Character Monday: Caroline Davis White Talks Art, Men and Money.

Interview with Caroline Davis White from “Sunny Days, Moonlit Nights”

1.      If you could live in another time, when would that be? I’d live during the time of the French Impressionists and I’d live in France. Of course Mike wouldn’t be there, but perhaps I’d marry Claude Monet or Jean Renoir. It would be so romantic to be married to a terrific painter like that where we could spend our days painting together. *sighs*, so romantic! But we would probably be poor. Can you live on love and paint fumes? *laughs*.

2.      If you could relive something in your life, what would it be? My days with my mom. I didn’t realize how tough life was for her. When my dad died, it was hard for me, but she never recovered and never loved another man again. I think they had a great romance and when he died, something in her died, too. Life got difficult then, we never had enough money and it ate away at her. I never gave her enough credit for keeping things together for us and putting me first all the time.

When I discovered the portfolio of my work she kept, I realized she did value my art, my talent. But she was lonely for my dad and trying her best for me, so afraid of making the wrong decisions. I don’t think I made it any easier on her and I regret that. If I could go back, I’d be more respectful of her situation and what she was going through…and maybe a little more obedient.

3.      Why did you go to all those expensive charity dinners? Because mom was husband hunting for me. At first it was fun to dress up and be among so many rich and fancy people. Although mom was a good sewer, I knew my dress was homemade, even if no one else did. I felt like a fraud most of the time. Though when I look back, I realize we weren’t the only ones husband hunting at those things. I did it for mom, because my marrying a rich man would give her peace of mind.

4.      What kind of men did you meet there? I met some doozies! There were many attractive men there, of course, and some took an interest in me. There were also poor men looking for rich wives. When I went out with one of those, my mom sniffed him out and insisted I stop dating him. He was nice but I knew once he found out I was as poor as he was, he would be gone anyway, so I didn’t mind. I did go out with some attractive men but often all they wanted was sex. They knew they would end up marrying a girl from their own social circle if they didn’t want to be disinherited by daddy. I found them predictable and fighting off their advances all the time was annoying.

5.      What made you pick Brad? Brad was the smartest man I met at those dinners. He wasn’t the best looking but he had confidence and he liked me. Of course he was just as interested in getting me to bed as the others, but he showed an honest respect for my art. He wanted to see my paintings and sketches. He is knowledgeable about art and was very supportive.

Since I wasn’t getting support in that area from my mother, I guess I latched on to his in a big way. He wanted to be someone in the world of art but didn’t have the talent himself. So he decided to make me a celebrity. It worked and it was amazing for me. I’m sorry my mom or dad didn’t live to see my shows at the tony galleries in New York City and the auctions where my paintings sold well and for a lot of money. They would have been proud. It was Brad’s interest in my art that made me overlook his faults.

6.      Do you regret marrying Brad? That’s hard to say. Yes, he made me miserable by cheating on me for two years, but he also made me famous. At first, I loved living in his big house with tons of household help, but at the same time, I felt the lack of love so keenly. I missed the genuine love of a husband for his wife and it wasn’t long before the house felt more like a prison than a luxury. I wondered what it would be like to live in a house like his with a man who truly loved me. I’ll never know. The first two years with Brad were okay. Although I never loved him like I love Mike, *blushes* we had a pleasant life together.

7.      Why did you fall for Mike? Mike and I go back a long way. I know who he is inside. He’s a great guy who had a short detour in his life. It wreaked havoc on him but he recovered. I think he’s better than ever. Besides, he’s always been so incredibly nice to me, taking care of me, sort of, in a non-obnoxious way, if you know what I mean. Besides, he’s a real hunk, great…uh, well, that’s enough on that topic. *blushes*

8.      What about him attracted you to him when you were younger? Mike, or Mickey as he was known then was everybody’s hero. He was the one who rescued all the little kids who got into trouble. When I was cornered by a poisonous snake, my friend, Karen ran and got Mickey. He sneaked up behind the snake and chopped its head off with a shovel. That part was pretty disgusting, but I was glad to see it dead. He was always doing things like that.

When I was 13 and he was a dreamy 18 years old, my teenage hormones went into overdrive and he was…*blushes*, well, enough on this topic. You should speak to Karen if you want more detail. She’s more comfortable talking about Mickey than I am.

