Free Criminal Intent (MIRA) by Laurie Breton

because they were strong and smart. A great deal of time and planning had gone into shedding their old identities and building new ones that would hold up when examined in the harsh light of day. She’d used her savings to purchase the little tract house in Dearborn from one of Uncle Bobby’s companies, then secretly signed it back over to him and pocketed the cash. She suspected that what she’d done wasn’t strictly legal, but she hadn’t bothered to question it. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that not all of Uncle Bobby’s business dealings operated on the right side of the law.
    But she and Sophie were safe. That was the bottom line. And tomorrow they would begin, brick by brick, to build their new life.

Three
    I ttook three cups of morning coffee to work up her courage.
    The day was going to be a hot one; already the thermometer registered eighty in the shade. She didn’t want to do this, but she’d promised, and the longer she put it off, the more difficult it would be. She might as well get it over with. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Like swallowing awful-tasting medicine, sometimes the anticipation was worse than the reality.
    The phone rang four times before Bill Wyatt answered. “Daddy?” Annie said. “I just wanted to let you know that we got here in one piece.”
    In the background, she could hear the murmur of voices. “Just a minute,” he said, setting down the phone with a dull thud. After a moment or two, he picked it back up. “Damn TV,” he said. “Why haven’t you called? I was starting to think something happened to you.”
    Why was it that every word out of his mouth always sounded like criticism? Maybe she was just being too sensitive. As a child, she’d been constantly reminded that she was too much like her mother, the drama queen of Atchawalla. “I told you it might be a couple of days,” she said.
    “And I’m not supposed to worry? I don’t know how to get intouch with you. You’re not even using your own name. Something could happen to you, and they’d never find me to notify me. Do you have any idea how that makes me feel?”
    Powerless, she imagined. And if there was one thing Bill Wyatt didn’t like, it was to feel powerless. Relax, she told herself. Don’t let him get to you.
    But somehow, he always got to her. “I’m sorry, Dad,” she said. “It’s just been so hectic. When we got here, we didn’t even have a bed to sleep in. I had to go out and buy furniture.”
    “Can you afford that?”
    She wondered why he was asking, since she doubted he was about to offer financial assistance. Not that she would have accepted it if he had. “I bought secondhand,” she said. Then, with forced enthusiasm, she added, “How’s Lottie?”
    Lottie Trent was a perky blond widow he’d met at a bingo game at the VFW hall eight months earlier. Annie couldn’t imagine her father, with his ramrod-straight posture and steelgray military haircut, playing bingo. But he swore that was where he and Lottie had met. A handsome if slightly intimidating man at seventy-one, Bill Wyatt maintained a trim figure and was still in possession of both the hair and the teeth that nature had bestowed upon him. That made the ex-marine a highly coveted commodity among the senior set, where single women outnumbered single men two to one. To Annie’s amusement and his chagrin, her dad was the darling of all the twittering, gray-haired widows in his retirement complex.
    “Lottie’s fine. She went to Tallahassee for a few days to visit her daughter. She’s flying back tonight. Monday, we’re leaving on a Caribbean cruise.”
    “Wow.” His romance with Lottie must be serious. None of Dad’s previous lady friends had managed to convince him to set foot on the deck of a cruise ship. She tried to picture him in a Hawaiian shirt and shorts, but the image her mind conjuredup was unthinkable. For as long as she could remember, Bill Wyatt had worn pressed khakis and dress shirts, seven days a