Nora Roberts - High Noon

"Well, if you're an actress how are you going to count your lines?" Duncan considered earning a second eye roll a badge of honor. "Anybody can count."

"Only with the beauty of numbers. Then you have to figure out how much you're going to make-so you can buy that house in Malibuafter you pay your agent her percentage, and pay your bodyguards so the paparazzi don't hound you. You got to have yourself an entourage, kid, and do the math so you can call up that personal shopper when it's time for the Oscars."

Carly considered. "Maybe I'll just be the personal shopper. Then I only have to know about clothes. I know about clothes already."

"What's your commission?"

This time he got a frown instead of an eye roll. "I don't know what that is."

"It's how much you make when you sell Jennifer Aniston that vin tage Chanel gown. You get a cut of what it costs. So say it costs five thousand, and you get ten percent. Plus, she needs shoes, and a purse thing. So what's your commission? Gotta do the math."

Her eyes narrowed now. "I get something every time they buy something? I get money, every time?"

"Pretty sure that's how it works."

Interest lit her face and banished the pout. "I don't know how to do percent."

"I do. Got paper?"

When Phoebe walked in, her family was circled around the table. Creamy omelets, fancy strips of Ava's masterful French toast, crisp bacon invited healthy appetites to tuck right in.

Duncan ate with his left hand while Carly, her chair scooted up beside his, leaned over his rapidly scribbling right.

"She needs earrings! She has to have earrings, too."

"Okay. How much for the ear dangles?"

"A million dollars!"

"You're the Satan of personal shoppers." He flicked a glance up, smiled. "Morning."

"Mama! We're doing percent, so I can figure out how much I'll make when I'm a personal shopper. I already made six thousand dollars on commission."

"Jennifer Aniston's up for an Oscar," Ava explained. "She needs to be outfitted, of course."

"Of course."

"And needs ensembles for various appearances."

Phoebe walked around to read the list Duncan had going. "Jen's on quite the spree."

"Numbers are fun."

Phoebe gaped at her daughter. "I think I've walked into a parallel universe, one where numbers are fun and there's omelets on Tuesday mornings."

"Sit right down," Essie told her. "We've kept yours warm in the oven."

Phoebe checked her watch. "I guess I've got time to force down a few bites. Numbers are fun," she repeated as she sat on the other side of her daughter. "How come they weren't fun when I made little bunnies and kittens out of them to show you how they multiplied?"

"Numbers are more fun when they're money."

Phoebe picked up her coffee, shook her head. "Mind yourself with this one, Duncan. She's a gold digger."

"She picks up a couple more clients like Jen here, she's going to be supporting me. Look how pretty you are in the morning. Even prettier than Ava's omelets-which is going some. I expect there isn't a man in Savannah with a better view than I've got here in this kitchen." Phoebe's brows winged up. "What did you put in his omelet, Ava?"

"Whatever it was, I'll make sure it goes in every time."

He ate cold cereal straight out of the box and washed it down with bitter black coffee. He hadn't shaved that morning. He hadn't showered.

He knew he was standing on the slippery edge of a bout of depression. He wanted the anger back. The anger and the purpose. They could get lost in that blue pit of depression, he knew. He'd lost them before. There was medication, duly prescribed. But he preferred the speed he'd bought from a friend of a friend. Still, he knew the uppers were a bad choice. He could do the rash and the reckless with that heady juice rushing through him.

He'd already done the reckless, hadn't he? Plugging that idiot rabbit was one thing. But he should've saved it-a few days in the freezer, then he could've dumped it on Phoebe anytime in the dead of night. He'd nearly gotten caught by rushing it. But he'd been so pissed off! She wasn't taking the heat for Johnson. Not from the department, not from the press, not from the public. The stupid fucker's mother had made Phoebe her new best friend. And that maudlin, that pitiful statement outside the funeral home played over and over on the news, on the talk shows.

Made that fumbling bitch look like Mother fucking Teresa instead of the ambitious, grasping, stumbling cunt she was.

He'd let the anger take over-always a mistake. He'd let it rule so he'd driven straight to her house, tossed the corpse up. He'd meant it to land on the veranda but his hand had been shaking with rage, and his aim was short.

He'd nearly gone after it, had started to, when light spilled out of the house next door.

He could see himself-humiliated even now-hiding in the bushes while that crazy bitch walked out with her ugly excuse for a dog. And he knew, he knew she walked that dog right at dusk, every single night. He knew, but he hadn't used the knowledge. He'd only used the anger.

And what if that crazy woman or her ugly excuse for a dog had seen him? It wasn't time for that yet.

He'd actually imagined killing them both. Snapping necks like celery stalks and leaving them on Phoebe's front steps.

But it wasn't the time.

He had a plan. A plan and a purpose. An agenda.

Now the rage was gone, and the purpose was blurred with a damning sense of failure. He'd wasted his time on that Posse asshole. Taken a stupid risk and wasted bullets.

It meant nothing.

He looked around his workshop and nearly wept with despair. None of it meant anything. He'd lost what mattered, and she'd lost nothing. Now he was reduced to leaving dead animals on her doorstep.

He should've killed the crazy old woman and her dog, he decided. Coulda, shoulda. That would've made a statement.

He took out one of the little black pills, studied it. Just one, he thought. Just one to give him back some juice.

Because it was time to make a statement. Time to stop screwing around and kick it all up a notch.

Johnson hadn't put a hitch in her step. Something else-or somebody else-would.

"Twenty-two caliber." The criminalist, a skinny guy named Ottis, held the slug up with gloved fingers. "You gonna kill da wabbit, this is plenty hot enough."

"Single shot?"

"Yeah." Ottis frowned at Phoebe. "Do you want me to run it through ballistics? Ah, do any trace on the… vie?"

"Actually, I would. If someone's playing a prank, I'm not laughing. And I think it's more than that. So anything you can tell me about the bunny or the bullet would be helpful."

"Sure, no problem. I'll get back to you."

She went back to her office and wrote up an official incident report. Then she took a copy out to Sykes's desk, filled him in.

"Do you want me to go have a conversation with Arnie?"

"No, at least not yet. I'd like you to pull a few lines, if you can. Find out how he's handling the security job, get a sense of his routine. See if you can find out if he's been spending any time in my neighborhood. He's got a mouth," Phoebe added. "If he's messing with me, he's probably bragged about it to someone. Someone he drinks with or works with."

"I'll poke around."

"Thanks. Thank you, Bull."

Best she could do, Phoebe decided. But not all she could do. Back in her office, she wrote up a log, listing the times and dates, the incidents she believed were connected. To these she added her own speculations.

Rat-symbol-snitch, turncoat, deserting sinking ship. Snake-symbol-evil, sneaky, bringer of ruin to Paradise. Rabbit-symbol-cowardly, running away.

Might be taking it all too far, psychologically, she mused, but it was better to err on the side of caution than to just err.