9.      Were you ever in love before Mike? If so, with whom? I dated Hank Collier in college. In fact he was my first…*blushes* well, never mind. Let’s just say we dated for two years, my last two years of college and I fell for him big time. Tall, blond, good-looking and smart. Hank wanted to be a lawyer and got into Yale Law School. He wanted to keep seeing me, wanted me to wait for him to graduate, but my mom convinced me not to. It would have been three years and she felt even with a degree from Yale Law School, he wouldn’t be as much of a sure thing as Brad.

She was sick, very sick, which I didn’t know at the time. I felt it was important to her and I trusted her judgment. Maybe I was wrong. Hank met another woman, an undergrad at Yale while he was there and married her. They have three children now and seem very happy. He and his wife live in Connecticut, so I used to see him for lunch from time to time when I was married to Brad.

I called Hank when I wanted to divorce Brad and he handled everything for me. He was so sweet, he hated Brad and took very good care of me. Am I sorry I didn’t end up with him? I used to think so, when I was so unhappy those last two years with Brad. Now I realize if I ended up with him, I wouldn’t be here with Mike. In a funny way, it’s all worked out well for me and I’m happier than I thought I could ever be. Who would have thought so a couple of years ago?

10.  Did you have a big wedding to Brad? His mother insisted on doing everything. We got married in his church with a huge reception at his country club. It was a massive wedding with 300 people there, 95% of which were their friends and relatives.  They were generous and paid for everything, including my dress which they had custom made at Vera Wang. Mom made herself the most elegant dress and looked terrific. My wedding day made her happier than I had seen her since my dad died. She was relieved I wouldn’t have to worry about anything. Or so she thought.

Her intentions were good, even if things didn’t work out so well. If she had sold that cabin and not left it to me in her will, with enough money to pay the maintenance on it for two years, then I would have been in trouble. That cabin saved my life, saved me from the worst decision I ever made…and brought Mike and me together.

So even though she was wrong about Brad, she gave me the cabin, opening the door for me to meet up with Mike again. I guess her love for me was guiding me after all. I know she would be so happy to see me where I am now…and so would dad. Mickey was like a son to them at The Birches. I miss them but have a wonderful life and so much to look forward toward to. I’m lucky, *smiles her dazzling smile*  I guess.

Wow Caroline thanks for visiting and sharing some much about your life. To find out more about Caroline and her creator Jean Joachim click here. 

Feature Friday: Astraea Press Collaboration of a Short Story Continues...Part 2

 And so the story continues of the attack llama name Satan, the millionaire cowboy accused of double murder and the detective investigating with more than a slight interest in the handsome cowboy. To see how it all began a head over HERE for the first installment. Today Jean Joachim throws in her style and voice to this ongoing story. 

“You here about Selena?” he asked her.

“Good guess.”

“I didn’t kill her, where’s Brian?” the cowboy asked.

“You tell me.”

“You mean you don’t know,” he asked her rising to his full height.

“Didn’t you take him when you set the house on fire?” She asked him.

“What are you, crazy?”

“Lots of men get rid of their wives to avoid divorce, alimony and the sting of infidelity. What makes you so different?”
“I love my son. I wouldn’t kill his mother!”

“Did you hire someone to do it?”

“Same answer. What are you doing to find my boy?”

“Talking to you. Where is he?”

“You’ve got it all wrong.”

“Do I?”

“If you’re not going to do anything about finding him, I sure as heck am,” he said, rising up and attempting to push past her.

“I don’t think so,” she said, pulling her weapon, “I’m not through with you.”

Her face flamed as a few ideas of what else she’d like to do with this handsome cowboy entered her thoughts.

“Sit down and stay down,” she said, waving the gun at a chair.

He sank down, shooting an angry glance at her.

“For a man worried about his son losing a mother, you don’t seem too broken up about it.”

“We had our differences, but I didn’t want her dead.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“What do you mean?”
“I heard about your session with the lawyer. Pretty nasty stuff,” she said.

“So what? A divorce isn’t a picnic in the park, officer.”

“But there’s nasty and there’s evil. Which one were you?” She asked him, levelling a cool stare into his gray eyes.

He laughed.

“I guess she’d have said ‘evil’ and I’d say ‘nasty’,” he replied.

“If you don’t have your son, who else would want him? Who would murder your wife and her lawyer lover with a bullet between the eyes and take your son if it wasn’t you?”

He sat quietly for a moment, holding his hat and raking his fingers through his gorgeous head of hair. Ellea looked at him and wished he’d been begging her to fix a parking ticket instead of a murder suspect.

