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  Loretta felt hollow listening to him ramble in the dark. She didn’t want to hear this. She’d wanted him to be her fling, to have some fun with him; she didn’t want to hear his confession, and she definitely didn’t want to be his pal. Being a guy’s pal was death.

  But what was she worrying about? She wasn’t going to be his pal or his lover, so what was the point? Even sick, Renée was beautiful. And petite. Marvelli didn’t want a big-boned girl. Obviously, she wasn’t his type. Just the thought of them together as a couple embarrassed her. She couldn’t see it. And she could just imagine taking him to meet her father. Oh, that would be a laugh and a half. Dad would just love Marvelli. A parole officer! And an Italian! Strike one and strike two. She could just hear that caustic tongue of his cutting into Marvelli like razor wire. Nothing less than a Philadelphia lawyer would please Dad. And even then, Dad would have to scrutinize his courtroom record to see if he was truly worthy. As if anyone ever was in Dad’s book.

  “Loretta?” Marvelli’s voice came out of the dark. “You still awake?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Me, too. I think I’m too wound up to sleep.”

  Thinking about your wife, she thought.

  “Tell me something,” she asked. “Are we gonna touch base with the local cops before we go out looking for Martha Lee?”

  “What’re you, crazy? Cops never go out of their way to help POs, especially out-of-state POs. Out in the field you’re pretty much on your own.”

  “That’s what I figured.”

  “Unless we do something wrong,” he added. “Then everybody’ll be on our case. That’s why I want to do this thing quick and dirty, in and out.”

  So you can get home to Renée, she thought.

  “So I can get home to Renée,” he said. “And Nina.”

  “What about your mother-in-law?”

  “Yeah, her, too.”

  Loretta turned over and stared at the sliver of light on her covers. The guy was a saint—still in love with his wife and absolutely devoted to his family, even his mother-in-law. Loretta didn’t stand a chance with him. Guys like Marvelli didn’t cheat. Not that she really wanted him to. Not really. . . . Sort of.

  She turned her head and listened to see if he was still awake. “Marvelli?” she whispered.

  Nothing but quiet.

  “Marvelli?”

  He stirred and let out a deep sigh. She listened closely for his breathing to go back to a normal pattern, but pretty soon she couldn’t hear anything at all.

  Jesus, she thought. He doesn’t even snore.

  Loretta turned over and made a face in the dark. She closed her eyes, but she knew it was going to be a long time before she fell asleep. Her head was too full.

  9

  Loretta was in a crappy mood the next morning as she and Marvelli drove out to Rancho Bonita. She’d slept badly, and at the diner they’d found on the highway, Marvelli had eaten French toast, six sausage links, a corn muffin, an English muffin, two big glasses of orange juice, three cups of coffee, and a side of grits because he’d never had them before. He’d consumed more butter in one meal than she did in a year. On top of that, she was wearing an orange short-sleeve camp shirt with the tails out over a pair of pleated jeans, and she felt fat. When she’d packed these clothes, she’d figured that she should dress comfortably for the arrest, just in case Martha Lee gave them any trouble, but now she didn’t like the way she looked, and the only other clothes she had was the nice dress she’d brought thinking she and Marvelli might go out to dinner some night, a pair of khaki shorts, two oversize T-shirts, and the rumpled skirt and blouse she’d worn down on the plane.

  With one hand on the steering wheel, she pushed her sunglasses up her nose and glanced at Marvelli, who was trying to read the map, making a crumpled mess of it. The road ahead was monotonous—flat and straight for as far as she could see, scrub forest on both sides. She hadn’t said a thing to him since they’d left the diner because he was aggravating her. She’d been up most of the night—wanting him, not wanting him—and now his mere presence annoyed her. She didn’t even want to look at him. She was tempted to tell him to get in the backseat.

  Marvelli narrowed her eyes, staring through the windshield. “Did you pass Sea Conch Road?”

  “No.”

  “Then it should be up here someplace. When you find it, take a left.”

  “Mmmm.” She resented him telling her where to go.

  “There it is.” Marvelli pointed to a street sign up ahead. “Turn left here.”

  “I see it,” Loretta grumbled.

  She flipped on her directional and made the turn. Sea Conch Road was narrower but just as flat and deserted as the road they’d just been on. Every so often she’d see a cheap ranch house set back in the scrub all by itself. Hermit quarters, she thought. Maybe she should look into buying one of those places. That’s what she was turning into—a lonely hermit.

  After a couple of miles, they didn’t seem to be getting any closer to civilization. “Is this the only way to get to Rancho Bonita?” she asked.

  “No, it’s a shortcut.”

  “Some shortcut.”

  “You don’t like back roads? I do. I mean, why take the highway when you can see something different?”

  She nodded at the scrub. “You call this different?”

  He shrugged. “Sorry. I just thought you might want to see a little of Florida while we’re here. We’re not gonna be here that long.”

  Go ahead, rub it in, she thought.

  They drove for a few more miles in silence, then the road ended in a T. The property straight ahead was bounded by a seven-foot cyclone fence. “Which way?” she asked.

  “Take a right.”

