"V" is for Vengeance Read Online Free PDF Page B

The two stood in front of a rack of matching lacy bra-and-bikini sets on little plastic hangers. I couldn’t imagine the chunky woman in bikini underwear, but there’s no accounting for taste. It wasn’t until the two parted company that I saw the younger woman’s big leather purse and shopping bag and realized she was simply another customer, shopping for lingerie like everyone else. I returned to my task, decided a size small would do, and gathered an assortment of pastels, adding animal prints until I had forty dollars’ worth.
    A girl-child of about three scurried past and concealed herself in the inner recesses of a rack of loungewear, knocking several hangers to the floor. I could hear the raised voice of an anxious mother.
    â€œPortia, where are you?”
    There was a movement in the loungewear; Portia wiggling deeper into her hiding place.
    â€œPortia?”
    The mother appeared at the end of the aisle, a woman in her twenties, probably trying not to sound as anxious as she felt. I raised a hand and pointed at the rack, where I could still see a pair of black patent leather Mary Janes and two sturdy legs.
    The mother pushed the clothes aside and dragged the child out by one arm. “Goddamn it! I told you not to move,” she said, and swatted her once on her backside before she retreated to the elevators with the little girl in tow. The child seemed totally unaffected by the reprimand.
    A woman standing nearby turned with a disapproving look and said to me, “Disgusting. Someone should call the floor manager. That’s child abuse.”
    I shrugged, remembering the many swats I’d endured at my Aunt Gin’s hands. She always assured me she’d really give me something to cry about if I wanted to protest.
    My attention was drawn back to the woman in the black pantsuit, who was now peering wistfully at the silk pajamas, much as I had. I confess I took a certain proprietary interest, having lusted after them myself. I glanced at her and then I blinked with disbelief as she slid two pairs of pajamas (one emerald, one sapphire) into her shopping bag. I shifted my gaze, wondering if the strain of panty buying had caused me to hallucinate.
    I paused, feigning interest in a rack of house robes while I kept an eye on her. She rearranged the display to disguise the gap where the stolen pajamas had been resting mere moments before. To the average observer, she appeared to be restoring order to an untidy tabletop. I’ve done the same thing myself after rooting through a pile of sweaters in search of my size.
    She glanced at me, but by then I was scrutinizing the construction of a house robe I’d removed from the rack. She seemed to take no further notice of me. Her manner was matter-of-fact. If I hadn’t just witnessed the sleight of hand, I wouldn’t have given her another thought.
    Except for this one tiny point:
    Early in my career, after I’d graduated from the police academy and during my two-year stint with the Santa Teresa Police Department, I’d worked a six-month rotation in property crimes—the unit handling burglaries, embezzlement, auto theft, and retail theft, both petit and grand. Shoplifters are the bane of retail businesses, which lose billions annually in what’s euphemistically referred to as “inventory shrinkage.” My old training kicked in. I noted the time (5:26 P.M.) and studied the woman as though I were already leafing through mug shots, looking for a match. Briefly, I thought back to the younger woman in whose company I’d first seen her. There was no sign of the younger woman now, but it wouldn’t have surprised me to find out they were working in tandem.
    With the older woman now in close range, I upgraded her age from midfifties to midsixties. She was shorter than I and probably forty pounds heavier, with short blond hair back-combed to a puff and sprayed to a fare-thee-well. In the clear overhead light, her