‘My first wife might be a good bet.”

“First wife?”

“Yeah. I was married before. Mary Jo wasn’t the most stable person. When she found out she couldn’t have children, she had a breakdown.”

“So you dumped her?”

“Of course not. She recovered and divorced me. But she never stopped contacting me. After my son was born, she would drop by unannounced from time to time. I had to get a restraining order out on her. Hated to do it…”

“Your kid. So she wanted your kid, eh? You expect me to believe that?
“It’s the truth. You can check on the restraining order.”

“Don’t think I won’t.”

“While you’re talkin’, my son is still missing.”

“I’m taking you down to the station so I can check your story. If you check out, we’ll need your help to find your son.”

“That’s the first sane thing you’ve said. Let’s get going.”

“Tie up that attack camel out there.”

“He won’t hurt you?”

“I’ll believe it when he’s tied up.”

“Okay, okay, I’ll go first.”

He stepped in front of her, his big hands on her waist, guiding her behind him and holding her there. His touch was heaven, but she tried to cover it up by coughing and moving around so he wouldn’t feel her trembling.

She put him in the back of the squad car, behind the cage and locked him in.

“Is that necessary?” He asked her.

“Procedure,” she lied.

Ellea wasn’t taking any chances. She didn’t get where she was taking unnecessary risks and she wasn’t about to start now with that hunk of cowboy in the backseat.

The station house was a dusty, dry two-story building alive with the sound of fingers on keyboards tapping in the background, feet shuffling along the gritty floor and the smell of pure male sweat in the air. Ellea pushed open the doors with enough force for the two of them to go through at the same time so she could keep her hand on Deuce’s arm. If he made a move, she would feel it in his muscles before he could get away. Besides, he had sexy arms.

Once inside, she sat him in the chair facing her desk while she attacked her computer, checking his story about the restraining order. She pulled up all the information she could find on him and sure enough, he was married before to a Mary Jo Stevens. Everything he said checked out.

Rats, dead end! But secretly she was glad he had fallen far down on the suspect list.

“Okay Deuce, how do we find Mary Jo?” She asked him leaning her elbow on the desk.

“She has a couple of friends and used to hang out at this bar, Ye Olde Gin Mill on Center Street.”

“Give me the name of her friends,” Ellea said, clicking on a pen and grabbing a pad.

She wrote down the names and leaned over to the desk on the right of hers, Joe Callon’s desk.

“Joe, you working the double murder, right?”

“Like you, yeah.”

“Check out these names. Friends of Deuce’s first wife, might know her whereabouts.”

Joe turned his gaze to hers and his dark brown eyes lit up. Joe had been asking Ellea out every week since he started there. She always turned him down, not interested in having her personal business brought into the station, but he was persistent and with those bedroom eyes and his good build, she was weakening.

“Anything for you, Ellea,” he replied, raising his eyebrows.

Deuce looked at Joe, then at Ellea and chuckled to himself.

“What are you laughing at?” She asked, printing out a picture of Mary Jo, folding it up and putting it in her pocket.

“Nothing,” he said, hiding a smile behind his hand.

“Let’s go next stop, Olde Gin Mill,” she said, rising out of her chair, checking her gun and walking next to Deuce.

None of this ladies first stuff, just gives him a chance to hightail it out the back. Deuce kept abreast of her, looking her over once. She grabbed a couple of bottles of water and handed him one as they walked through the door.

“Think about anyone else who might want your son. Anyone hate you, besides your dead wife?”

“Not to my face,” he shot back.

They walked into Ye Old Gin Mill and stopped for their eyes to adjust. The bar was dark and appeared to be empty. Ellea put her hand on her gun while she looked around the room, getting the layout of the bar, entrances, exits and a glance at the patrons. She could size up the people there quickly having seen their types a thousand times before. There were two men and a woman sitting at the bar.

Old rock and roll was playing softly in the background. The walls of the bar were dark brown with greasy signed pictures of movie stars in frames and a cheap painting or two hanging up for decoration. As if anyone drinking in this dump could care what’s on the walls! The floor was warped wood, giving the floor a little rise as fall as they walked in. The bartender was a middle aged man, not heavy, with steel gray hair and hard brown eyes. He was dipping glasses in soapy water then drying them off. Remind me never to drink here.

Ellea turned to Deuce,

“Is that her,” she asked, nodding to the half-drunken woman sitting at the bar.

