But when an elderly victim complained to a local cop that she feared she’d been cheated, the authorities closed in. A sting was organized with an undercover agent, but by the time the cops moved in, the two male associates had fled, leaving only Tanya behind holding the bag. But not the profits from the scam, or any of the gold or silver, which had apparently vanished.

“Ain’t that the way?” Vikki mused aloud.

The woman had been booked and arrested, but eventually released. Vikki wondered why, until she pulled up Tanya Carnahan’s booking photo.

“Ahhh,” she said. She’d seen other, flattering photos of Tanya in the New York tabloids, and she’d even seen the police photos taken at the murder scene. But even dirty and disheveled in a police mug shot, the woman was strikingly beautiful. Vikki could see what Evan Wingfield had seen in Tanya. And she could understand how even a devious crook like Wingfield had been taken in. The snake had been charmed, and he still didn’t know to what extent.

She read the arrest report again and laughed at a detail she’d overlooked earlier. Tanya Carnahan had been arrested in a small beach town called Treasure Island. You couldn’t make this shit up if you tried, she thought.

Several different jurisdictions had been involved in the sting operation, including the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the FBI, the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office, and, of course, the locals.

The feds and the state cops probably weren’t all that invested in the incident, especially since the men had slipped through their grasp, but this would have been a big deal to a small police department. Vikki figured the arresting officer, a man named Joe DeCurtis, would know the most about the incident. She glanced at the clock. It was after six, but she put in the call anyway. As expected, her call went straight to voice mail, so she left a message.

Returning to the arrest report she found the name of the other two suspects in the scheme, both of whom had slipped away before the authorities closed in. One, a Declan M. Rooney, age forty-two at the time of the incident, was apparently the mastermind and founder of the ring. And, it seemed, he was married to Tanya Carnahan. Or so she claimed.

Rooney’s driver’s license photo was included in the report. Vikki had a theory that you should never trust a man who took a good driver’s license photo, and Declan Rooney’s photo only reinforced that belief.

He had dark, wavy, shoulder-length hair combed back from a high forehead, and piercing blue eyes. He looked, Vikki thought, like a goddamned pirate.