Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 150, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 914 & 915, November/December 2017

A writer who’s made her mark not only in the mystery field, where in 2002 she won an Edgar Allan Poe Award for best paperback original novel, but in the field of science fiction and supernatural suspense, T. J. MacGregor first appeared in EQMM in last year’s June issue. The Florida author is back this month with a story about that state’s popular lottery.

1

“I’m feeling it,” Dad says.

“Feeling what?”

We’re having lunch on the front deck at Bart’s, where we come at least once a week. It’s a lovely spot in Key Largo, tucked away in palm trees on a prayer rug of a beach. The Gulf of Mexico spreads out before us, the water a blue as breathtaking as the cloudless sky. Gulls sweep through the cool February air, their cries echoing.

“The lottery burn. I need to buy a ticket when we leave here.”

“What’s the jackpot for the next drawing?”

“Big.” He slips his phone from his shirt pocket, his hands trembling badly today from the Parkinson’s. He uses a stylus to navigate to the lottery site. “It’s estimated at five fifty.”

“Five hundred and fifty thousand?”

He laughs so hard he nearly chokes. “Spoken like a non-lottery player, Jo. Five hundred and fifty million. After taxes, it would be about half that.”

Max Baker, lottery expert. “Maybe I’ll buy a ticket too.”

“I might actually buy several. The last time I felt the lottery burn was the year your mom died. I won fifty grand. That enabled me to pay off the mortgage and take her to Hawaii.”

My mother died a decade ago, when I was thirty, of a sudden heart attack. She was only sixty-four. Dad couldn’t stand living alone in the house that held so many memories of her. So he retired from the high school where he’d been a guidance counselor for more than half his marriage, sold the house, and moved to Key Largo.

In 2012, shortly before he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, he married Anne. At sixty-two, she’s twelve years younger than Dad, manages one of the bars on the beach, smokes and drinks too much, and parties like she’s eighteen. As we say in my profession, she has issues. A lot of them.

I’m not sure what he sees in her other than companionship. She’s the complete antithesis of my mother, but maybe that’s the point. Maybe when you’re married to your soul mate for forty years, the second time around demands someone at the opposite end of the spectrum. I wasn’t invited to the wedding, probably a good thing.

We finish our lunch, I pay the bill, and we make our way to the parking lot and my car. He uses a cane when we’re out, but at home he resorts to his walker or an electric wheelchair. Anne complains about the wheelchair, says he’s always bumping into walls, nicking the paint and the door frames. When I was at their place a couple of weeks ago, I touched up the nicks and scrapes and cleaned the place from top to bottom. Anne doesn’t lift a finger to keep the house clean and the rooms stink of smoke. I opened all the windows, turned on the ceiling fans, and went through the house with Febreze. She complained about that too, said the smell made her sneeze.

None of this is new. But it’s getting worse.

Once we’re in the car, his cane propped alongside him in the seat, I tell him that the cleaning woman I hired will be at his house two days from now, on Friday at nine. “Jo, I appreciate it, but Anne doesn’t want some stranger coming into the house to clean.”

“What do you want, Dad?”

“Just to keep the peace and win the lotto.”

“What will you do if you win?” I pull out of the lot and onto a dirt road that eventually takes us to U.S. 1. “What would you do with that many millions?”

“Give half of it to you, that’s first. So you don’t have to work so hard.”

“I love working. But a long sabbatical would be great! What else?”

“I’d buy us a house in Tuscany. And I’d divorce Anne.”

“You can divorce her now, Dad, and move in with me. I’ve got an extra bedroom.” It isn’t the first time I’ve suggested this, but I’ve never before heard him say he wants to divorce her.

“You’ve got your own life, honey. I don’t want to intrude.”

My work is my life. I’m an outsourced school psychologist. I travel to schools throughout the Keys and tend to students with issues both simpler and more complex than my father’s or Anne’s. I’m divorced, no kids, have a friend with benefits, love to read and garden and travel to exotic places when I have the time. That about sums it up.

“You wouldn’t be intruding. Since I’m on the road so much, I could hire someone to cook for you and watch after you when I’m gone.”

“Anne does that.” He points at an old fishing shop coming up on the right. “Hey, let’s try that mom-and-pop place for our lotto tickets. Those places are sometimes luckier.”

I pull into a parking space in front. The windows are plastered with signs: We sell Lotto tickets! Live bait! Fishing poles! Spare engine parts! And even a few groceries! “Okay, what numbers should I play for you, Dad?”

