Key West Read Online Free

That’s because you can pick and choose, isn’t it?”
    “Well—”
    “Yes, well, I’m a good case. And I want you to take me on because it’s not going to be easy. D’you understand?”
    “No.” No, he surely didn’t understand.
    “Something awful happened to me. I don’t know how, but I do know when. And I think there’s a why, too. And I don’t just mean it happened because things happen. It could have been...I just don’t know if I should accept the story I was told about it all. There could be something else.”
    Chris pushed aside his bοurbοn. “That, ma’am, is as clear as mud. I’m sorry for your trouble. I wish you luck finding some peace. But I’m not your knight on a charger.”
    “Are you a private investigator?”
    Hell and damnation, he’d get Roy for this.
    “You are. That’s what you do here in Key West. You find things out. You tracked down that man who said his boy had been kidnapped. It turned out the father had locked his own son up at home all the time, and—”
    “I don’t talk about old cases.”
    “You aren’t retired, are you?”
    He made himself smile and knew the result wasn’t inviting. “Why would you want to hire someone who doesn’t want to be hired?”
    When the lady’s stubborn streak surfaced, she looked different, alive. “I want to know why you’ve decided—without even finding out what I need—that I’m too boring to waste your valuable time on.”
    Rather than start to relax, he felt the tension tighten. “You aren’t boring. You’re just…You’re inconvenient.” Wow, he was refining his insult skills to new heights.
    “Okay.” She was giving up. Her fine-boned hands curled on the scarred top of the many-times-lacquered table. “You’ve got enough work already. I understand.”
    He hadn’t taken a case in a month. “Yeah. Sorry.”
    “Don’t worry about it. I’m the one who’s sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed myself on you like that.”
    Shit. “You didn’t push. You’re worried is all. I understand.”
     “It’s not fair to expect strangers to care about your problems. I can handle it. I don’t know what came over me.”
    His brother was what came over her. She wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.
    Why would he care? He didn’t. Just the old observation habit. “Don’t beat yourself up if you don’t have to, Sonnie. Life will do it to you without any help. Feel that wind?”
    “Uh-huh.” Her hair flipped across her face and she pushed it back. “Funny how storms here make you excited, even while you’re scared.”
    He looked at her again. Refined. That was the word. She looked refined and fit in around here about as well as any lady would. But she wasn’t cool, this one. Nope, her words, the little things she said, gave her away. There was some fire behind the delicate exterior. Not that he cared about those things anymore.
    “Don’t let me keep you,” she said.
    “You aren’t.”
    She wore the collar of her white shirt turned up. When she turned her head, a point brushed her sharp chin. There wasn’t a whole lot of her in that shirt, but what there was might be very nice. He hadn’t had a chance to study the rest of her before they sat down. The limp was something he’d like to know about.
    “Why did you say you were retired? Really, I mean?”
    “I am. I did. Ι thought you were talking about something else. When I was on the force. I used to be. Up north. I didn’t retire; I quit.” End of topic, and that was more than he’d said to anyone in the months since he’d arrived on Roy’s doorstep.
    Sonnie Giacano was staring at him. Not a comfortable experience.
    He tried a real smile. “Felt like a change of pace.”
    She looked at his mouth.
    Chris watched her face. “Sometimes you need to accept that it’s time to move on.” That wouldn’t earn him a place among the great philosophers.
    “You’re hurting, aren’t you?”
    “What?” Hurting? How did you tell a woman who was obviously feeling