“That just about covers it.”

“Stay here,” he ordered, then put his leg down on the ground, preparing to exit the car.

“Like that’s happening.” I opened the driver’s door and got out.

“Okay,” he countered, looking at me from over the roof of the car. “In that case, stay behind me.” He darted to the far side of a tree and out of the house’s sight line.

“Sure thing, Frank,” I said in a stage whisper, crouching down and sprinting to a pine tree about five feet away. I studied the house, still as the woods surrounding it. “Meanwhile, I think we should go in from the side rather than the front or back.” I pulled the nine-millimeter Glock from my pocket and gestured with it toward the house. “These trees end only a few feet from the side door. Good cover.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “But keep low. All those picture windows could make us easy targets. That gun you’re waving around have the safety on?”

“Yes, but thanks for reminding me. I need to load it.”

“It’s not loaded?” His voice held an incredulity I didn’t want to think about.

“I forgot.” I reached into my sweats pocket for the magazine and loaded the Glock.

Watching me, Frank said, “And then you wonder why I worry about you.”

“I would have remembered before we got there.” I didn’t add the word maybe.

That’s the drawback of hardly ever using these things. As the in-house investigator for DI, 99 percent of the time, I sit on my derrière at my desk in a designer suit and heels, sifting through emails, memos, and other correspondence. My job is to find clues about who did what to whom. A lot of truth can be revealed by going through a company’s emails and paperwork, if you’re good at ferreting things out. I’m a good ferret.

Legwork on most jobs consists of walking daily to a nice restaurant for a lovely, long lunch, and then back to work. So, while I have a black belt in karate and go to the practice range to shoot regularly, most of the time I have no use at all for a weapon and keep my firearms locked away. But being the prime suspect in a murder changed that, as it has in the past when I get up from my desk only to stumble over a dead body or two.

Shaking his head, Frank squatted behind some shrubs. I did the same. Together we skuttled through brush to a tree nearest the property, maybe fifteen feet away. From there on, it was open space.

Resigned, Frank dropped down to his belly on the ground with a grunt. “I’m getting too old for this stuff,” he remarked.

Glad I was still wearing my grungy sweatsuit, I dropped down as well. No grunt, but I felt one in the offing. The smell of pine needles and soil assaulted my nose. I fought off a sneeze and crawled on my elbows and belly next to Frank toward the house. The oh-so-glamorous side of detective work.

“No sign of life, Frank,” I whispered, as we neared the deck off the side door.

“Doesn’t mean anything.” He hopped onto the deck and flattened himself against the outside wall. I followed.

With caution, Frank looked inside the picture window with a view of the kitchen area. At the same time, I looked through the glass in the top of the outside door and entrance to the kitchen.

“Clear,” he said.

“Nobody,” I said.

I reached for the doorknob, turned it, and pushed. It opened on silent hinges. We entered the green and white kitchen noiselessly. The only sound to be heard was a ticking clock. I followed the sound and focused on the clock over a doorway leading to another room.

It was one of those Felix clocks i.e., a black and white tuxedo cat, popular in the late thirties and early forties. Eyes and hanging tail moved in unison from side to side with each tick. It seemed like such a frivolous and lighthearted addition to

a house, it caused me to consider the actual people who lived there. Thinking of suspects as people can be very unsettling.

Frank tapped me on the shoulder, and gestured he was going to check out a closed door off the kitchen. I followed as his backup. It was a laundry room. A basket filled with rumpled clothes sat on top of the washing machine.

Then we checked out the entranceway and open door. Leaves and small branches littered the plank flooring, indicating the door had probably been left open for a while.

“Don’t close that door, Lee,” Frank whispered in my ear.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I whispered back. But I made a note to keep my eye out for any meandering critters, small and large.

As silently as possible, we went through the living room, dining room, family room, and closets. Nada. A quick view of a small cellar basement revealed nothing but mud walls, a sump pump, and spiders. Yuk.

We crept up the stairs to the second floor. Not saying a word, we went through each of the five bedrooms, bathrooms, and closets. While one bedroom and bathroom had signs of an occupant, there was no one to be found.

More relaxed, we came back down the stairs. We sheathed our guns, and I moved to the floor-to-ceiling glass-enclosed living room, with an incredible view of the mountains beyond the outdoor patio and pool.

I opened the door to the pool area and stepped out on the patio, looking around. Frank came up behind me and whispered in my ear, “Maybe he’s out hiking somewhere.”

“I don’t think so,” I said, my voice revealing the shock I felt. I pointed to the deep end of the pool. Hidden from inside the house, a man dressed in black, floated face down, arms extended up and outward.

“Good God,” Frank said.

Almost as one, we ran to the edge of the rectangular pool and dropped to our knees on the rim. Frank reached into the water for one arm, me for the other. Together we pulled the limp body toward us and hauled the man out of the water. Turning him over, I saw it was Steven Kutner. No longer wearing an engaging smile, he stared back me with unseeing eyes.

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