“Jo, you never let anyone else buy your Lotto tickets. That’s the first rule.”

Oh, of course. I should have known this. Dad has been buying one-dollar lotto tickets twice a week for years. “What’s the second rule?”

“Believe that you’re going to win. See it in your head. Feel that you’ve already won.” He opens the car door, grasps his cane, swings his legs over the edge of the seat, and gets out.

“Any other rules?” I ask as we start up the steps to the front porch. He has trouble with steps sometimes. He grips the railing with his free hand, leans on the cane with the other.

“Third rule: Never allow yourself to get into a situation where you’re so dependent on others that winning the lottery becomes your salvation.”

I really dislike what that implies. But before I can ask him about it, the front door of the shop opens and Dad greets the old guy who hurries out, a fishing pole in one hand, a bag of bait in the other. “Hey, Charlie.”

“Max! Good to see you.” Charlie shakes Dad’s hand like a man pumping water. “Looks like you’re getting around fine. We miss you on our fishing excursions.”

“I may try them again. Give me a call when you’re planning another one.”

“You bet. Anne won’t like it one damn bit, though,” he says with a laugh.

Dad dismisses the remark with a wave of his hand. “Don’t know why she’d care.”

“She thinks you might fall overboard.”

Dad laughs. “Yeah, right. Have you met my daughter, Charlie?”

He introduces us and we chat for a few minutes about their last fishing trip together and what a hissy fit Anne had about it. “She carried on like your dad was nonfunctional,” Charlie remarks.

Issues, like I said. Anne has issues. “She obviously exaggerates,” I say.

“I’m feeling the lottery burn, Charlie,” Dad says, changing the subject. He’s apparently uncomfortable talking about Anne.

“Just bought mine.” Charlie pulls a ticket out of his shirt pocket and wags it in the air. “Someone’s got to win, right? Gotta get moving, Max. Nice meeting you, Jo.”

“You too, Charlie.”

I open the door for Dad. “Why does Anne throw a hissy fit when you go fishing?”

He shrugs. “She seems to have the idea that I should be housebound.”

“That sucks, Dad. You should get out fishing as often as you can, be with other people.”

“So I can listen to her bitch and gripe about it for days? No, thanks.”

His cane taps along the floor as he makes his way to the counter, his shoulders hunched, his gait a shuffle. He moves through narrow aisles of fishing hooks, poles, weights, buckets, all the paraphernalia of what he loves to do. It infuriates me that Anne puts up a stink when he goes fishing with his friends. I immediately entertain the idea of moving him into my place today.

But why should he move? The house belongs to him. Anne should move out. He can divorce her, and I’ll use his place as my home base until I can find a job that doesn’t require as much travel. And until that happens, I’ll hire someone to come in, just like I told him earlier.

A plan. I’m one of those people who needs a plan.

2

“Afternoon, Max,” says the cheerful young woman behind the counter. “Fishing supplies or the lottery?”

“Lottery, Barb.”

“Random, or do you have numbers?”

“Both.”

“Okay, random first.” She taps at a machine, a ticket slides out, she hands it to Dad. “Numbers.”

“Five, six, seven, eight, sixteen, thirty-one.”

“Aren’t those the ones you usually play?”

“Yup.”

It takes me a moment to realize these are birthdates — his, mom’s, and mine.

“Here you go, Max. Two bucks for two tickets for February tenth. And good luck! You’ll know by eleven tonight if you’ve won five hundred and fifty million! Just remember me when, huh?”

He laughs. “Absolutely.” He drops a pair of ones on the counter, checks both tickets, slips them in his shirt pocket, and steps aside so I can buy a ticket. “Honey, I’ll be over in the fishing-pole area.”

I buy my ticket and when I turn to look for Dad, Anne is coming through the door in her bar-management attire. She has the body of a much younger woman, slender with curves in the right places, and dresses like she’s half her age — skintight jeans, a pale blue shirt with the name of the bar written across the pocket. She’s a blonde, one that comes from a bottle, and wears her curly hair chin-length. At one time, she was undoubtedly attractive, but now she looks weathered and used in spite of the plastic surgery she had before she met Dad. Traces of that surgery are evident around her mouth and eyes, where the skin looks as tight as her jeans.

