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long tendrils of hair bouncing like some shampoo commercial. Tess initially had a sense of lights, but the “crew” that followed her was one small, thin young woman, pulling a wheeled suitcase and carrying a digital camcorder with one hand. A man in a dark suit was behind her.
    “No filming,” Tess said before anyone else could speak. “Sorry, but I don’t want to have our interactions filmed. I don’t even want to be in the same room as a camera. My work methods are confidential and proprietary, meant only for the paying customer.”
    “I’m not really up for being filmed, either,” Sandy said. He managed to sound polite.
    Tess had expected more of a fight, but Melisandre dispatched her entourage immediately, clapping her hands as if she were some magical nanny. “She has a point, Harmony,” she said to the young woman. “Even if this won’t be shown for months, it’s probably not a good idea to provide insight into my security detail. You and Brian can take the plate of Danishes. I don’t want them.”
    Did it even occur to Melisandre that others in the room might want them? Did she assume everything in the world was for her? Probably. Money could do that to a person. Money and beauty, and Melisandre Harris Dawes had plenty of both.
    “What happened to your famed sweet tooth?” Tyner asked.
    “I sometimes think it was overcome by one too many malva puddingsin Cape Town. At any rate, I almost never eat sweet things anymore. Maybe it’s the change of life.”
    “As if,” Tyner said. “You’re years away.”
    Sandy wiped his hands on a napkin and introduced himself with a brisk handshake. Sandy was big on manners, downright lousy with manners. Tess had hired him for his investigative skills and police experience, but it didn’t hurt, having a male partner who could lay on the charm. Not in a smarmy way, but in a genuine, courtly way. Tess followed with the hearty, confident handshake that her father insisted was the key to success in all business ventures. Tyner kissed Melisandre’s proffered cheek, only to have her offer the other one. She had lived overseas for a while and her mother was British. Maybe it wasn’t entirely pretentious.
    “So, cameras outside the hotel—and you decided to confront them,” Tyner said. But his tone wasn’t scolding, as it would have been with Tess.
    “I decided to act like a human being, if that’s what you mean. I’ll never let anyone take my humanity away from me again. Let them take my photograph. It doesn’t steal one’s soul, quite the opposite.”
    It was an interesting assertion, the kind of idea that Tess wanted to dissect, debate. If the public gaze didn’t affect one’s soul, it did transform and might even corrupt. But Melisandre Harris Dawes was paying by the hour—and at twice Tess’s usual rate. Tess had no desire to argue with the client that she and Sandy had privately dubbed the Windfall.
    “I’m going to let my partner, Sandy, present the overview. I want to stipulate again that security is not our specialty, and your own bodyguard—I assume that was the man in black?—is probably better suited to some of the tasks you’ve assigned us. I appreciate your business, but there is a learning curve.”
    “My bodyguard is too well suited,” Melisandre said. “To be in the security business is to be paranoid. I wanted a more pragmatic overviewfrom someone who understands that I hope to live a somewhat normal life here in Baltimore. I have two daughters. I don’t want them to feel as if they’re shut up in a fortress.”
    “Will your daughters be staying with you?”
    Melisandre, who had arrived with an enormous Starbucks coffee, took a second to adjust herself—putting her coffee and purse down, arranging her wrap, picking up her coffee, taking a sip. Tess tried to total up the cost of her outfit, including the jewelry. The wrap, almost certainly cashmere, had been layered over a turtleneck and leggings, which were tucked into suede