yeah, well, all of it’s moot if I don’t get you cleaned up for the arraignment. Come here and take off that dress.”

I went to him and took off the dress. He rose from grabbing the bag and froze, his gaze fixed on my breasts, which were sort of way out there on account of I had on a push-up bra.

“I guess it’d be really bad form to make love to you right now.”

“Really bad. For one thing, I’m not into being watched, and Clara might have a stroke out there by the window. For another, it would only be fun for you. I’m freaking out way too bad to enjoy it, Ed.”

He pulled a black dress out of the bag. “Another difference between men and women.”

“We wear dresses and you don’t?”

As he slid it over my head, his hands brushed my breasts, and it was definitely not accidental. “We can enjoy sex anywhere, anytime.”

“Yeah, you’ve got it made, Ed, you and the rest of humans with penises. You can pee anywhere, as well.” I shimmied until the dress fell around my thighs. “Speaking of which, I haven’t since before they locked me up. I refused to do it in front of all those women and the guards. It’s inhumane the way they have a toilet in there, just open, for anyone to watch.”

“I’ll get you to a bathroom, don’t worry.” He pulled a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste out of the bag. “I thought this would feel good.”

“Lord, yes! You wouldn’t happen to have some lipstick in there, would you?”

He produced a tube of passion pink.

“Ed, you’re the man.”

He pulled a black jacket out of the bag. “Put this on.”

I did, and he handed me a pair of black-framed glasses and a hair clip. “Now put these on, and pull back your hair.”

“But I don’t wear glasses.”

“They’re just glass. I want you to look like a serious CPA. But not dowdy or poor. I want you to look classy.”

When I was done, he inspected me. “After you brush your teeth and put on some lipstick, you’ll do. Now, all you have to do in there is stand up when I tell you to, look directly at the judge and don’t say anything. Got it?”

I nodded and he knocked on the door for Clara to let us out.

Twenty minutes later I was in a crowded courtroom, with a lot of other souls awaiting arraignment. When it was our turn, the room went curiously silent, which increased my tension a million times over.

To hear the prosecuting attorney tell it, I was a dangerous, murderous, conniving thief, a real menace to society. Lucky for me, the judge remembered my testimony to the finance committee and thought I was not so dangerous. When Ed requested that I be released on my own recognizance, the judge said he couldn’t do that, based on my charges, but he thought a million bucks bail would do nicely.

I hadn’t actually considered that I couldn’t make bail. I might be locked up until my trial. While I was standing there, freaking out, Ed nudged me and whispered, “Let’s get the hell outta here, Pink.”

“But what about bail?”

He looked down at me and said with just a trace of bitterness, “Mister Billboard is gonna cover it.”

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