She’s with one of her employees, a younger woman I recognize who works the bar but whose name always eludes me. They’re laughing about something on her phone. When Anne glances up, she sees me and struts over.

“Jo.”

“Hey, Anne.”

“I thought you and Max were having lunch.”

“We did. Now we’re buying lotto tickets.”

She rolls her dark eyes and leans toward me, touching my arm. “Between you and me? It’s not just the lotto tickets anymore. It’s scratch-offs, Powerballs, Megas, Fantasy Fives. He’s got a problem, Jo.”

I touch her arm in the same spirit with which she touched mine, that woman-to-woman stuff that teenage girls sometimes use when I’m evaluating them. “Between us, Anne? You’ve got a problem. Why do you put up a fuss about him going fishing with his buddies? Why don’t you ever take him out for lunch or dinner or just out for a drive? You can’t even drive him to a doctor’s appointment. He has to take a cab. And why do you bitch at him for a few nicks in the paint? And since you don’t clean the house and he can’t exactly do it hobbling around with his cane or in a wheelchair, why the hell should you care if I pay for a cleaning woman to come in once a week?”

Her dark eyes widen and she rocks back, away from me. “Wow, where did all that come from?”

“Right from the heart,” I snap. “In fact, I think it’s time for Dad to move in with me or, even better, for you to move out. It’s his house. Your name isn’t even on the deed.”

Her nostrils flare, blood rushes up her neck and into her face, turning that leathery brown skin even darker, and her hand flies toward my face to slap me. But my reflexes are fast and I grab her wrist and jerk her toward me, our faces so close I can smell the booze on her breath. “Don’t screw around with me, Anne.”

She wrenches free of my grasp. “Let’s see what Max has to say about all this.”

She marches away from me, swinging her tanned skinny arms, and I follow her into the aisle where Dad is examining a box of fishing weights. “Max,” she snaps. “Your daughter is way outta line and you need to set her straight fast.”

Dad glances up, surprised to see Anne here, and fear shadows his eyes. It shocks me to see it, to realize that Dad is actually afraid of his wife. “What’re... you doing here?”

“Didn’t you hear what I just said?” Anne demanded.

“My God, Anne, lower your voice,” Dad says.

“We’re going outside,” I tell her, touching Dad’s arm. “Where the three of us can talk without disturbing anyone else.”

Dad and I start up the aisle, but Anne rushes up behind us, grabs the back of his shirt, and spins him around so fast that he loses his grip on the cane and it clatters to the floor. He stumbles, I steady him, then scoop the cane off the floor and point it at her. “Back off, Anne. Your stuff will be in the driveway by this evening.”

“Jo... c’mon... please,” Dad stutters.

“See?” Anne says. “See that? You’re meddling, Jo. You’ve always meddled, you’ve never liked me, you’ve always tried to come between Max and me.”

I hook my arm through Dad’s and we head for the front door. I pass him the cane and he clutches it as though it’s his last best hope and my heart bleeds for him, for the tangled mess of his life. He has always been my biggest supporter, has always been there for me. Now he needs me the way I needed him when I was learning to ride a bike and lost control of it, when I was bullied in middle school, when I got stood up for my high-school prom, when my marriage fell apart, when Mom died, when he threw himself between me and a car that nearly hit me. Always, the look on his face was, I’m here. Now I’m throwing myself between him and Anne. Our roles are reversed.

Customers stare at us. I hear Anne’s sandals slapping the floor as she hurries after us, and Barb at the counter shouts, “Don’t you dare come back in here, Anne!”

Witnesses. There are witnesses to what Anne did, grabbing the back of Dad’s shirt, spinning him around so fast that he lost hold of his cane and would have pitched forward if I hadn’t caught him. Elder abuse. The courts in Florida take it seriously, even here in the laid-back Keys.

Once we’re outside, I walk Dad over to a bench on the porch and he sits down, rubs his hands over his face, looks at me with haunted eyes. “Not good,” he murmurs.

“Dad, do you want her gone or not?” I ask.

“Yes,” he whispers. “Yes.”

Anne barrels through the door, rage radiating from her in waves. I can smell it, a scorched-earth stink, and I taste its burn inside my mouth and hear its bellowing voice in my head. I turn to face her, this woman with more issues than I could ever treat, and she stops dead. She slowly raises her arm, a Shakespearean gesture, and stabs her red-painted nail at me.

“You’re to blame for all of this, Jo.”

“You’re just an observer?”

