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my watch. I’d been there three minutes.
    Now what?
    Ack. I should have waited until Monday to come with Goldie, since I had no inkling as to what to do next. I popped a Celine Dion cassette into the tape deck, leaned back and waited. Normally I was a country buff, but hey, who didn’t enjoy a little Celine once in a while?
    A neighbor drove by in a silver Jaguar. Obviously this was the ritzier part of Hope Valley. She slowed alongside me and looked through the haze of snow. I smiled, leaned back. She moved on. Good. I sure didn’t need any interference on a job. I had enough to figure out on my own.
    After forty-three minutes and the two power bars, my feet hurt. Cold does that to little toes. I’d turned up the heater, but the outside temperature dropped in proportion to my increasing the controls. The only excitement so far was when the light in the upstairs room of Tina’s house came on for a minute and then went off. Somehow I thought that wasn’t going to do me any good.
    I decided to “will” Tina to come out the door and do something stupid. Something that a person getting paid by Workers’ Compensation shouldn’t be doing with a “back injury.”
    I shut my eyes to have that “will” thing work better.
    An engine purred in my left ear. My eyes flew open. I turned to look out the window to my side, but could only see a blur of black through the frosted pane. I wiped off a circle and peeked out.
    Shit!
    I pulled back, then looked out again.
    A black SUV of some sort was pulled up right next to me! Real close. That wasn’t the part that had me pull back. Oh no. It was the occupant.
    He sat staring at me. Not just any
he
. More a younger version of George Clooney—and hey, he’d been voted the star folks would want to come knocking at their door by a whopping 41.2 percent—so this younger version was no slouch. The guy, who was actually scowling down at me now, since his SUV towered over my Volvo, had the same look as George, only his hair was jet black without the sprinkles of gray.
    From what I could see at this angle, and yes I did unabashedly peer up as high as I could, he wore a black ski jacket, black leather gloves and aviator sunglasses—also tinted black. I could picture him swooshing down some trail at Mount Snow. Maybe I should be more scared than excited, watching him stare at me like that.
    And here I had thought
surveillance
was an orgasmic experience.
    The window on his SUV slid open.
    I opened mine. “Afternoon.”
    â€œNeed something?” The tone wasn’t friendly, more like a what-the-hell-are-you-doing-here kind of tone. But that voice! Scratchy in a sensual sort of way with a wee bit of a laid-back tone thrown in. Had my insides a-quivering.
    Did I need something from him! Be still my heart.
    I had to once again face the fact that I wasn’t a good liar. That was something I’d have to brush up on with Goldie. So, I looked at him. “Nope. Thanks anyway.” Then I shut my window and wouldn’t allow myself to look back. He must live near Tina. God, I hoped he wasn’t her husband. Then again, Tina was married to a doctor, and this guy looked too streetwise to be a doctor.
    I convinced myself that he didn’t even know Tina. Besides, I could spot a doctor a million miles away—and this guy was no doctor. What was I thinking? He had me all confused. I’d learned from Adele that Tina’s husband was an orthopedic doc—go figure—and that she worked in his office.
    After a few minutes I heard the crunching of snow and figured that he had driven off. I turned to see him pull up in front of the tan house next to Tina’s. I switched my windshield wipers on full tilt. Through the now-clear windshield, I could make him out, using his cell phone. Damn. Now what? What was he doing here, ruining my surveillance? Why hadn’t he just pulled into his driveway? This secluded