Accidental Bodyguard by Sharon Hartley Read Free Book Online Page A

know was he was about to file a false report, something he’d never done in his career.
    And why was he doing it? What P.J. had done was not only against every Collins Island rule, but criminal. Although, yeah, no harm done except to Louise Clark’s mental health. Would it be better to fire the kid to teach him a hard lesson about following the rules? That lesson could alter his life. He might need the money for tuition and have to drop out of school. Jobs were still hard to come by for kids. An angry teenager could turn sullen and bitter.
    Jack closed the file without entering a single word. He wanted to think about what he’d put in his report a little longer. Maybe he’d watch P.J. for a few weeks, see what happened. The report wasn’t due until the end of his stint as director.
    Jack’s gaze drifted to the surveillance feed switching from camera to camera around the island. Everything remained calm. As usual , he thought, mimicking Lola’s comment.
    When the stream landed on Villa Alma’s impressive front gate, he froze the image on a secondary monitor and leaned back in his chair. Was he considering cutting P.J. a break because Louise Clark had asked him to? He thought about his time inside the walls of Santaluce’s estate, searching for anything unusual, out of place. He hadn’t seen the junker car Ms. Clark had driven to her new home. Likely she’d secreted it in Santaluce’s garage. She’d indicated she didn’t plan to drive anywhere.
    Surveillance cameras took a snapshot of every car loading the ferry. It’d take some digging, but why not get the car’s license plate and run her down from there? She could have switched plates, but maybe not. At least he’d have more information.
    He pulled up the database from the date of her arrival, accessed the log and found the name Louise Clark on the 5:00 p.m. ferry. The camera time stamped every photograph, and the shot would have been taken around that time. In case the clock was off—a common occurrence with surveillance cameras—Jack began his search with photographs after 4:00 p.m. He scrolled through photo after photo, and finally found what Louise Clark called her devil car. Her twenty-year-old clunker was easy to spot among the Bentleys, Porsches and Teslas.
    He enlarged the screen and wrote down the name of the tag, double-checking the digits. He sure didn’t need to start this little treasure hunt with bad intel.
    Remembering the happy hour in the clubhouse, he glanced at the time. He was already late. The phone would ring any minute and Dr. Diane Kirkman, the home owners’ association president, would demand his presence.
    Entering Ms. Clark’s tag number into the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles database would have to wait.
    Jack slipped into his blazer and walked to his cart deep in thought. He wanted to skip this cocktail party, another giant waste of time. He was expected to mingle with the socialite island residents, be available to answer any questions about security protocols, listen to them outbrag each other about their latest investments.
    He’d much rather continue his investigation into Ms. Clark, but the answers would have to wait.
    Lola was right. He couldn’t let it alone until he unraveled the mysteries of the new tenant.
    Who was she? What was she doing on Collins Island? His gut told him something was going on with Louise Clark, something he needed to know about.
    * * *
    A T 2:00 A . M . Claudia dressed in black jeans and a black sweatshirt with a hoodie and tucked the Glock in her waistband. She moved to Villa Alma’s front gate.
    A brisk northeast wind, the leading edge of a strong cold front sweeping into south Florida, whipped palm fronds. It would start raining in an hour, maybe less. Clutching the cool wrought iron, she scanned the street in front of the estate and saw no one. She looked up at a clear night sky with thousands of stars and