“I’m a victim of... of your hatred... for me.” She moves tentatively toward Dad. “Do you want me gone, Max?”

Her voice is soft, sensuous, perhaps even a little seductive. The idea of the two of them making love sort of grosses me out, my being the daughter and all. But that’s what I hear in her voice.

Dad doesn’t raise his head. He rubs his hands over his thighs, fast, as if to tame his trembling fingers. The scraping sound of skin against fabric is so irritating I want to punch Anne for causing his hands to move like that. Her soft question triggered it.

“Dad? Anne asked you an honest question.”

Honest is the operative word here.

Now he raises his eyes and meets Anne’s glare. If he says no, I will try to honor that. If he says yes, I’ll hire an attorney to handle the divorce, shuffle around nearly every facet of my life, and her stuff will be in the driveway by nightfall.

“Do you really want me gone, Max?” Anne asks.

He starts shaking, his tongue darts along his lower lip, his glazed eyes drift to me, back to her. His shoulders stoop with exhaustion. “You hate me. I want you gone.” He presses his hands over his face and begins to weep.

3

The lawyer is on the divorce angle. I’ve called my boss, told him I have a family emergency, and he said I should take all the time I need. I feel like I’m letting my kids down, the ones I see week after week, the ones from dysfunctional families or families so poor the kids can’t afford lunch in the cafeteria. But I can’t allow Dad’s situation with Anne to continue.

I’m now hauling some of Anne’s stuff into the driveway, as promised. The problem is the furniture. I’m strong, but I’m not strong enough to carry a dresser down two flights of stairs and across the front yard to the curb. I can drag a queen mattress, but not the frame. I can’t handle a mahogany nightstand even with the drawers out, the couch in the living room is a sectional, and each separate piece is way too big for me. I call my neighbor on Islamorada and offer to pay her twin sons to help me out.

The strapping sixteen-year-olds are dropped off by a friend awhile later and the three of us start moving the rest of Anne’s stuff to the curb. An hour into it, I take a break to check on Dad. He’s nodding off at the kitchen table, the salmon dinner I cooked half eaten. His lotto tickets are on the fridge, held in place by magnets, and I know he’ll want to be up at eleven for the drawing, so I help him into his room. He yawns and flops back on his bed. I lift his legs onto the mattress, remove his shoes and socks, cover him with the sheet. “Dad, I’ll be back in a while. I have to give these kids a ride home.”

“Remind me to check for the winning numbers at eleven.”

“I will. I’ll be back in time for the drawing.”

He grasps my hands and pulls himself up against the pillow. “I’m sorry you saw that. I’m sorry you saw how weak I am against her. I just want to read and fish and be left alone.”

“I know.” I urge him back against the bed, fluff up his pillows. “This is going to work out. I love you, Dad.”

I want to strangle the bitch.

4

I wait in a heavily wooded lot across the street from Max’s house, seething as I watch Jo and two young men hauling my stuff to the curb. As soon as they’re gone, I intend to go through it all and take what I can fit in the back of my truck. What a meddling bitch. She doesn’t have any idea what it’s like living with him.

He twitches and shakes constantly, drives his wheelchair into the walls and door frames, needs help to get to the bathroom, falls frequently, forgets to take his meds, and can’t even boil an egg without making a mess. All I do when I get home from work is tend to his needs. So, yes, I’ve borrowed liberally from his financial accounts. I’m entitled. I’m going to miss that additional income, but I’m glad to be rid of him. Jo will discover soon enough what she’s signing up for, the endless annoying details involved with caring for a seventy-four-year-old man with Parkinson’s.

There goes my sectional couch, my bed — mattress, frame, springs, and all — and now my dresser. How am I going to get that into my truck by myself? Any decent person would give me the option of moving my stuff. But Jo isn’t a decent person. She has disliked me from the day she met me, always thought I was after Max’s money or something. I’ve got news for her about Max’s money. Except for Social Security, he’ll be broke soon and then on top of caring for him, she’ll have to support him. Karma, baby.

It looks as if they have finished cleaning out my belongings. The three suitcases at the curb probably contain my clothes. I can get those into the truck easily enough but I may have to write off most of the furniture. Some of that stuff was expensive, from Pier 1 in Key West, and the bitch should be reimbursing me for it. But I think I’ve still got one of the checks from our joint checking account, so first thing tomorrow I’ll be writing a check for about five grand and will deposit it in my own account. Good riddance, Max.

