Herb Allison lets out a sharp ha. “Cheap bastard. I like it. I’ll start you at sixty-five. Upward potential, if you know what I mean.” Sara does not know what he means, but dollar signs are dancing in her vision.

“What about my place?” Sara asks, looking around the cramped and dingy kitchen. “I can’t just leave.”

“Sure you can. Quit the lease. I’ll cover any fees for early termination, have my guys get you a storage unit.” She’s heard Herb use this tone on the phone, but to be on the other end of it: even with its gruffness, somehow he sounds like she’s the one doing him a favor. “Movers to haul your stuff, too.”

“Why me?”

“You? I like you, kid.”

“But you hardly know me!”

“You seem like you can roll with the punches. And I’ve got a guy.” He means a service that does background checks on all potential clients, to make sure he doesn’t make any unwise investments. “No domestic assaults or child porn on my roster, no way. Try to stay away from the drunk drivers, too. At least the habitual ones.” It was easy enough to run her name. “Sara Ashley Jones, daughter of Cathy and blank. Born February 27, 1981—big birthday coming up, my dear—raised in Flagstaff. First in your family to go to college—congrats for that—though your grades were nothing to write home about. Started out with Jewell eight years ago, which we knew, stable employment since. Your credit score is shit, but—”

“Some of it was for school,” she interrupts.

She hears a rustle of papers. “Whopper loans, I see that. But I’m looking at thirty-five K of uninsured cosmetic medical treatments for one Cathy Jones.”

Her face burns, remembering that.

“What was it, her tits?”

“She just said she needed a medical procedure.”

Herb coughs. “What you need to do is become a better judge of character.”

He couldn’t possibly realize how deep that digs. “Are you all done with that Davis guy?”

“What?” Coffee sloshes around in her stomach. How could he know about Davis?

“That thug you were seeing. I’ve got controlled substances in the house—pain meds and the like—and I can’t have any addicts around. Convicts, neither. I’m not saying no gentlemen callers. But not him.”

“Right,” Sara says, though she is more confused than ever. Her on-again, off-again boyfriend isn’t exactly a Cub Scout, but in three years of dating he’d never said anything about jail time.

“It’s a lovely house, as cookie cutters go,” Herb says. “Just a few years old, right on the Troon North course. Did I mention there’s a hot tub?”

Herb prattles on about the patio and the view. When he reaches the chef-quality kitchen, a new message pops up on Sara’s computer. Davis, again. Still. Subject line: “I’m Sorry.”