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“Okay, but he must have wanted something. He doesn’t normally come to the door.”

Cash heaved a giant sigh like I was torturing him and said, “The tree drops leaves.”

“Yeah,” Wilder said. “That’s what trees fucking do. Besides, it’s summer. It ain’t dropping shit right now.”

Cash nodded.

“Hey,” Wilder said, “you want to stick around for chicken? I’m gonna put the grill on now.”

Cash shook his head. He stood up and put his plate beside the sink. “Got work.”

“Say hey to Grandma for me,” I said. Cash worked as a janitor at Sunny Fields, the senior living community over in Brodnax where Grandma lived.

He gave me a rare smile and nodded. Cash had a soft spot for Grandma, and she had one for him.

Cash left soon after, and Wilder and I went and sat on the back porch with a couple of beers and waited for the chicken to grill.

“Work good?” he asked me.

“Work’s work.”

He snorted. “Fucking A.” He pulled out his phone and started scrolling, then held it out to me. “I swear she’s grown like a weed in a week.”

A photograph of his daughter, Gracie, beamed out at me. She was a cutie. She’d inherited her dad’s blue eyes and blond hair. It was sometimes weird to think that Wilder was a dad to a four-year-old when we’d only been able to start buying beer this year. Legally, at least. And it was still funny how Wilder did that dadthing where every second word he dropped around us was “fuck” but when Gracie was staying here, he said “flip” instead. Except he forgot a lot of the time, so now Gracie thought “fu-lip” was a word. Which was kind of hilarious when she was muttering it under her breath while she was trying to put her shoes on.

“She coming for the weekend?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

Shit. Maybe it really was time we cleaned up the yard. The weeds were half-dead but the stalks were still tall enough that we could lose Gracie in them, and they were probably hiding all sorts of critters.

“We gotta clear the backyard before then,” I said.

Wilder squinted at the weeds. “Yeah. We can start tomorrow after work. We’ll get most of it done before the weekend if we all pitch in.”

It was a solid plan.

Except the next morning, when the sun was barely over the horizon, I woke up to the roar of a chainsaw.

CHAPTER 2

MILLER

Missy Thurston-Wallace wafted into the meeting room on a cloud of perfume so sweet and overpowering it could be classed as a felony assault. She perched on the edge of her chair and crossed her ankles delicately before flashing me a blinding smile. “Miller,” she cooed, “it’s so good to see you again.”

The feeling was not mutual.

Missy Thurston-Wallace was my least favorite client, and that was even taking the local meth dealers into account. At least they didn’t waggle their feet in my direction, trying to draw my attention to their anklets. Of course, their anklets were supplied by the Virginia Department of Corrections and not Cartier.

“Good morning, Ms. Thurston-Wallace,” I said.

She laughed as though I’d said something funny and pressed a well-manicured hand to her ample chest. “Oh, call me Missy, Miller. Everyone does!”

I cleared my throat and opened the folder in front of me. “Ms. Thurston-Wallace.” And then I stopped, because it was the wrong folder. This wasn’t Missy Thurston-Wallace’s file. This was real estate paperwork for someone called Alfred Prentice.

That fucking intern, seriously.

Those names weren’t even alphabetically close.