My phone vibrates, a text from Sam, the guy I sleep with from time to time. You free tonite?

No.

Isn’t the old dude in bed by now?

Undoubtedly. I’ll call you tomorrow.

Now Jo and her two helpers stroll down the driveway, chattering, and get into her car. Really? Am I about to become this lucky? She’s going to drive them home? Perfect. I can get inside the house and take a good look around for stuff of mine that she just dumped in the garbage.

Her bone-white Prius hums off into the dark. I hope those young men live in Marathon or somewhere else in the Middle Keys; that will give me plenty of time to look around the house. Once her car turns out of the neighborhood, I quickly drive my truck into the driveway, load the suitcases in the rear, and hurry up the stairs to the front door.

Locked.

No problem. I still have a key. Jo, for all her efficiency, has overlooked a number of details — the key, the joint account Max and I have, and the fact that I know where his cash stash is hidden. It’s not much, maybe a thousand, but that will help cover the cost of my furniture.

As I step into the house, the silence tells me Max is asleep. I move to the framed photo on the kitchen wall, the two of us on the day we were married in my son’s backyard in Tallahassee. I remove it from the wall, set it facedown on the counter, and slide the glass out. There. The envelope with his stash. I take it, drop it in my handbag.

My cell vibrates. It’s probably Sam, who can’t take no for an answer. But when I slip the phone from my back pocket, the night’s winning lotto numbers scroll across the screen. My heart hammers, I can’t wrench my eyes away. The numbers are the ones Max always plays — 5 6 7 8 16 31. My hands are shaking so badly that I jam my phone back into my pocket for fear of dropping it.

You want me outta your life, Max? Fine, no problem. I’ll just take this beautiful lotto ticket off the fridge door and be on my way. I snatch the ticket off the fridge and race for the door.

$550 million.

5

With two pit stops for gas, a bite to eat, and coffee, it takes me eight hours to drive to Tallahassee, where the lotto’s main office is located. It’s the only place where winnings in excess of $250,000 can be claimed. Once you make your claim, it becomes public knowledge.

With a jackpot this large, experts advise you take the full six months to make your claim so you have ample time to move, change your phone number, consult with tax attorneys and financial planners and anyone else who can help you to invest your newfound wealth. They warn you that friends and relatives you haven’t seen in years will start coming out of the woodwork and that every charity and scam artist in the country will be after you. Probably all true. But I don’t care.

If my credit cards weren’t maxed out, I would have flown and rented a car. But after today, maxed-out credit cards aren’t going to be an issue. After today, nothing in my life will be an issue. I’m going to buy this house I saw on Sugarloaf Key one day when Sam and I were out fishing, gorgeous place made of cedar that sits on a corner lot and has a view of the bay. The yard is white sand, landscaped with tropical plants, palm trees, banyans. And then I’m going to buy a new car and maybe I’ll buy Bart’s. That would be a great investment. Sure, put my money to work for me.

The lottery office in downtown Tallahassee opens at eight A.M. I hit the drive-through at Starbucks first for coffee and a turkey bacon and cheese breakfast sandwich. Even though I’m famished, I can barely eat. My stomach churns with excitement. I’m so tired my eyes feel like they’ve been scrubbed with Brillo. Once I pick up the check I’ll head straight to a branch office for my bank here in town and get it deposited. Then I’ll use some of Max’s cash for a motel room and will sleep for twelve hours.

Promptly at 8:41, I pull into a parking spot in front of the lottery office. When I get out of the car, my legs feel like hot blown glass. Even though the morning is chilly, in the thirties, my hands are damp with sweat. Oh, Max, thank you, thank you.

Inside the building, the air is toasty warm. Three of the five claim windows are open and have lines of people in front of each of them. Men and women, white and black, Hispanic and Asian, young and old and everything in between. They are holding various types of tickets, from Fantasy 5s to scratch-offs. Only a few people are holding lotto tickets. I pick up one of the forms — for the IRS, obviously — and fill it out as I wait in line.

Cold air rushes into the room as other people enter. I glance around and nearly panic. It’s them, Max and Jo. He’s using his walker and doesn’t see me yet, but she does. Our eyes meet briefly, then she laughs and leans close to him, whispers something. He looks up, smiles as if at a private joke, and shakes his head. Jo is already filling out the form.

