Surest Poison, The Read Online Free PDF Page A

morsels of candy and mumbled,
“Thank you.”
    Sid looked down. “Happy Halloween.”
    He waved at the woman who waited in the
driveway, huddled against the wind in a bulky leather jacket. He felt
certain she lived at the other end of the street. Though he had seen the
kids out playing, he had never met the mother or daddy. And considering he
was not much of a social type, chances were he never would.
    Back in the kitchen, he decided on a can
of vegetable soup as the simplest solution to supper. He had just opened the
can when the doorbell sounded again.
    Grabbing the candy bowl, he strode to the
door and pulled it open. He studied the odd figure bathed in the glow of the
porch light. She stood a good head shorter and appeared at least a hundred
pounds lighter than he did. Dressed all in black, hair flowing in long black
tresses, she looked at him with the sultry eyes and blank stare of the old
TV character Morticia Addams.
    “Jaz,” he said, more than a little
amused. “Where the devil did you get that long black hair?”
    She gave a cackling laugh. “Trick or
treat!”
    He pulled the door open wide. “Get in
here out of that cold wind.”
    “I was on my way to a party at an old
basketball teammate’s house in Hendersonville,” she said. “You didn’t call
to tell me what happened with Arnie Bailey.”
    “Sorry. I’ve been busy.” He waved at the
sofa. “Make yourself at home.”
    She sat and glanced around. Sid followed
her eyes as she took in the earth tones of the sofa and chairs, furnishings
chosen to give the place a masculine look, despite a few touches left over
from his mother, like a crisp white scarf on the table beside the window.
    Jaz looked back at him, fingering the
wig. “I got this at a costume shop.”
    “You make a great Morticia,” he said from
his recliner, “but I’m partial to the real thing.” Her own hair was short
and blonde. The tight black outfit revealed a shapely figure but hid the
muscular structure that must have helped put her in the boxing ring,
something he’d heard mentioned. She still drew men’s glances wherever she
went.
    “Well, thank you, Mr. Chance.”
    There was no way around it, he had to
admit. Jaz LeMieux was one helluva woman. She had the looks and the brains
to be whatever she wanted, and she had the money and the contacts to pull it
off. But it hadn’t come easy. Mike Rich told him about the struggles she’d
faced after making an impetuous decision to leave college and go her own
way. He admired what she had done, and he was tempted to pursue that
admiration in other ways. But he had too many issues of his own to go beyond
where things stood.
    She cocked her head to the side. “Okay,
Sid. What did Arnie have to say?”
    “He wants me to find everything there’s
to know about the polluter. It was a company named Auto Parts Rehabbers.”
    He told her about his visit to Ashland
City.
    “And the company simply disappeared?” she
said.
    “Maybe not so simply, but it hardly left
a trace. I’ll see if the old Chamber of Commerce guy can give me something
to get a grip on. I plan to check with him in the morning.”
    “Are you going to see Harrington
tomorrow?”
    “After I talk to
Murray Estes.”
    “Do a good job on this, Sid, Arnie can throw you plenty of business.”
    He leaned back and tapped his fingertips.
“You remember how reluctant I was to look into your employee problem.”
    “Sure.” She waved a black-draped hand. “I
had to twist your arm a bit. But you did a whale of job with it. You got a
faithful employee reinstated and a crooked manager fired.”
    “But after that I intended to head back
to the cabin. You kept pushing me into the PI business. Why didn’t you let
it go?”
    She gave him an impish smile. “It was
your scintillating personality.”
    “Bullshit.”
    She turned serious. “Mike told me a lot
about you. After seeing the way you handled my case, I thought this was