Now she was on the stoop, red in the face, still in her shapeless nightshirt, hair wild, clearly, even from a distance, pissed way the fuck off.

He was in jeans and a jeans jacket, a few feet down the walk from her, his back to me, but his body language was easily read and he shared his woman’s mood.

Since they were a house away, I didn’t hear what he said. I just knew he replied when she kept screeching.

“Fuck you! You don’t change your mind, motherfucker. Carlito will learn all your shit!”

At that, I knew it was time to go inside and do it quiet so neither of them would know I was outside and I’d heard what I’d heard.

This was what I did.

When I soundlessly closed my door behind me, I looked into my living room and hissed, “Shit.”

I didn’t know Carlito.

But I worked in a bar that served booze to cops, bikers, and bankers. Hairdressers and lady doctors. Farmers, plumbers, and lawyers.

And at a bar, customers considered waitresses deaf to anything but drink orders.

Also at a bar, customers considered bartenders their own personal shrinks.

So I knew that the least of what a man called Carlito was was a low-life loan shark.

But considering I’d heard his name murmured on more than one occasion by Colt, Sully, Mike, Drew, Sean, Merry, and a number of other cops in that ’burg, I suspected he was more.

I did not need that shit on my block, but it was more.

I did not need that shit on the block where my kid lived.

I went to my kitchen to pour myself a travel mug, emptying the last cup of joe from the pot into the mug to take out with me when the coast was clear. I was standing in the living room, holding it in my hand and listening for my neighbors, when my phone sounded with a text.

Excitement and annoyance chased its way through me as I looked to my phone on my purse, wondering if the text was from Merry.

Last night, through texts, his games had begun.

I was trying to ignore this.

It was hard to ignore.

I put the mug down on the coffee table, grabbed the phone, and saw it wasn’t from Merry. It was a text from Violet telling me she could pick Ethan up from school on Thursday when both Mom and I were working.

When I texted her back to confirm and give thanks, I saw I had a voicemail.

It was from that number I didn’t know.

I didn’t want to listen to it, but just in case the school got a new extension or some teacher was calling me from their own phone for some reason, I went to it, hit play, hit speaker, and heard, “Ms. Sheckle. This is Walter Jones. I would appreciate it if you could phone me back when you have a moment. Just so you know, I’ll make it worth your while. I was a profiler with the FBI, currently freelance, and am researching a book I’m writing on serial killers of the last twenty—”