I ask the woman behind me to save my spot in line and go over to them. “It’s my ticket. Your name isn’t anywhere on it, Max. And I don’t intend to split it with you.”

“No problem,” Jo says with a soft laugh. “We don’t intend to split with you, either.”

I don’t have any idea what she’s talking about.

“Better keep your spot in line,” Max says.

I move quickly back to my line, certain they can’t do anything to me. There’s no proof that I stole the ticket. But their presence here rattles me.

6

Finally, at 9:22, I reach the window. I glance over at Max and Jo, who are second in their line. “I’ve got a winner,” I tell the clerk, a bored-looking middle-aged woman sipping at coffee. Her name tag reads Trudy.

“ID, please, form, and the ticket,” she tells me.

I set my license, the form, and the beautiful winning ticket in a slot. She spends the next five or ten minutes checking information, jotting my license number on the form, and asking me questions. Is the address on my license current? As of last night, no. But since Max’s address is on my driver’s license, I tell her yes, that address is current.

I look over at Max and Jo. They have reached the window.

“Do you issue a check for the winnings or what?” I ask.

“A check, yes,” Trudy replies.

I lean closer to her and whisper, “Even for a sum as large as five hundred and fifty million?”

“Wow! Lucky you.” Then she reads off the numbers on the ticket. “Five, six, seven, eight, sixteen, and thirty-one. These are the numbers, honey. And what are you going to do first with all this?”

“I don’t know.”

“Hey, Sue, we’ve got a biggie here,” Trudy calls out, and Sue hurries over, excited.

“My God, those are the numbers,” Sue gushes. “We’ve got two winners here!” she says loudly.

Two?

I quickly check my phone to find out how many winners there were in last night’s jackpot drawing. Just one. Me. Max usually buys two tickets, so maybe his second ticket won something.

“Just one more step,” Sue says. “Every ticket has to be checked by our trusty little machine.” She taps a metal box to Trudy’s left and slips the ticket inside.

The machine beeps.

“Uh-oh,” Trudy says. “This isn’t a winner.”

What? “Of course it’s a winner. Five, six, seven, eight, sixteen, thirty-one. Those are last night’s winning numbers.”

“That’s true. But the date on this ticket is for last week.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Anger riddles my voice. “Let me see the ticket.”

“Please keep your voice down, ma’am.”

She drops my license, the form, and my ticket back into the slot. I turn the ticket so I can see it. 5 6 7 8 16 31. The numbers are right, but the date beneath them is all wrong: February 3, 2016.

“This is rigged!” I scream. “Those are the winning numbers and so what if I bought the ticket last week? I should get something!”

Suddenly, a beefy security guard is at my side. “Ma’am, you’ll have to leave.”

“Excuse me,” says Sue, stepping out from behind the window. “See that gentleman and woman at the last window?” She points at Max and Jo. “I would love to know how come you both have the winning numbers, but only their ticket has the correct date. Coincidence?”

“No coincidence,” Jo calls from the other side of the room. “She stole it off his fridge. All she saw was dollar signs. She didn’t bother looking at the date.”

Everyone in the room looks at me, people murmur, whisper. I’m shaking with rage. Now Max comes toward me, pushing his stupid walker along. “If you had paid attention to anything in the years you’ve known me, you’d realize that last week’s ticket is always the one on the fridge. I don’t toss it until the current drawing is over. Just one more gambler’s superstition.”

With that, he turns away from me. Sue hands me my license, the outdated ticket, my form, then looks at the guard. “Escort her out, please.”

Around me, the crowd breaks into applause.

The guard touches my arm and urges me toward the door. “You bastard!” I yell, and lunge toward Max and slam into him from behind.

His walker slides away from him and he pitches forward, crashes into a woman in line, and bedlam erupts. The security guard rushes up behind me, throws me to the floor, pins me there with his knee. He handcuffs me, yanks me to my feet, and shoves me into a chair.

“The police are on the way!” Sue shouts. “Please calm down, folks. We’ll get to your claims as quickly as possible.”

A siren wails somewhere nearby.

7

We pressed assault charges against Anne and the Tallahassee cops took her away. That was two weeks ago. I don’t know how long they’ll keep her, but the check has been deposited in my account. Dad closed out his accounts, and we’ve listed the house for sale.

It’s unlikely that Anne will find us. Tomorrow we fly to Tuscany to look for Dad’s special place.

© 2017 by T.J. MacGregor