“Is this what I think it is?”

Marty grinned and said, “If you think it’s the pistol I took from Brennan’s closet.” He made it sound innocent, like it was a shoe he had taken.

“What’s it for?” I kept my voice as even as possible.

“Our game.”

“What’s the game?”

“It’s called scare the shit out of my ex-wife, Teal.” He kept driving, taking a few turns, and said, “Come on, it’ll be good for a laugh.”

I didn’t say yes or no as we parked on a short cul-de-sac a few blocks from the ocean.

Marty pointed at one of the three houses on the right side of the road. A vacant lot took up the space on each side of it, separating it from the houses next door. “That’s her house.”

It was nice. Nothing like my old house, but it was clean and cute. A short walk to the beach. I was getting nervous as I considered all the crazy things that could happen. But I didn’t want to let Marty down, and frankly I was curious as to how he’d scare her. He was a smart guy. I was certain he had put some thought into this.

A brown Audi whipped down the street, then pulled into the driveway.

Marty said, “And heeeeere’s Teal.” Then he looked at me and said, “Are you sure you want to play? I could really use the help.”

I hesitated, then blocked out all the reasons I should say no. Instead I said, “Yeah, I’ll play.”

Chapter 23

Marty explained my part of his plan quickly, and I just nodded like a robot. It all sounded crazy to me. All I had to do was distract his ex-wife and he would do the rest. I still had no idea how badly he was going to scare her, but somehow, the idea was enticing. Maybe it was because I wanted to scare Brennan badly that I agreed to go along with everything. This was as close as I could get for now.

We both slipped out of the car, and Marty darted toward a row of bushes that would keep him out of sight. I just started to walk slowly down the street in the direction of Teal’s house. I noticed that of the few houses, one of them was empty, with a For Sale sign in the yard, and another house on the corner had no cars in its gravel driveway. On the other side of the street, where we were parked, there were no houses, just the rear of a church soccer field.

Teal was unloading groceries and had to make a couple of trips from the front door to her open trunk.

When I was on the street in front of her house, I got my first good look at Marty’s ex-wife. She was a beauty: tall, with a creamy complexion and long, wavy hair. I realized I had never seen a picture of her. I’d done a little snooping on Facebook, but she had no profile.