Deuce shook his head.

“She’s shorter and probably not drunk. It’s not seven yet, she’s still sober. Besides, she’s a brunette or was when I last saw her,” he said.

“According to this picture, she’s a blonde,” Ellea corrected him.

“Beats me,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.

Ellea pulled out the picture and walked up to the bar, her hand still on Deuce’s arm.

“Good afternoon,” she said, flashing her badge at the bartender.

He nodded.

“What can I do for you, officer?”

“Ever see this woman before?” She asked, handing him the picture of Mary Jo.

“Sure, but not for a month or so.”

“How often did she come in here?”

“Every night.”

“Know where she lives?”

“Buddy over there might. He and she were…an item…for a while,” he said, indicating a tall thin man drinking a beer at the other end of the bar. 

I'm sorry I just love that llama photo. LOL. So tune in next Friday to see what happens next....

More from the author....

 

Caroline Davis White is a well-known artist and married to a wealthy, controlling man. She has everything money could buy except one thing: Love. Brad refuses to give her a divorce she so desperately wants.  With no money, family, or friends, she flees to the Catskill Mountains where she spent her summers as a young adult.

Mike Foster has achieved success and made more money than he could have thought possible, but it destroyed his marriage and cost him his son.  He is wary of every woman he meets, knowing his money may be more attractive than his good looks.

Caroline reconnects with the life she had and friends from long ago. Mike stepped out of her teenage dreams into her life again, looking more handsome and tempting than ever. Caroline knew Mike back then, but is he still the man she fell in love with?

Sunny Day Moonlit Nights buy Link

Writer Wednesday: A Somewhat Magical Formula

It's Writer Wednesday here at Astraea Press and we are pleased to have Therese Gilardi guest posting about becoming published and the magic powers she employs for those endeavors. Take it over Therese...

A Somewhat Magical Formula

            Whenever people find out I’m a published writer they inevitably want to know how I managed to land my poems, prose and essays between the covers of numerous magazines, journals and book covers. Even those who disdain reading are curious. To some, becoming a published writer is a twenty-first century parlor trick, requiring some sort of sleight of hand or at least a lot of luck. Writers and non-writers alike insist there must be a secret handshake, or perhaps a how-to manual not available to the general public. I understand this mentality, for that’s how I thought when I first set pen to paper.

            Back in the day (that would be 2002), sending out queries meant that the writer had to spend hours pouring over publishers’ guidelines that were often out-dated by the time they hit bookstore and library shelves. These guidelines directed the writer where to send a cover letter, writing sample and the all-important SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope). Hours were spent crafting submission packets, which then had to be carted to and from the post office. Submitting a poem or short story was a labor intensive and often costly undertaking that required the patience of Job, since it was not at all unusual to hear of response times upwards of eighteen months. Ah, the good old days.

            I don’t think so. For, while today’s e-publishing marketplace does bring with it the peril of online piracy and the depressing demise of the brick-and-mortar bookstore, it also heralds a time of great opportunity for the writer. Online publishers’ guidelines make it a snap to find out where to submit that essay on the eating habits of iguanas or that short story about a talking baseball bat. The ability to contact potential publishers from any place with an Internet connection means far less time is spent going about the tedious task of formulating submissions packets, which frees up far more time for the writer to spend on developing her craft.  E-submissions equal less paper waste, generally much shorter response times and a more egalitarian process, since the cost of postage is no longer a barrier driving writers of lesser economic means from the marketplace.

            Since 2002 my work has appeared in print and online. There are advantages and disadvantages to both formats. While I’m convinced that there is still no perfect method for ensuring that a piece of work will ultimately reach the marketplace, I’m convinced that e-publishing has allowed many more writers to hone their craft and submit their work for consideration. Ultimately this means that far more writers are able to see their words in print. Which sounds to me like a pretty magical formula for success.

"What do you like best about e-publishing? What, if any, changes would you make to the e-publishing format?"

To Therese or find out more about her...click her name.

Terrific Tuesday: Two New Releases...

So it's terrific Tuesday and we have two new releases...hold your horse before you go running off to download them. You heard on Character Monday, yesterday, about Sandy and Ryan in Lifeline Echoes and we will hear about them more today. But we also have another jewel in our crown of romantic gems. Blackbird Flies. Check out both they new releases and destined best sellers below.

