Hard Rock (A Hardboiled Private Investigator Mystery Series): John Rockne Mysteries 2 Read Online Free Page A

down together.  The pasta was delicious and I heard all about the girls’ activities at school, including a spill for Isabel on the playground and a ‘mean’ comment from one of Nina’s teachers.
    Afterward, the girls went back upstairs to finish their homework and I cleaned the kitchen while Anna watched me.  She glanced over at the stack of files I had dumped on the counter near the kitchen doorway.
    “Is that what I think it is?” she asked.
    I finished loading the dishwasher, started it, and refilled our wine glasses.  We moved into the living room. Anna took the couch; I took one of the chairs that formed a semi circle around the fireplace.
    “It is,” I admitted.  “I met with Benjamin’s sister Amanda today.”
    She raised an eyebrow.  “I thought she lived overseas or something.”
    “She did.  She just moved back.”
    “How’d that go?”
    “As you’d expect.  I didn’t learn anything, but I gave her my card.  Maybe she’ll think of something.”
    She tapped the side of her glass with a fingernail.
    “And how are you doing?” she asked.
    “Fine.”
    We sat in silence for a few moments.
    “I saw Barbie today,” Anna said, her voice flat.
    Barbie is how she referred to Elizabeth Pierce, the woman I had been engaged to until Benjamin Collins’ murder.  Needless to say, the relationship ended that night, along with everything else.  I quickly realized that it’s pretty difficult to marry someone who won’t speak to you or return your calls. 
    “Where?” I asked.
    The Pierce family was one of the wealthiest families in Grosse Pointe.  Elizabeth’s father, Charles, had something to do with the auto industry.  Her brother Edward had long since left Michigan.  The family, I believed, still owned one of the monster mansions on Lake Shore Drive. Elizabeth, as far as I knew, had never married, and I knew she had bought a place in Grosse Pointe Farms, but I didn’t know if she actually lived there.  Everyone knew that the Pierce family had homes all around the world, including spots in Aspen, Paris and Monaco, to name a few.
    It was rare to see any of them in public.
    “The village.”
    I nodded. The little town of Grosse Pointe had a main street lined with the usual stuff; a Kroger, Trader Joe’s, coffee places, bagel shops and some clothing stores.
    “Sort of near your office,” she said.
    I caught the tone in her comment and smirked.  “Well, she didn’t pay me a visit if that’s what you were wondering.”
    “Are you sure she didn’t hire you to investigate her panties?”
    A note here: my wife has a sense of humor that ranges from sarcastic to bawdy and back again.
    It’s one of the reasons I love her.
    “I don’t take on cold cases,” I answered.
    Anna laughed.
    “Speaking of cold cases,” she said. “Tell me about the files.”
    I knew what she was asking.  Ever since the conclusion of my last case, she knew I was going to be digging back into Benjamin’s murder.
    “Just going back through the files again, looking at them in a new light,” I said.  “The fact that someone had to hire this guy has a lot of ramifications.”
    “Unless someone didn’t hire him,” Anna pointed out. “You’re making a bit of an assumption.  Contract killers are probably psychos by nature.  You don’t know that he doesn’t kill people for a living and also kill people for fun, as a hobby.  Maybe even as practice.”
    “True. But not likely.”
    “So you’re going to follow the money,” Anna said.  She took a sip of wine. 
    I hadn’t yet articulated that thought, but it was in the back of my mind.
    Follow the money.
    Up until my last case, I had looked at all kinds of scenarios.  I’d investigated criminals who had been on the streets at the time of the murder, even thoroughly researched sex offenders in the area.  But I hadn’t really looked at murder-for-hire.
    “Yes, I’m going to follow the money.  I wonder how much contract killers go for these