Second Grave on the Left

I knew Angel didn’t like the guy, but I had no idea he felt such malevolence toward him.

“Is there a reason you’re sitting in a puddle of oil talking to yourself?”

I looked up to find Garrett Swopes standing over me, a dark-skinned, silvery-eyed skiptracer who knew just enough about me to be dangerous; then I glanced back at Angel. He was gone. Naturally. When the going gets tough, the tough refuse to talk about it and insist on running away to stew in their own crabby insecurities.

I struggled to my feet and realized my jeans would never be the same again. “What are you doing here, Swopes?” I asked, swiping at my ass for the second time that morning.

As skiptracers went, Garrett was one of the best. We’d been fairly decent friends for a while until Uncle Bob, in a moment of weakness brought on by one-too-many brewskis, told him what I did for a living. Not the PI part—Garrett already knew that—but the Charley-sees-dead-people part. After that, our slightly flirtatious relationship took a left turn into hostile territory, as though he were angry that I would try to pull off such a scheme. A month later, Garrett was slowly but surely—and quite reluctantly—beginning to believe in what I could do, having seen the evidence firsthand. Not that I gave a shit if he believed me or not, especially after his behavior over the last month, but Garrett was good at his job. He came in handy from time to time. As for the skeptic in him, he could bite my ass.

At the moment, he seemed to be contemplating that very thing. He’d tilted his head and was eyeing the general vicinity of my lower half as I knocked dirt and rock chips off it when he asked, “Can I help?”

“No, you can’t help.” Didn’t I just have this conversation? “Stop channeling Angel and answer my question. Wait.” Reality sank in slowly but surely. My jaw dropped for a moment before I caught it and turned on him. “Oh, my god, you’re the tail.”

“What?” He stepped back, his brows drawn sharply together in denial.

“Son of a bitch.” After staring aghast for a solid minute—thank goodness I’d recently practiced aghast in the mirror—I watched him try to disguise the guilt so plainly on his features. Then I threw a punch that landed on his shoulder with a solid thud.

“Ouch.” He covered his shoulder protectively. “What the hell was that for?”

“Like you don’t know,” I said, stalking away. I couldn’t believe it. I simply could not believe it. Well, I could, but still. Uncle Bob had actually put Garrett Swopes on my tail. Garrett Swopes! The same man who’d been taunting and badgering me about my ability for the last month, swearing to have me locked away or, at the very least, burned as a witch. Skeptics were such drama queens. And Uncle Bob put him on my tail?

The injustice of it all. The indignation. The … wait. I stopped short and considered all the possibilities. All the wonderful, glorious possibilities.

Garrett had been trailing behind me when I stopped and, his reaction time being what it was, almost ran me down. “Did you go off your meds again, Charles?” he asked, sidestepping around me while trying to change the subject. He’d taken to calling me Charles recently. Probably to annoy me, so I didn’t let it. And my meds were none of his concern.

I turned, planted my best death stare on him, and said, “Oh, no, you don’t.”

“What?”

He stepped back. I stepped forward.

“You aren’t getting off that easy, buddy boy,” I said, stabbing him with an index finger.

The confused expression on his face would have been comical had I not felt so blindsided that my uncle put him, of all people, on my tail. And I was in dire need of an investigator who was on Albuquerque’s finest’s payroll. Free labor.

“Did you just call me buddy boy?”

“Damn straight I did, and if you know what’s good for you,” I said, taking another step toward him, “you won’t insult me for not coming up with anything better on such short notice.”

“Okay.” He held up his hands in surrender. “No insults, I swear.”

I trusted him about as far as I could throw him. He was totally going to insult me the first chance he got. Damn it. “How long have you been tailing me?”

“Charles,” he said, trying to come up with a good story.

“Don’t even.” I poked him again for good measure. “How long?”

“First…” He took hold of my shoulders and led me back toward the building as a car passed through the alley.

When we were out of harm’s way, I crossed my arms and waited.

With an acquiescent sigh, he admitted, “Since the day Farrow disappeared from the long-term-care unit.”

I sucked in a sharp breath of indignation. “That was a week ago. You’ve been following me for a week? I can’t believe Uncle Bob did this to me.”

“Charley,” Garrett began, his voice sympathetic. I didn’t need his sympathy.

“Don’t. Ubie is so not getting a Christmas card this year.” When he spread his hands as if I were overreacting, I added, “And you can mark your name off the list as well.”

“What did I do?” he asked, following me as I cut across a parking lot toward the street.

“Stalking isn’t pretty, Swopes.”

“It’s not stalking when you’re being paid for it.”

I stopped and scowled at him.

“Well, when PD is paying you, anyway. And your uncle Bob didn’t do anything to you. He figured there was a possibility Farrow would try to contact you, and for some unexplainable reason, he didn’t want a convicted murderer hanging with his niece.”