I caught up to Allen pretty quickly because he drove like a ninety-year-old woman with a suspended license trying not to get busted. Maybe he lost the gas pedal. Even after we drove past the pelican on the way out of town, he kept it to five below the speed limit.

This granny was my prime suspect in a brutal killing of his baseball coach? I didn't think so.

I followed him into Clearwater and stayed behind as they parked at the diner. Such a typical choice. No one had any adventure or taste buds anymore.

Actually, the diner in Clearwater was pretty good. I'd eaten a few meals there, but I had an alliance to the bakery and had to keep my loyalties tight. The only thing the Clearwater Diner did better than the bakery or our diner were the milkshakes. And that was only because Anessa hadn't added milkshakes to the menu yet. I still had to talk her into it.

I had it on a list. Somewhere.

The two kids sat in the car talking for a moment before Allen got out of the vehicle first and opened the door for the woman. What a cheater! I bet he didn't open doors like that for my sister.

Plus, everyone knew you went out of town when you were cheating because if you stayed in Pelican Bay, it might make the paper. We were a town of tattlers. It normally worked to my benefit.

Clearwater residents had no loyalty to one another. They let cheaters all up in their diner to become cheating cheaters. It disgusted me. Their milkshakes would never taste the same again.

The woman with Allen got out of the car, and I hated her instantly. She had on a cream-colored skirt with little pink flowers on it and a white T-shirt. It was so... grunge looking. Didn't she know that grunge went out with the nineties?

He went from my adorable sister with great fashion taste to this throwback personality? Yeah, Allen definitely killed the coach. He had a murderer's personality. How didn't I see it when I met him? My dad hit the nail on the head. Allen was a problem.

"What do we do, NB?" I asked and turned to find my dog licking the window. I needed a new partner. One with fewer idiosyncrasies.

If it were anyone else, I'd walk into the diner and get a seat close to Allen to eavesdrop on them. But the diner was too small. Plus, Allen would make me in an instant. Not even Katy's plumber uniform would help me in this situation.

I still had to get evidence, though. "Scooch over," I said to NB as I popped open the glove box and dug inside it.

He moved his butt and bumped it against my arm to find his position again as I grabbed the fuzzy black cloth bag and dumped out the contents in the palm of my hand. "We need long range for this."

Earlier in the year, I spent bookoo bucks on a long-range zoom lens for my big camera but then found the mini versions for a quarter of the price. They worked on my cell phone. Technology was a killer. The lenses didn't work for super long-distance work like catching husbands in hotel rooms, but they'd work to get a snap of Allen in the diner. NB licked away at his window art work and I snapped photos of Allen and his mistress as they walked to a table together.

I'd never show these pictures to Vivi. Even if she did the dumping part, this would break her heart.

But I wanted evidence of Allen's shitty character. It might come in handy when I put him behind bars for murder. He was lucky they didn't have a jail sentence for cheaters.

And to think I bought his whole "I love your sister" act he put on so thick. I disgusted myself. Stupid men. I needed something to chomp to get out my aggression as I watched the two love birds order food.

I searched in the middle console of the car for my container of gum, but it wasn't there. "What the hell? Did you take my gum?" I asked NB.

He ignored me.

The server brought the couple two waters. What a cheapskate. Allen didn't even spring for a soda.

I doubled over to feel around under my seat, and when I didn't find it, I checked under his seat. Still nothing.

Who the hell stole my gum?

My thief's identity hit me square in the face.

"Ugh. Men are the worst. Just horrible creatures, NB." I grabbed my phone from my lap and sent a text to the culprit.

VONNIE: Did you steal my gum?

He didn't answer right away.

The server in the restaurant brought out two plates of food and two milkshakes. Milkshakes! How dare they?

"I told you men are the worst," I said and patted NB on the back. He didn't notice.

His artwork looked a little like a landscape. Some mountains in the background and a river of slobber in the front. I removed the mini lens from my camera and snapped a picture. His Aunt Katy always wanted to see pictures of his creations. She just needed help identifying them sometimes.

My stomach growled as Allen bit into his stack of pancakes. A milkshake and mid-day pancakes? I hated him even more. I watched as he took every bite, growing hungrier by the minute. Damn those missing breakfast cupcakes.

"She did not!" I leaned forward as Allen finished chewing his most recent bite and his lady whore placed her hand over his on the table. My phone fell to the floor between my feet and I scrambled to grab it and take a picture of the pose. This was gold. He'd never beat a murder rap once a jury saw these.

My finger grazed the case and pushed it further away. "My life."

I leaned further down and tugged on the corner to bring it closer until I grabbed it. "Got you," I said and jerked up to get the shot.

They'd moved. Damn it. Sometimes this gig sucked.

Who placed her hand over someone else's like that? Hussies.

Allen and she had a tense eye thing going on between them. Look at the two of them. Sipping milkshakes and basically holding hands. And in public. Public!

How dare they?

"I'm so putting him away for murder," I said to NB, giving up the hunt for the gum.

Now I had no hand pose picture and no disgusting grape gum. Without the Mick Money Shot, how did I really prove Allen's horribleness to a jury? My mentor Mick might have considered himself the new Dick Tracy, but sometimes he had good advice. So, what would he tell me to do?

"Probably a better mentor than Ridge would have been," I said to NB.

After I graduated college, I asked Ridge to be my mentor to work on my required PI hours, but he turned me down for what he called "conflict of interest." It sounded like a crap excuse to me. It turned out fine because working for Ridge would have sucked. He liked to give orders.

At least Mick left me alone for the most part. Sure, he checked in occasionally at really annoying times and had an obsession with clicking pens, but I liked the leaving me alone parts. Now I could see that Ridge would have been way too bossy as a mentor. He had a real complex with thinking he was always right. It probably came with the muscles.

Thank goodness Broadrick wasn't like that. It was cute when he got bossy. Mostly.

The server set down the bill on the table, and Allen snatched it away from his date. Look at him, being all chivalrous again. Disgusting male.

Allen paid the tab, and the two of them walked out of the restaurant together. Smiling. They were smiling. Sure, Allen had a small one. It was barely discernable, but it was there. I saw it.

How dare he? Seriously, how dare he?

He had no right to smile.

Allen broke my sister's heart, killed his baseball coach, and now he was out in public with a woman smiling. The audacity.

I couldn't let these things go any longer. Broadrick wasn't here to stop me, and NB didn't have opposable thumbs, so I opened the car door and stepped out.

"Allen!" I yelled as I crossed the street.