Fifteen year-old Payton MacGregor is a musical prodigy. To him, though, his music is merely a way for him to escape from the chaos that surrounds him. All of his life, he’s had to care for his mother, who copes with her bipolar disorder with booze instead of turning to her own musical talents. He refuses to become a statistic. Then he’s thrown a curve ball.

His mother suddenly dies, leaving him to be cared for by his aging grandparents.  As much as they love him, they decide to send him halfway across Canada to live with his father, Liam—the man Payton always believed abandoned him and his mother. Payton isn’t making the relocation easy on anyone until he finds out he's going to attend the prestigious School of the Arts for musically gifted youth. Any second thoughts he has about his new life are erased when he meets Lily Joplin. Their connection is instantaneous.

Lily is a talented singer, but her struggles with drugs and bipolar disorder hit too close to home for Payton’s comfort. And when her issues become all-consuming, he wonders if his music will be enough to carry him through.

 

Voices form a powerful connection. The day the earth rocked LA, Sandy Wheaton became a voice lifeline over the radio for trapped firefighter, "Mick." Less than twenty four hours later, she had fallen in love with him. Shattered when she learned that rescue came too late, she sought solace Wyoming, the home state he had loved. Now, seven years later, she's made a life there as the owner of a popular local bar. But her wounds are still fresh, and she longs to let go of the past and her lost love so she can begin living again. That opportunity presents itself when the local prodigal son returns home. The attraction between them is instant. It feels like she's known him far longer than just a few days.

Sixteen years ago, Ryan McGee left home in the midst of controversy. After living through a harrowing trauma, he finally returns home when his family needs his help through some troubling times. All he wants to do is make amends with those he hurt most and to get back to the life he'd never wanted to leave in the first place. When he meets the sexy bartender, he starts thinking in terms of forever. But there's still someone out there he wants to find, someone who once believed in him and gave him hope.

To purchase Blackbird Flies click the title for the buy link. To find out more about the author Chynna T Baird click her.

To purchase Lifeline Echoes click the title for the buy link. To find out more about the author Kay Springsteen click her.

Character Monday: Please Welcome Kay Springsteen and Her Imaginary Friends...Uh I Mean Characters

Its Character Monday again and we are so very happy to feature Kay Springsteen and her second release with Astraea Press Lifeline Echoes. Lifeline Echoes releases tomorrow check out more about this amazing new contemporary novel and the characters that embody it. 

Voices form a powerful connection. The day the earth rocked LA, Sandy Wheaton became a voice lifeline over the radio for trapped firefighter, "Mick." Less than 24 hours later, she had fallen in love with him. Shattered when she learned that rescue came too late, she sought solace Wyoming, his home state that he had loved and described to her in detail. Now, seven years later, she's made a life there as the owner of a popular local bar. But her wounds still feel fresh and she longs to let go of the past  and her lost love so she can begin living again. When the local prodigal son returns home, the attraction is instant. It feels like she's known him for far longer than just a few days.

A son comes home. Sixteen years ago, Ryan McGee left home amidst controversy. After living through a harrowing trauma, he finally returns when his family needs his help through some troubling times. All he wants to do is make amends with those he hurt most and to get back to the life he'd never wanted to leave in the first place. When he meets the sexy bartender, he starts thinking in terms of forever. But there's still someone out there he wants to find, someone who once believed in him and gave him hope. Someone who had held his life in her hands...and then just disappeared. 

Feature Friday: Astraea Press Collaboration of a Short Story

So this is something we are really excited about. Every Friday an Astraea Press author will add her part of a continuing short story. Today we have Cheryl Grey who graciously stepped forward and volunteered to be first. Let me tell you this was an amazing way to start it out. She was given 3 words by the bosslady Steph those words were , llama, waterfall and dating that have to be included in the story. Here's the results.

Llama, dating, waterfall

The house looked like half of a bleached orange, placed juicy side down in the shadow of a long, sloping hill. Detective Elleanor Sharpe slammed the door of her rental car, leaned against its hot metal, and kept staring. A geodesic dome, the guy at the gas station had called it as he’d given her directions, his chest thrust out as if proud he’d mastered the term. She’d caught him reading a Scooby Doo comic book, so he hadn’t mastered much else.

Grasslands and cacti faded into the distance in all directions, sliced through by the state road and caliche driveway, punctuated by lazy pump jacks, and weathered, leaning shacks. To the west, looming mesas shimmered in the heat haze. Behind the dome, a flock of sheep hid in the fold of a ravine, the hillside shading them from the afternoon sun. The sky was too dry and washed-out for even the wispiest of clouds.