  It wasn’t long before the scrub behind the fence gave way to evenly spaced palms reaching up to the cloudless sky. Then the cyclone fencing abruptly stopped and was replaced by a black wrought-iron fence with pikes and curlicues along the top. High on a hill just beyond the edge of the property, a modern three-story office building covered with mirrored glass reflected the blue sky. It had its own entrance with a toll-taker barrier manned by a uniformed guard in an air-conditioned guardhouse.

  “This must be the place,” Marvelli said, wrapping the map into a ball and tossing it in the backseat.

  “Why don’t you fold it?” Loretta asked.

  “Later.” He was leaning over on her side of the front seat, trying to get a closer look at the grounds of Rancho Bonita. “Just follow this road,” he said. “It should get us to the front entrance.”

  Loretta wanted to smack his face. Just the sound of his voice, that take-charge tone all men have, made her want to smack him one.

  After another quarter-mile or so they came up to the front gates of Rancho Bonita. There was a guardhouse at this entrance, too, but no toll-taker barrier.

  “May I help you?” a smiling female guard asked when Loretta rolled down her window. The guard was pretty, with dark Hispanic features. Loretta guessed she was somewhere in her midtwenties.

  “We’re here to see—”

  “The spa,” Marvelli interrupted, leaning over the seat to see the guard.

  Loretta watched his eyes. He was checking her out, the son of a bitch.

  “We’re considering a stay here,” Marvelli explained. “We were hoping we could see the place.”

  “Of course, sir.” The girl smiled wider. “Drive in and park in any of the visitor spots. Someone at the front desk will help you.”

  “Thanks,” Marvelli said. He was flirting with her, the bastard.

  “Thank you,” Loretta said as she pressed the window button. So that was it, she thought. Marvelli liked the young ones, the skinny young ones. Well, frig him.

  The place looked familiar as soon as she drove in. The road bisected a manicured jungle setting with several winding pebble paths running through it. The road turned from blacktop to cobblestones and led to a circular drive in front of the thatched-roof main bungalow. Elephan
t-ear palms were planted everywhere. Staff people—all of them young and beautiful, it seemed—rushed in and out of the building. They all wore black shorts or slacks and white polo shirts with RANCHO BONITA embroidered over their hearts. Even the maintenance people were good-looking in their khakis and pith helmets. If Disney designed a fat farm, this would be it.

  Loretta parked the Ford and took off her sunglasses, a feeling of dread sitting in her stomach like a mean little troll. It was being here again that made her feel this way. She had despised this place the time she’d stayed here, and those wonderful memories were all coming back now. The fairy-tale jungle setting, the false friendliness of the staff, the beautifully prepared starvation rations, the hearty but cruel encouragement from the body Nazis urging her to try a little harder, do a few more reps, go a little longer—it all came back to her in a distasteful rush.

  Suddenly, Loretta’s door swung open. She assumed it was Marvelli trying to be polite, and she was ready to slug him in the gut, the bastard. But when she saw who it was, her stomach bottomed out.

  “Hi!” a wiry little man in an aqua-blue jogging suit said. “Welcome to Rancho Bonita. My name is Lance. How can I help you?”

  Loretta was afraid to say a word. He didn’t seem to recognize her, but she sure as hell recognized him. Lance Talbot, chief aerobics instructor, commandant of the body Nazis, and fat-free cheerleader number one. The week she’d stayed here, Lance had made her his personal mission. When she left, he saw her off and glumly told her she was his first failure. He’d actually shed a few tears when he told her, the little wuss. He begged her to stay a little longer, promised to get her a reduced rate if she’d give him another week to help her lose weight. She’d told him that if she had to stay in this hellhole another day, she’d eat him.

  “So are you just here to visit or are you checking in?” Lance asked. He was still as peppy as a Broadway chorus boy and just as swishy.

  Loretta didn’t know what to do. If he recognized her, he’d surely remember that she worked for the New Jersey Department of Corrections—he’d called her “Warden Loretta” the whole time she was here—and if that got back to Martha Lee, she’d head for the hills, sure as shit.

  Lance hunkered down next to the car and tried to make eye contact. He bounced as he hunkered. She remembered that about him. He never sat still. He always had to be exercising something. “What’s the matter, honey?” he asked with a pout. “Bashful?”

  Marvelli came around the back of the car. “No, no, no, not bashful,” he said. “Well, maybe a little. You know how it is?”

  “Do I ever,” Lance said, patting Loretta’s hand on the steering wheel. “I know it’s hard,” he said softly, just to her. “Admitting your problem is the hardest part and the biggest step. But once you take that first big step, then it’s easy. Believe me, I know about these things.” He gave her a wink. “And I can see a bikini in your future.”

  Loretta arched her back so that her breasts stood out. She could string him up from a palm tree with a bikini top that would fit her. And it would be a fitting death. The bottoms she could use on Marvelli.

  Lance tried to peel Loretta’s hand off the steering wheel, but she wasn’t letting go. He sighed with a patented note of sympathy. “Denial is your worst enemy, honey.” Then he flashed a devilish grin. “So let’s kill him.”

