The man sneered at me, highlighting two slightly crooked top teeth.

How in the hell did I end up in these situations? Stuck in the hallway in front of Anderson's apartment with a scared woman and a half-deranged man wearing Whitney's plumber uniform. Broadrick said I had to stay out of trouble, but none of this was my fault. Trouble had a way of finding me.

Okay. The attempted breaking and entering was my fault, but not the rest of it.

The longer we dawdled in this hallway, the bigger chance someone would call the cops, and I couldn't have that. Not while dressed as Whitney. I flipped the switch on the stun gun to get the party started.

It zapped and sent out a spark of electricity.

The asshole's eyes widened, finally taking me seriously for the first time since he charged up the stairs after the mystery woman I'd risked my life to protect.

"Why don't you come closer and see what my little friend and I are capable of?" I said, trying my best to pull off a great Scarface impression. I'd always wanted to use the line.

He finally took a step back and narrowed his eyes. Not at me, but the woman he'd chased up here. "This isn't the last we'll talk."

I rolled my eyes. What a boring return line. I wasted my Scarface reference on him.

No one moved for a full second, which felt like a year, and then he slowly backed away toward the staircase. I waited until the outside door closed before I flipped off the stun gun and turned.

The woman hadn't moved her eyes from the window at the end of the hall, and she waited to release her shoulders until a fancy-looking sports car zoomed out of the lot. When she released, it wasn't fear on her face, but anger.

A worthy recruit.

The day just got a lot more interesting.

And that was saying something.

"Um... well... thanks," she said, finally getting her key in the lock and twisting. The door popped open. Why couldn't Anderson's lock have been so easy? "I'm sorry you had to see that."

"Hey, never apologize for an asshole." Women had been taking the blame or apologizing for assholes too long. That shit had to stop.

She walked into her apartment, and I followed right behind her, not wanting to get shut out. We had things to discuss.

Like why it took an active stun gun to fend off the dude following her.

I closed the apartment door behind me and set the metal toolbox on the floor in front of it. A small round table was the first thing in the apartment with a galley kitchen attached and then a long rectangle-shaped living room. A big fluffy white couch sat in the middle of the room, separating the spaces.

She probably didn't have kids or a dog.

"Is everything okay?" I asked, using one of her kitchen chairs to lean against. The leg wobbled, and I hurried to support my weight again.

The woman turned around as if she hadn't realized I'd followed her inside. We really had to work on her awareness. "Yeah, it's nothing."

I laughed, but it wasn't funny. "I've heard that like sixteen times."

She dropped her backpack on the other side of the kitchen table. It was an odd choice of purse, and I'd been carrying around a metal toolbox.

"Are you a student?" she was young looking but definitely not college student age.

"No, teacher. That was a parent from my previous school. I'm Lainey McLeod," she said, holding out her hand for me to shake it. "I started at Pelican Bay High in January."

"Oh right, because Mr. Haney retired." The man walked out of his class at 11:21 on a Wednesday in December because he'd hit the exact moment he could retire. "I'm Vonnie Vines. Local PI."

Technically, the state of Maine said I couldn't call myself a PI yet, but my hours were so close to being the real deal, I figured it didn't matter. They were guidelines more than established rules. Probably.

"A PI? What are you doing here?" she glanced at my gray plumber's uniform.

"Oh, this? A little side work." I unbuttoned the top one, getting ready to step out of it before I returned to my car. No point in taking extra risk. "What's up with the angry dude? Did you guys break up? Run over his favorite cat?"

"No, I gave his son a poor grade in math last semester before I left my prior position."

"What? People go around stalking women about that?"

She nodded. "Windsor Prep is highly academic. It's fiercely competitive."

Weird. If my parents went around threatening every teacher who gave me less than an A grade, they'd have to quit their jobs. I didn't do horribly in school, but compared to my sister Vivienne, I practically failed. I slipped out of the sleeves of the uniform and let it pool around my feet.

"Hopefully, you won't see him again, but if he comes back, take my card and call me." My shoe became stuck in the uniform's leg and I had to yank the material to get it off.

Lainey accepted the small business card. I always kept a stash in my pockets. "Are you going to come back with the stun gun?"

"No, something bigger with more muscles." A whole SEAL team of them. "But when shit hits the fan, call me."

Lainey glanced at me as I balled up the uniform with an expression of disbelief. "I don't think anything is hitting a fan."

My nose tickled. "It will. Trust me." It always did. A sneeze came out of nowhere. I covered it with my inner elbow and han to swallow a few times from the force after another one hit me. Weird.

Maybe Lainey had a cat. An enormous fluffy one.

"Thanks again for the help," she said as she held open her apartment door for me to leave.

I turned back quickly before I made it all the way out. "You own any black clothes?"

"Like for a funeral?" she asked, giving me that "she's crazy" expression again.

"Sure, something like that. But probably not a dress."

A pause. "I guess."

Her answer brought a genuine smile to my face. "Good."

The drive back to my office took about twenty minutes, and I made a quick pit stop to return the uniform to Katy, but she wasn't around. I didn't want to get caught with it in my car, so I shoved it in the trunk for safekeeping. I parked beside Broadrick's motorcycle in the office parking lot and scowled at it hardcore as I walked in.

Not Brent... I mean Nut Bread... err... NB barked at me as I opened my office door.

"How in the hell did you get my dog here on the motorcycle?" I asked before Broadrick said anything.

He dropped his feet from my desk, where he'd been pushed back enjoying a spot in my office chair. "Carried him. I'm thinking of getting a side car for him."

"What? Did you put on his jacket?" My little Jack Russell mix got cold in the Maine winters. "A side car would be ridiculous."

Broadrick had too many muscles to be driving around with a dog in his sidecar. Plus, NB belonged to me.

I grabbed NB and gave him a snuggle, letting his hair tickle my nose and force me to hold back another sneeze. "Buy a car like a regular person." Something with a working heater and radio.

Broadrick literally shuddered at the thought. "I'm not a car guy."

"Whatever." The men in this town were crazy, and it'd apparently started affecting Broadrick. "What are you doing here?"

Broadrick stood up in one fluid movement. The move made me a little jealous. "Since you didn't like my box of chocolates."

"The murder chocolates?"

"Vonnie," he said, sounding frustrated, but that was weird because I just got there. "I wasn't trying to murder you with poison chocolates."

"Whatever you say." I set NB down and glanced at the ceiling above my desk.