Well, this Dallas detective might not be from flyover country. But she knew enough to wear a light cotton shirt with heavy trousers and boots against the cacti and scorpions, a cowboy hat and Maui Jims against the sun. Even so, as she climbed the cut-out steps from the parking area, sweeping across a broad swathe of the south-facing slope, she could feel sweat pooling between her breasts and sliding down her spine.

If this wasn’t a murder investigation, she’d never be caught in such a place. It seemed so barren, so naked—no garden, no handrail, no trees, and no shade, unless you were willing to argue with the sheep. And the smell wafting from the ravine was enough to convince her against that.

One animal, on the edge of the flock, suddenly rose, staring at her. Ellea slowed on the steps, staring back. That thing was far too tall to be a sheep. Besides, it was the wrong color—spotted black and white, more like a long-necked, awkward horse with flat feet and a hippie haircut. And it stared as if she had a run in her stockings or a pimple on her nose.

Suddenly it screamed, an angry, braying honk, and charged down the slope toward the stairs. Ellea jumped, tripped over the next step, and sat down hard. Her hat slid down over her eyes. But she didn’t need to see that thing, because she could hear it, braying like a burro on steroids, big feet galumphing across the hillside. At this range, she could feel and smell it.

What was it? Would it kick her? step on her? bite her? Forget it, these were new clothes, and she didn’t want to know. Ellea scrabbled to her feet and raced up the last few steps—straight into the chest of a real cowboy.

Strong arms closed about her, took her weight, guided her scrambling steps in a half-circle, and parked her behind his Wranglers. “Satan!” he yelled over his shoulder. “You stop right where you are, you devil!”

Panting, Ellea made sure her Walther PPK was secure in her hidden front holster, and then peered around one soft denim shirtsleeve; she didn’t have a hope of seeing over that six-foot-plus shoulder.

A long, narrow, camel-like head peered back, just peeking over the last step, atop a long, narrow, shaggy neck. The animal’s face was white with a black nose, naked as a rat’s pelt but with a wild shag of rough hair sprouting over its eyes. Fluffy ears waggled, flipped back.

“Guard llama.” The cowboy shrugged. “Takes his job seriously.”

Satan gargled at her, like a camel, lips drawing back from big yellow teeth.

“What does he do with those teeth?” Ellea asked.

“Whatever he wants.” The cowboy waved one arm. “Go on, get back to work.”

With one last forlorn gargle, Satan lumbered down the steps to the slope and returned to the sheep. None of them had budged from the shade.

Crikey, what an entrance. If this tall tale made it back to Dallas, she’d never hear the end of it. Besides, she’d sat on those dusty steps and had to be a mess. Ellea brushed at her behind. But the cowboy’s eyes, steel-colored and sharp as barbed wire, followed her swiping hands with a gleam. Not good. She stopped and straightened before she made herself look even sillier.

“Mr. Carmichael?” she said. “Thaddeus Carmichael?”

He winced. A fan of brown hair, shades darker than the sandstone caliche of his roadway, drifted down over his high forehead. Carmichael combed it back with a long-fingered hand that was surprisingly gentle and precise. “That’s me. You the detective?”

“Elleanor Sharpe, Dallas Police.” She dragged the ID wallet from her hip pocket and flashed it. His eyes followed the motion, squinted at the badge and photo, flickered to her face, and then relaxed as he nodded. Ellea felt her shoulders loosen, too; the guilty ones usually tensed at sight of the badge. It was a good sign. “Can we talk inside?”

The door was plain, steel with a kickplate at the bottom, and painted the same shade of eggshell as the pebbled concrete of the geodesic dome. But on either side, narrow inset panels of stained glass sparkled with leaded glitter. They seemed an oddly decorative touch on an otherwise plain residence—there wasn’t even a knocker on the door, nor a pot plant on the flagstoned stoop—but the doorknob was matte brass. Maybe it was civilized inside, at least air-conditioned. She followed him through the door, watching his broad shoulders for possible wrong moves.

A mass of humid, heavy-scented air flowed over her, as if she stepped, not into a high plains Texas ranch house, but into a languid tropical jungle. Water flowed, a steady fluid sound. Carmichael stepped aside to close the door behind her and as his big frame moved and exposed the view, Ellea gasped. The dome’s interior was huge; a big open shell lit by skylights, and down the center of it thundered a waterfall. It poured from a granite ledge, level with the balcony of the second floor, splashing over a pile of glistening white rocks into a shallow pool edged with quarried stones and dotted with water lilies. White and yellow Bourbon vanilla orchids bloomed on wooden trellises, brilliant in the sunlight.

