Mona Lisa Eyes (Danny Logan Mystery #4) Read Online Free PDF

business needs to bump us up to the next level.” Among Richard’s many talents is a keen appreciation for the business aspect of running a private investigation firm. He should know—he actually lived it for twenty years. He knows the importance of keeping the casebook filled. He smiled. “I can’t wait to talk about it.”
    At that moment, Joaquin “Doc” Kiahtel walked into the conference room. Doc is a tall Chiricahua Apache Indian, transplanted to the rainy Northwest from the Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation in New Mexico by way of an eight-year stint in the U.S. Army Special Forces. He’s a quiet man, someone who doesn’t usually reveal much in the way of outward emotions. I met him at Fort Lewis. Not counting Toni, he’s probably my best friend. “Hey, bro,” I said when he walked in.
    He glanced at me and gave me a very slight nod and said, “Ya Ta Say.” This actually means something like, “Welcome, brother” in Apache, but Doc uses it more as an all-purpose greeting.
    Doc was followed by Kenny Hale two minutes later. Kenny’s what you’ d have to call the opposite of Doc. While Doc is tall—maybe six four or so—Kenny’s no more than five eight. Doc weighs in at around 230; Kenny’s 150 or 160 tops. Doc’s the strong, silent type. Kenny rarely shuts up. Doc’s an action guy. Kenny’s a cerebral kind of guy. He gets in trouble when he tries to become an action guy, which is why he’s our technology wizard. The firewall that Kenny can’t breach is yet to be invented. This comes in pretty handy for us because so much of PI work these days involves obtaining and interpreting data, which is invariably kept tucked away on databases somewhere.
    This morning he was breathless. “Dude, I found her. This is it.”
    I cocked my head and looked at Doc. He rolled his eyes a little and gave a quick shrug. I turned back to Kenny. “Great, man. I’m really happy. What are you talking about?”
    He slid his chair back and flopped down. He paused, letting the tension build, and then he said, “I met someone.”
    I studied him carefully. This had happened before, more than once.
    “Not just anyone,” Kenny continued, “she’s the one .” He was beaming, and then suddenly got very serious. “Danny, I need to talk to you right after the meeting. Okay?”
    I nodded. “ No problem. Anytime.” This could be interesting.
    I looked around and got the meeting started. “Well. Now that the announcements are out of the way, it appears as though Toni has a new case she wants to present—” I smiled at her, “—to those whom she hasn’t already presented it to.”
    We hadn’t discussed how we’d present the case to the others beforehand. I’d have thought that my turning it over to her like that an hour after our meeting would have at least caught her a little off balance, but she jumped right in like we’d rehearsed it. I shouldn’t have been surprised. She’d even found time in the last hour to prepare a little PowerPoint presentation. She fired up the projector and had the show all ready to go, one step ahead of me. She walked to the monitor. “Okay. Let me get started.” She opened the file, and her first slide was a close-up of Sophie. “Please meet Sophie Thoms.”
    The room was quiet—we all stared at the large photo without speaking. I’d only seen newspaper and TV photos before but seeing her now, larger than life on the screen in our conference room, I could see that Sophie had been a hauntingly beautiful young woman. She had long, golden-blonde hair with bangs and big, dark brown eyes that seemed to look right inside you. Her skin was very tan—the contrast with her light hair was striking. Knowing, as I did, that she was gone gave the photo a powerful, dramatic effect. Eerily, her eyes seemed able to look right through me, directly into my soul. I shuddered and stared, mesmerized, while Toni got started.
    “ You’ve all heard over the past few months about Sophie’s