  Loretta closed her eyes, ready to sock the little pest. He’d said the exact same thing, word-for-word, to a crowd of people at an aerobics class the last time she was here.

  Marvelli reached in and took her wrist. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s not start out with a bad attitude.”

  She whipped her hand away and glared at him. Sweetheart! Who the hell did he think he was talking to? She got out of the car, wishing an alligator would drag Lance into the bushes, so that she could really lace into Marvelli.

  “You see,” Marvelli said to Lance, “we’re thinking about signing her up for a couple of weeks, but my wife is still a little unsure about all this. She doesn’t think it works.”

  Loretta pressed her lips together. She could feel her face getting hot. Wife? What the hell was he talking about, wife? She was gonna kill him when she got him alone. Did he think this wife shit was funny, or was he playing Mission Impossible without telling her about it? Well, she had some news for him: parole officers don’t do undercover work.

  “Would you excuse us for a minute?” she said to Lance. “I want to talk to my husband.” She gave Marvelli the eye as she went to the front of the car and waited for him.

  Through the palm fronds she could see a group of fatties on the aerobics court, huffing and puffing in the heat, trying to keep up with some little twenty-year-old with great legs and an off-center ponytail sprouting out of the top of her head. These people were in misery, and the sight of them made Loretta angry. With clothes on, they were probably competent, professional people who functioned just fine, except for this one hang-up about their weight. But in shorts and T-shirts, all tired and sweaty and out of breath, they were just pathetic grade-B cattle, following along with the program, thinking that being this miserable would eventually make them happy. It made Loretta want to break something.

  Marvelli came up behind her. “What’s the matter?” he whispered.

  She glared at him. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Is this supposed to be funny?”

  “You got a better idea for getting on the grounds so we can take Martha Lee? Or should we just ask for her at the front desk? You think she’ll surrender voluntarily?”

  “I don’t need the sarcasm, Marvelli.”

  “She’ll scram if she finds out we’re here. We gotta take her by surprise. You know that.”

  “Of course, I know that,” she snapped. “But you could’ve told me what you were going to do. Jesus!”

  “Loretta, it’s not like I had a plan or anything. It just sort of came to me when that guy came to the car. I figured this was the easiest way to get in.”

  “Well, next time let’s discuss it first because we may have already blown it, thanks to you.”

  Marvelli frowned. “What do you mean?”

  She rolled her eyes toward Lance. “If that guy remembers me, we’re sunk. I stayed here a couple of years ago.”

  “You stayed here?”

  “Sssshhh! Keep it down.”

  “You really stayed here before?”

  She gritted her teeth. “Yes.”

  “Why the hell didn’t you tell me? Now who’s withholding crucial information? Jeez!”

  “Just because we’re partners, you don’t have to know everything about me.”

  “In this case that’s no excuse.” He was mad, but she didn’t care.

  “How about if we just get on with it since we’re here?” she said. “We can always argue later.”

  “Count on it.”

  She looked him in the eye. “I will.”

  Marvelli put on a smile for Lance, who was in the next parking space doing back bends to keep busy. “You think he recognized you?”

  “No,” Loretta said. “If he did, he’d be gushing all over the place.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “What if it comes back to him? Then what?”

  “Don’t worry about it. We won’t be here that long.”

  Loretta was dubious. “I don’t know. . . .”

  “Look, how many people come in and out of here every week? At least a hundred? You were here a couple of years ago. He sees five thousand people a year. What are the chances that he’ll remember you?”

  Loretta shook her head. “I still don’t like it.”

  “So what if he does remember you? You don’t have to tell him why we’re here.”

  Loretta just grumbled. Her real fear was that Lance would harangue her about her weight, about her being his one and only failure, about his wanting to succeed with her. She didn’t want to deal with that.

  “Listen,” Marvelli said. “Let’s just go take the tour. Let the guy sh
ow us around. Maybe we’ll get lucky, spot Martha Lee on the grounds, take her by surprise, and just get the hell out of here. We can be on a plane by noon.”

  Loretta glowered at the fat people killing themselves on the aerobics court. So much for reckless abandon on the beach with Marvelli, she thought. It was a dumb idea anyway.

  “Okay,” she finally said. “Let’s take the tour.”

  But Marvelli’s attention had wandered off. He was staring at a silver-gray sedan that had just pulled into one of the visitor spaces. A tall black man in a gray business suit and gold-frame glasses stepped out and walked across the cobblestones toward the main bungalow. He was carrying a black leather attaché case.

  “Holy shit,” Marvelli said under his breath. He had this funny grin on his face.

  “You know him?” Loretta asked.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “Ex-con?”

  “Worse. He’s an IRS agent.”

  “Is he a friend of yours?”

  “IRS people don’t have friends.” But Marvelli was still grinning, staring at the black guy’s back. “You go take the tour,” he said to her. “I’ll catch up with you in a few minutes.”

  “Marvelli!”

  But he was already trotting off to catch up with the man.

  Lance was pulling his elbow behind his head, stretching his shoulder, but he was also staring at her, his eyes as eager and pathetic as a puppy dog’s.