The Lone Star Cinderella

“Thanks,” he muttered. “So can I come in and talk to you about this now?”

“I guess—” She stopped, looked over his shoulder at the yard and said, “Don’t!”

Instantly on alert, Dave whirled around and saw a young man, somewhere in his early twenties, aiming a digital camera at them and clicking away.

“Hey,” Dave said, stepping off the porch toward the man.

The guy jumped backward, shaking his head and grinning. He held out a digital recorder and shouted, “Great pictures! Chester Devon from All The News blog. Care to comment?”

“The only comment I have is one you can’t print, Chester,” Dave told him as he stalked toward the reporter, who had somehow slipped past the Pine Valley gate guard. “And no pictures, either.”

“Free country, man,” Chester countered, still grinning. “I think my readers will be interested to see Santiago’s housekeeper and a suspect in his disappearance looking so cozy...”

His readers, Dave thought. All ten of ’em. Still, if this guy posted pictures to his blog, they would eventually get around and make for more of the kind of scandal he was trying to avoid.

“Cozy? Oh, for—” Mia broke off, then spoke up again, louder. “I’m calling security.”

Just what he needed, Dave thought grimly. Not only a reporter but security coming over, too. More food for the local gossips. He couldn’t do anything about Mia’s call to security, but maybe he could head the reporter off at the pass.

“I’ll give you a thousand dollars for your camera.”

“Are you serious?” the kid asked with a laugh. “No way, man.”

Great. A budding reporter with morals. Or maybe Dave just hadn’t hit the guy’s price yet. “Five thousand.”

Chester wavered.

Dave could see it in the kid’s eyes. He was thinking that with five grand in his pocket he could buy a better camera, maybe get a job at a real newspaper.

“I don’t know...” Chester ran one hand across the chin sprouting a few stray whiskers. “With this kind of shot, I could maybe get a job at a paper in Houston.”

Dave understood the kid’s dreams. He’d had a hell of a lot of them himself once. And he’d worked his ass off to make sure they all came true. Didn’t mean he was going to be the rung on the ladder beneath Chester’s feet, though.

“Haven’t you heard, kid? Newspapers are dinosaurs.”

“True...”

Dave had the kid now. This guy wasn’t enough of a poker player to hide the avarice in his eyes. Everyone had his price, Dave reminded himself. All he had to do was find the right number and this guy would cave. “Call it ten thousand and I want your recorder, too.”

“Seriously?” Chester’s eyes lit up. “You got a deal, man.”

The kid followed while Dave went to his car, grabbed a checkbook from the glove compartment and wrote out a check. He signed it, then held one hand out.

“Let’s have ’em,” Dave said. The kid laid his camera and the recorder on Dave’s palm, then snatched the check. He stared at it for a couple seconds, a slow smile spreading on his face.

“This is seriously cool, man. With this, I can get out of Royal and move to Houston.”

“Good.” The farther away the better, as far as Dave was concerned. “You should get moving before security gets here and starts asking you uncomfortable questions.”

The kid looked up and grinned. “I’m practically gone.”

A second later, Chester was sprinting off across the yard, and then lost in the scrub oaks and pines defining the edge of Alex’s lot. Probably scaled the fence to get in here, Dave thought and had to give the kid points. He approved of determination. He also approved of getting rid of the kid as easily as possible.

Ten thousand was nothing. He’d have paid twice that to keep Chester quiet. As that thought moved through his mind, Dave realized that his problem might not be completely solved. Just because Chester didn’t have photographic proof didn’t mean he’d be quiet about Dave’s visit to Mia.

So it was time to put a different spin on this. His mind raced with possible solutions and almost instantly, he came up with a workable plan. And if he worked it right, this could actually solve all of his problems. He glanced toward the house, where Mia was again standing in the open front doorway.

A Pine Valley security car pulled up to the curb and a uniformed guard stepped out. Before he could speak, Dave pointed and called out, “He ran toward the ravine.”

The security guard hopped back into his car and went in pursuit, but Dave knew that kid was going to evade the guard. He’d gotten in to the gated community without being caught, hadn’t he?

“What’s going on?” Mia stepped out onto the wide, brick porch. “How’d you get him to leave?”

“Made him an offer,” Dave said as he walked toward her.

She blinked at him. “You paid him off?”

“I did.” Dave took the porch steps and stood directly opposite her. “Bought his camera and recorder.”

She looked up at him and he could see disdain in her eyes. “It’s easy for you, isn’t it? Just buy people if you have to.”

“I didn’t buy him,” Dave corrected with a smile. “I bought his stuff.”

“And his silence,” she added.

“In theory,” Dave agreed. “But there’s nothing to stop him from spreading this around, despite his lack of evidence.”

She wrapped her arms around her middle. “Then paying him off accomplished nothing?”

“It bought me some time,” he said, mind still racing.

“Time for what?”

“That’s something we should talk about.” The more he considered his idea, the better he liked it.

When Alex had disappeared, Dave had hired an investigator. He’d seen the writing on the wall and had known that sooner or later, people would start suspecting him. As always, he’d figured it was better to be prepared. The investigator hadn’t turned up much information on Alex, but Dave now knew enough about Mia to convince him he could get her to go along with his plan.

“But first,” he said, meeting her eyes, “tell me. Do you think I should be a suspect?”

She looked at him for a long, silent minute. He knew she was thinking that over and it irritated him more than a little that it was taking her so long to make a judgment call. “Well?”

She slumped one shoulder against the doorjamb. “Probably not.”

His mouth quirked. “A resounding testimonial.”

“I don’t know you well enough for that.”

“Right. Well. That’s something else we should talk about.” He glanced over his shoulder at the empty yard and scanned the tree line looking for another sneaky reporter. He’d learned over the years that reporters were like ants at a picnic. First you saw one. Then two. Then the picnic was over.