Let's do it, he told himself as he opened a slatted gate and walked toward a large, brown-shingled house on a path strewn with seashells. The beach house and the setting seemed too good to be true. He even liked the sign: Paradise Found.

Mrs. Houston must have been watching for him from inside the beach house. As soon as his foot touched down on the stairs, the screen door swung open and she stepped outside to meet him.

She was a small African-American woman, and more attractive than he'd expected. Not movie-star beautiful, but there was something about her that drew his attention and held it. She was wearing baggy khaki shorts with a black tee-shirt, and was bare-footed.

“Well, you certainly picked a nice day for a visit,” she said, and smiled. Nice smile, too. She was tiny, though, probably only five feet tall, and he doubted that she weighed much more than a hundred pounds.

“Oh, it isn't like this every day?” Sampson asked, and managed a smile himself. He was still recovering from his surprise at Mrs. Houston as he mounted her creaking, wooden porch steps.

“Actually,” she said, 'there are a lot of days like this one here. I'm Billie Houston. But of course you knew that." She put out her hand. It was warm and soft in his, and so small.

He held her hand a little longer than he'd meant to. Now why had he done that? He supposed it was partly because of what she'd been through. Mrs. Houston's husband had been executed nearly two years earlier, and she'd proclaimed his innocence loudly and clearly until the end, and then some. The story felt familiar. Or maybe it was because there was something about the woman's ready smile that made him feel comfortable. She impressed him about as much as the town and the fine weather had. He liked her immediately. Nothing not to like. Not so far anyway.

“Why don't we walk and talk on the beach,” she suggested. “You might want to take off your shoes and socks first. You're a city boy, right?”

Alex Cross 8 - Four Blind Mice

Chapter Fifty

Sampson did as he was told. No reason the murder investigation, this interview anyway, couldn't have a few nice perks. The sand felt warm and good against his bare feet as he followed her down the length of the big house, then up and over a tall, broad dune covered with white sand and waving beach grass.

“Your house is sure something else,” he said. “Beautiful doesn't begin to do it justice.”

“I think so,” she said, and turned to look back at him with a smile. “Of course, this isn't my house. My place is a couple of blocks inland. One of the small beach bungalows you passed driving in. I house-sit for the O'Briens while Robert and Kathy are in Fort Lauderdale for the winter.”

“That's not such bad duty,” he said. Actually, it sounded like a great deal to him.