“What?”
“One thousand and sixty-two,” she said, somewhat breathlessly.
“Don’t pull that with me, old woman,” he said, coming closer to watch as she won the hand. “Don’t go lowering your voice like you’re out of energy just so I can’t hear you.”
“I wouldn’t do that.” She didn’t look at him. And her cantankerous tone didn’t put him off a bit.
“Yes, you would.”
“Don’t you have homework to do?”
“How many tokens, Nonnie?”
“One thousand and sixty-two.” He’d heard her correctly.
“That’s over eighty hands of poker in three days!”
“Winning hands,” she pointed out. “I’ve still got my touch.”
He didn’t doubt that. And hoped she kept it forever. But he wanted more for her than a life spent playing poker against other lonely people online.
* * *
ADDY WASN’T GOING to set one foot outside her house Friday evening. To prove that fact to herself she pulled on the pair of cutoff black sweat shorts she wore for cleaning, and her favorite T-shirt. The one she only wore in private because she figured she was the only one who’d appreciate the saying emblazoned across the chest: I Live in My Own Little World, But That’s Okay—They Know Me Here.
The threat against Will had escalated. She had so much to do, so many personnel files to get through. Scholarship recipients to investigate. Athletic programs to look at. Clubs to join on campus so she could see how they operated.
And homework to complete. Her cover would be blown if she failed out of her classes.
Pouring herself a glass of wine—something she allowed herself about once a week—she sat at the kitchen table with her laptop, leaving the desk in the living room for the next occupant of the duplex to use. The desk faced a wall and it was too far from the kitchen window and the sliding glass door—she couldn’t hear the fountain.
She opened the secure server, typed in her user name and password, and opened the faculty files. She was still in the first half of the alphabet. The Ps weren’t far off. Where she would find Will’s personnel file. His hiring information. Any formal complaints. Performance reviews.
She prayed to God she wouldn’t find anything suspect among them. Prayed she could protect the man whose family had taken her in such a long time ago. She wasn’t nearly as sure now, as she’d been when she’d taken this job, that she’d be able to do so.
The people of Shelter Valley lived by their own code. A good code. One that worked. But not necessarily one that would fit into today’s court system where only the law—case law—mattered.
She needed a pen and got up to get one from the desk drawer where she stored her supplies.
She caught a glimpse of the front window through her peripheral vision as she bent over the tray of pens—one slot for red, one for black and one for blue. The window overlooked the front yard, the driveway and the road beyond. The houses across the street. Straightening, a black pen in hand, she moved to the window, just to check on the state of the neighborhood like any reasonable person living alone would do.
Mark was home. She’d heard him come in. And yes, there was his truck parked right next to her car in the driveway. His and hers. The sleek, big black truck and the small, older, tan-colored sedan.
Male and female. Side by side.
She had work to do.
She was not going outside that night.
Mark was as temporary as the duplex. He had a bit part in the life of Adele Kennedy. He could not mean anything to Adrianna Keller.
And it was Adrianna Keller who sat down at the kitchen table, and proceeded to take notes with her black pen as she peered at the files in front of her. Personnel records for an Amanda Kingsley. She’d been a professor of music at Montford for thirty years before her retirement five years ago.
The sliding glass door opened next door. And shut again. She was not going to look up. To see Mark sitting in his chair close to her side of the patio. She was Adrianna Keller. An attorney with a job to do.
She didn’t hear him sit down. Had he seen that her chair was empty and gone back inside?
Had he needed to tell her something?