Read Deceived (A Hannah Smith Novel) for Free Online

road was bad, getting there would take awhile. Levi wasn’t wearing his earbuds, I noticed, which was unusual, so I made him an offer. “Don’t you miss your music? We’ll go for a ride another day when you’re better prepared.”
    The man shrugged but didn’t budge.
    I sighed, thought about it for a moment, then started the engine. “Put your seat belt on,” I told him, “and keep your hand inside the window once we get moving.”
    Levi didn’t speak again until we had crossed the line into Sematee County, driving north.
    “
You’re
nice” was all he said.
    •   •   •
    “THE NEIGHBOR LADY threatened to hire Mexicans to shoot the owl,” I told Marion Ford, cell phone cradled to my ear as I drove. “Then she threatened me. Said she’ll have me arrested if I pick up clients at Loretta’s dock because it’s not zoned commercial—doesn’t matter Uncle Jake chartered out of there before he died. Fifteen years? Longer—he was only forty when they retired his badge. Scariest thing is, the neighbor lady didn’t sound crazy, just mean. One of those women who’s used to getting what she wants.”
    The biologist had called to ask if I would be at Dinkin’s Bay before dark, but his voice had assumed the role of comforter and counselor now that I was sharing details about my afternoon.
    “I wouldn’t worry about the owl,” he said. “Mexicans, especially the illegals, are too smart to risk jail or their jobs. And the neighbor, it’ll dawn on her a sheriff’s deputy was there listening. She’s a physician? She’ll think it through and that’ll be the end of it.”
    “A doctor of
some
type,” I responded. “I was tempted to do a background check through the office, but it seemed sneaky.”
    Ford found me amusing. “It’s a poor private detective who lets ethics get in her way.”
    The agency had been part-time even for Jake, which is why I replied, “I’m already the poorest one around. It hasn’t cost me my principles, though. And it gives me something to do when the wind’s blowing too hard to fish.”
    “Good, keep your license current,” he agreed. “Personally, I wouldn’t hesitate to check out someone harassing your mother. First the vegetable garden, then the dock. You want me to have a talk with her? Tomlinson says Loretta’s a lot of fun, and it’s about time we met.”
    Tomlinson, of course, smoked weed and said, “Float on, honey!” to charm-addled women. He didn’t mind escorting Loretta to the mounds at night to eavesdrop on her conversations with an Indian king who had been dead a thousand years. Ford, thank god, was from solider stock, which meant my mother would hate him at first sight.
    “As soon as Loretta’s feeling better,” I lied. “She’s still all torn up about that little dog.”
    “Sounds as softhearted as you, Hannah.”
    There was no way for me to reply to that without another lie. Fortunately, the biologist in Ford saved me by inquiring,
What kind of owl?
    As we chatted, Levi watched the scenery of Sematee County flow by: raw land that had been clear-cut decades ago, then had gone wild with palmettos and melaleuca trees, awaiting the next small-time developer to go bankrupt. Lots of billboards—
Chatham Subaru & Honda
, I noticed—then walls of vegetation that were interrupted by ATV trails or small housing developments, a couple of nursery farms, and a trailer park or two. The turnoff to the Helms place wasn’t marked, and I hadn’t been there in a year, so, after another few minutes, I had to tell Ford, “Mind if I call later?” Because Levi was sitting right there beside me, however, my words came out sounding formal and abrupt. It created a silence between us.
    “You doing okay?” Ford asked. “After last night, I mean.”
    “Never better,” I assured him, giving it all the warmth I could. Then abandoned my concern about Levi and said, “I bought something today I want to model for you. But maybe I should wait. The doctor was