“Wow.” Ellea paused for another deep breath. The air smelled good enough to bite. “Just wow.”

Carmichael’s narrow lips curved in a shy smile. “Like it?”

She wanted to gush like a teenager. But she stopped herself in time. Her years in college and the Academy hadn’t created a fool, and she was in Pecos on business, not the undeniable pleasure she felt relaxing the last tension from her shoulders. And this was a murder investigation, the most serious of her career.

But she couldn’t dam up all she felt. “It’s truly beautiful.”

“Thank you.” Carmichael crossed to a glass and metal table, nestled beneath the vanilla orchids. “We’ll sit here. Can I get you something cool? Iced tea?”

Through the shiny leaves, she saw a small and ordinary kitchen. “Sure.”

Ellea sat, drinking in the tropical languor and listening to the little clinks and rattles audible beneath the waterfall’s splashing. She’d expected—shoot, she didn’t know what she’d expected, a drab doublewide trailer huddled beneath an empty mesa, perhaps, or a hunting cabin with outdoor plumbing. This casual elegance had her so off-balance, she was forgetting the reason she’d come. And that wouldn’t do at all.

Especially if she wasn’t satisfied with his story. Thaddeus Carmichael, “Deuce” to his friends, was one of those casual Texas millionaires whose lifestyle, according to the press he routinely snubbed, didn’t reflect his resources. Two days ago, he’d met his ex-wife in Dallas at her attorney’s office. The notes typed that night by the efficient legal secretary, who’d stayed late for the task at the attorney’s request, had shown lingering anger as they wrangled over custody of their little boy, who’d been living with his mother until word leaked of her torrid and poorly hidden affair. Those notes showed no satisfactory arrangement had been reached at the meeting and Carmichael had left the area immediately after, according to the testimony of the valet parking lot attendant who’d driven out the F-150 SuperCrew and seen the cowboy off the upscale Galleria premises.

At midnight, the attorney’s live-in housekeeper had been awakened by a screaming fire alarm. When she stumbled into the Swiss Avenue front yard, choking on smoke, her Sponge Bob pajamas blackened with soot, she’d tried to tell the embattled firefighters in her mixture of broken English and vexed Tongan that her employer hadn’t made it out. Nor had his girlfriend.

The two bodies were pulled from the still-smoking debris hours later, to no one’s surprise; the fire had burned long and hot, and already the investigators were discussing accelerants and throwing about the other fiery “A” word. But the autopsies sealed it and guaranteed a charge of murder for someone, for both the attorney and Serena Carmichael had been double-tapped in the forehead with a small-caliber handgun.

The burned and twisted skeleton of a Smith & Wesson was pried from what was left of the attorney’s fingers, as if the police were supposed to believe he’d shot her, set the historic Mediterranean frame house ablaze, and then blew out his own brains—twice. But that just wouldn’t fly, even if it were physically possible.

Because little Brian Carmichael was missing.

Not only was it Ellea’s job to learn everything she could from the embittered ex-husband and yearning father. She also had to break the news of Brian’s disappearance.

And see if Carmichael was really surprised or faking it.

Ellea was the best judge of character, the best reader of emotions, in the police departments of East Dallas. How she managed those readings was her secret, and she’d promised her mother she’d never break it. No suspect had successfully lied to her during an interrogation, at least not that she or anyone else knew of. But she worked best alone, away from the station, in relaxed surroundings. She worked best with people, including suspects, in their natural environment.

Otherwise, she wouldn’t have braved an attack llama to beard a true Texas cowboy millionaire in his hideaway tropical den.

His long, gentle fingers, just a bit roughened at the tips, set an already damp glass of iced tea on the table before her. A touch of mint joined the vanilla, sharpening the air’s sweetness. That fan of hair was back over his forehead, the edges floating and falling in the breeze off the falling water. Steel-colored eyes darkened as he examined her face, and the little shy smile faded away. Nonsensically, she wanted to say something funny and bring that smile back.

But she wasn’t here to comfort him. And she most certainly wasn’t going to be dating him any time soon, so she could just get her interest under control.

She was here to decide if Deuce Carmichael was a double murderer.