I pulled my Rebel off the 2, roaring to a stop at the front entrance to the Palm Grove community, and cut the motor. I hopped off the bike, walking it silently through the wrought-iron gates into the complex. The residents didn’t exactly appreciate the sound of my twin engines as much as I did. Mostly because they were all eighty. Yep, I lived in a retirement community.

When my great-uncle Sal finally cashed in his chips, Aunt Sue traded in her four-bedroom in Long Beach for a cute little condo in Palm Grove. Lucky for me, that was right about the time the lease had expired on my apartment across town, and I’d needed a place to hang my hat for a few weeks.

That was three years ago.

Turns out Aunt Sue isn’t as sharp as she used to be. And having a person who doesn’t forget to turn off the oven and knows that socks don’t go in the freezer has come in handy. Which suits me fine. You can’t beat the fixed-income rent on the place, my neighbors are always quiet, and I have the entire pool to myself as soon as Jeopardy! comes on.

I wheeled my bike down Sanctuary Drive to Paradise Lane before turning onto my street, Oasis Terrace. I know, someone was a creative genius when it came to street names in this development. Aunt Sue and I lived in a little two-bedroom number, third on the left. White siding, blue shutters, low-maintenance square lawn. Exactly like the other thirty-two units in the complex, except that ours had a pink flamingo out front.

“That you, Tina?” A woman in a pink housecoat and fuzzy slippers shuffled onto the porch of the house next door, fifty years of a pack-a-day habit grinding her voice into a gravelly baritone.

“‘Evening, Mrs. Carmichael,” I said, waving.

She put her hands on her bony hips and narrowed a pair of eyes beneath her cap of white curls. Though her eyes were always kind of narrow. Mrs. Carmichael had had one too many face-lifts in her fifties, and her seventies weren’t being kind to her. “I can always tell it’s you,” she said, clacking her dentures. “That motorbike of yours is so noisy.”

“It’s off,” I said. “See?” I paused, putting my ear to the bike. “No sound.”

“Hmm.” She clicked her upper teeth again. “Well, it’s still noisy. Can’t hardly hear Pat Sajak over the thing.” Mrs. Carmichael was the only person in the complex who didn’t wear a hearing aid, a fact that had not only earned her the title of Neighborhood Watch Captain, but also tickled her vanity to no end. Mrs. Carmichael never turned her TV volume up past three.

“Sorry. I’ll try to be quieter.”

“And tell your aunt to turn down her music,” she shouted after me. “It’s been blasting all day!”