Tangled Up in You Read Free

Mick Hennessy, but whatever it had been, this living, breathing man who laughed and smiled hadnt been it.
    Through the dark bar and cigarette haze, his gaze landed on her. She could almost feel it reach across the room and touch her, which she knew was pure illusion. She stood in the darkened entrance and it would be near impossible for him to distinguish her from the crowd. She opened the door and stepped outside into the cool evening air. While shed been in Morts, night had descended on Truly like a heavy black curtain, the only relief a few lit business signs and the occasional streetlamp.
    Her black Mercedes was parked across the street in front of Tinas Mountain Skivvies and the Rock Hound Art Gallery. She waited for a yellow Hummer to pass before she stepped from the curb and walked from beneath the glow of Morts neon sign.
    A keyless transponder in her purse unlocked the drivers-side door as she approached, and she opened it and slid inside the cool leather interior. Normally, she wasnt materialistic. She didnt care about clothes or shoes. Since no one ever saw her underwear these days, she didnt care if her bra matched her panties and she didnt own expensive jewelry. Before purchasing the Mercedes two months ago, Maddie had put over two hundred thousand miles on her Nissan Sentra. Shed needed a new vehicle and had been looking at a Volvo SUV when shed turned around and locked eyes on the black S600 sedan. The showroom lights had been shining down on the car like a signal from God, and she could have sworn she heard angels singing hallelujahs like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Who was she to ignore a message from the Lord? A few hours after walking into the dealership, shed driven the car out of the showroom and into the garage of her home down in Boise.
    She pressed the start button on the shifter and hit the lights. The CD in her stereo system filled the Mercedes with Warren Zevons Excitable Boy . She pulled away from the curb and flipped a U in the middle of Main Street. There was something brilliant and disturbing about Warren Zevons lyrics. A little like looking into the mind of someone who stood at the line between crazy and sane and occasionally pushed one toe over. Toying with the line, testing it, then pulling back just before getting sucked into looneyville. In Maddies line of work, there werent many who pulled back in time.
    The Mercedes headlights cut through the inky night as she turned left at the only traffic signal in town. The very first car shed ever owned had been a Volkswagen Rabbit, so battered the seats had been held together with duct tape. Shed come a long way since then. A long way from the Roundup Trailer Court where shed lived with her mother, and the cramped little house in Boise where shed been raised by her great-aunt Martha.
    Until the day of her retirement, Martha had worked the front counter at Rexall Drug, and theyd lived off her small paycheck and Maddies Social Security checks. Money had always been tight, but Martha kept half a dozen cats at any given time. The house had always smelled like Friskies and litter boxes. To this day, Maddie hated cats. Well, maybe not her good friend Lucys cat, Mr. Snookums. Snookie was cool. For a cat.
    She drove for a mile around the east side of the lake before turning into her driveway lined with thick towering pines and pulling to stop in front of the two-story home shed bought a few months ago. She didnt know how long shed keep the house. One year. Three. Five. Shed bought rather than leased for the investment. Property around Truly was hot, and when or if she sold the place, she stood to make a nice profit.
    Maddie cut the Mercedes headlights and the darkness pressed in on her. She ignored the apprehension in her chest as she got out of the car and walked up the steps and onto the wraparound porch lit up with numerous sixty-watt bulbs. She wasnt afraid of anything. Certainly not the dark, but she knew bad things did happen to women who werent as