Shadowed Paradise by Blair Bancroft Read Free Book Online Page A

returning to the day-to-day routine of real estate in
Golden Beach.

Chapter Four
     
    He’d been a bad boy. His mother would be
angry. If he still had a mother.
    She was always mad at him for something.
Which was one of the reasons he’d killed her. Only nobody knew. He
was much too clever. He told them she’d gone up north to take care
of her father who was ill. And, finally, that she’d decided to
stay. Beyond a casual question or two, nobody cared.
    That was the nice thing about Florida. People
came and went so much, nobody gave a damn.
    The first one had been an accident. He hadn’t
meant to kill her. He’d had a fight with his mother, after telling
her he was thinking of getting a place of his own. Hell, he’d
stayed at home only because she begged him to. Swore she needed his
help around the house.
    Wanted to keep an eye on him was more like
it.
    Mothers were smart. There’d been that time
he’d hung the row of frogs across his window. Of course he’d had to
flatten them so they wouldn’t jump around, but the design was much
better than some old poster, or so he’d thought at age twelve.
She’d grounded him for a week. No TV. Then there was the cat . . .
and the Barclay’s dumb mutt . . .
    God, how she’d screamed at him. And whaled
him good with the fly swatter. Until he took it away from her.
    A long time since the fly swatter—he’d
definitely lived at home too long. He was entitled to a life of his
own, wasn’t he? So he’d made an appointment to see this house after
work. Nice house. Nice neighborhood. Vacant. Ready for him.
    As Kim Willis was. Young and ripe, she was
there just for him, he knew it. Why’d a Barbie doll like that agree
to meet a strange man in a vacant house if she wasn’t looking for a
little something extra?
    When he put his hand on her hip, she jumped
away like she’d been shot. Nice come-on. Women were always faking.
The ball-teasing bitches.
    He smiled at her, and she’d looked so damned
relieved. As she caught her breath and tried to smile back, her
boobs bounced. She told him it was time to leave and started for
the door.
    He grabbed her from behind, one hand over her
tits and the other over her mouth. The bitch bit him. She squirmed
and kicked and fought. There were neighbors. He couldn’t let her
scream, now could he?
    Fortunately, it was January and dark within
the hour. He’d pulled his car into the garage, dumped her into the
trunk and headed for the woods east of the Interstate. But he
wasn’t stupid. No way. He’d wiped every surface he touched,
including the button for the automatic garage door and the key to
the house. He even locked the front door and returned the key to
the Realtor lockbox. There were lights on in the neighboring
houses, but they must have been eating or watching TV. There wasn’t
a sign of life.
    There wasn’t a sign of life in Kim Willis
either. Too bad, he’d thought at the time. He’d never done it with
a dead woman before.
    Later . . . later he rather thought he liked
it.
     
    Heads rose in T & T’s Realtor bullpen as
Maggie McKinnon and Jake Spanos burst through the office door. One
look at Maggie’s face, and they all sensed a story. Jake lounged
back against Jody Steven’s desk and gave Maggie the floor.
    “ You won’t believe it!” she exclaimed.
A shuffling of chairs as everyone gathered around. “It was a
single-wide up on cement blocks with nothing but weeds for a yard.
No air conditioning of course. We could see the owner through the
screen door, just sitting there in this big old chair with the
stuffing hanging out.”
    “ So was his stomach,” said
Jake.
    “ He didn’t even get up, just told us to
come in.” Maggie sucked in a breath, making them wait. “He had this
huge salt and pepper beard--”
    “ And a Harley out back,” Jake
deadpanned.
    “ If Jake wasn’t with me, I’d have
chickened out for sure,” Maggie confided, “but he gave me a boost
up the steps and there I was, so what choice did I