"No one's always right," she said. "Sometimes it's nice to get someone else's energy involved in a reading. Especially in times like these." She perched on the rear seat of my scooter, one hand on my waist, much more relaxed about the ride than she had been on the way over.

When we reached Whitehead Street right near the Courthouse Deli and the Green Parrot Bar, she tugged on my shirt and pointed for me to pull over. Surely we weren't going to start drinking this early in the afternoon?

"Hayley, I think it's time I rent my own wheels. That way I won't be relying on your generosity to get around. And I can have a little independence."

"But you hate motorcycles," I said after a stunned pause.

"It's hardly a motorcycle." She laughed. "More like a bike with a toy engine. I can handle it, dear." She rubbed my back, hopped off the scooter, and handed me the helmet I'd loaned her. Then she marched over to the nearby rental hut and accosted a tanned man wearing a faded Hawaiian shirt, his blond hair pulled into a ponytail that hung almost to his waist. His head was bobbing to music we couldn't hear. She motioned to him to remove his earbuds.

"I'd like to rent a scooter. And a helmet. Both of them pink if possible."

"Hmmm. Pink is popular," he said, studying my mother with a bemused smile. "I think I rented the last one." Mom's face fell. "But I did take delivery on a new machine yesterday."

They combed through the rows of motorbikes until he found a Euro-style moped with a locking trunk-cotton candy pink-and a pink paisley helmet to match. Not a scratch on either one. I didn't have the heart to mention to the attendant that my mother had never driven-or even ridden on-a scooter before today. From the wacky driving I saw here on the streets every day, this did not seem to be a prerequisite anyway. After taking her license and credit card information, the man pushed the scooter into the middle of the parking lot.

Now Mom looked nervous and fl.u.s.tered: I suspected a case of cold feet. "My daughter thinks this might be over my head."

"Pffft," he said with a flick of his fingers, "you just get on it and ride. It's not like operating the s.p.a.ce shuttle." He explained how to start the bike, accelerate, and most important of all, how to brake. "You should use both front and back brakes, but in an emergency, rely on the front. You'll stop quicker. But don't brake too suddenly-I've seen the mechanisms lock and dump the rider right over the handlebars. Usually after a few beers." He squinted at her, looking a little more worried.

"I don't even like beer," Mom a.s.sured him. She putt-putted around the parking lot for twenty minutes until she p.r.o.nounced herself ready and then rolled the pink bike out onto the street behind mine.

"Thelma and Louise, meet Hayley and Janet," she called out as she fastened the helmet's strap under her chin. Not an image I found comforting.

"Scan the road and the sidewalks all the time," I warned her. "Look for bicyclists, cars, pedestrians, chickens..."

"Thanks, dear," she said, smiling as she gunned the engine and swerved past me into the flow of traffic.

Ten minutes later we reached the Customs House Museum, where I showed her how to park the bike and pull it up onto its stand, a detail that the hippie rental agent had failed to cover.

"Always, always remember to take the key," I added.

She linked arms with me. "I know I said this before, but it's still true. I'm having so much fun with you." Her eyes filled suddenly. "Even with all that's going on."

"I know. Weird how you can feel two such different things at once," I said.

We followed the brick path between the Westin Hotel and the water, admiring the yachts tied to the closest moorings. On the largest boat, three stories high with a deck the size of Miss Gloria's entire home, workers dressed in white shorts and shirts polished chrome and swabbed mahogany while the owners sipped wine and looked out at the world.

"Don't you think it would feel like being in a zoo?" Mom whispered. "Speaking of zoo animals, where did you live with Chad?"

"Nice transition, Mom." I snickered-I knew she'd been dying to ask about my ex but trying to hold back-and pointed to his whitewashed building a block to the left. But then I flashed on the possible horror and humiliation of running into my old boyfriend while showing his gorgeous place to my mom. "I can't take you any closer because of the restraining order."

She pulled away, her hazel eyes widening to the size of quarters.

"Just kidding. Let's go find Lorenzo." I gripped her arm and guided her in the opposite direction. It took us almost fifteen minutes to get to the main square because Mom wanted pictures of everything: the bar that looked like a trolley car, the Cat Man of Key West setting up for his feline acrobatics show, the slightly sad aquarium. She walked over to take yet more photos of the cruise ship getting ready to cast off from the dock.

"Howdy, Hayley," called a man from his perch on a cement wall bordering the square. I waved back at Tony, a homeless guy I'd met before Thanksgiving. We'd bonded when he helped me find the real killer of my ex's girlfriend. He'd been keeping a loose eye on me ever since. In exchange, I gave him leftovers and spare change whenever I had them.

"Who the heck is that?" my mother asked.

Grubby and marginally groomed, he didn't look like the kind of friend a mother would want her daughter to cultivate. And the two men lounging on either side of him looked worse.

"He's homeless," I explained, trying not to sound defensive. "He helped me out with that business about Kristen Faulkner. He's a nice enough guy but rough around the edges. And to be fair, he's lived through some hard life experiences. He isn't about to follow some random authority's rules."

Tony sauntered over and I introduced them, cringing a little inside.

"Wouldn't your mother like a photo of us?" Tony asked. "We're pretty good local color." He broke into a big smile that showcased his missing incisor.

"Yes, of course I would," said Mom. "Thank you for suggesting that." After she had arranged the three bemused b.u.ms into a photogenic pose, she gave them each five dollars and we moved on to find Lorenzo.

"This is such an interesting place to live," my mother said. "I love all the different kinds of people you've gotten friendly with. Makes me feel like I did something right as a mother."

Lorenzo was setting up shop in the large open area between the Waterfront Theater and the harbor. He straightened a deep blue cloth edged in gold fringe over his card table and pulled on a vest decorated with the stars and the moon. His tie was pinned to his shirt with a large silver question mark. And a rhinestone the size of a golf ball dangled from his black turban almost to his heavily made-up eyes.

"Hayley!" he called out, then placed his fingers to his forehead, as if concentrating deeply. "This must be your mother." He hurried over to hug her. "I didn't read that in the cards," he whispered to Mom. "She told me you were coming. Welcome to sunset in Key West. Your daughter is one of my favorite customers."

"That means I've paid him a small fortune," I said with a laugh. "Can you give us each three cards?" A three-card reading would offer us a quick glimpse into our past, present, and future. I laid a twenty-dollar bill on his table and rustled in my backpack for another.

"This one's on me," he said, waving the money away and escorting my mother to the chair across from him. He waited for her to sanitize her hands, then placed his deck in her open palms. She shuffled the cards and handed them back, a look of hopeful antic.i.p.ation on her face. He dealt out the ten of pentacles, the nine of cups, and the two of cups.

"So interesting," Lorenzo said, leaning over the table to get closer to the cards and visibly slowing his breathing. "As you probably know, the ten of pentacles, the card in your past position, represents a good home life, security, prosperity, and happiness ... on the surface. But look a little closer"-his finger grazed the card's border-"the family crosses paths, but they are not together. They don't appear to appreciate the richness and blessings around them, which are symbolized by the stars or pentacles."

Mom looked down at her hands, brushing the empty place on her left ring finger where her wedding band had been. "That's so true," she said sadly. "I took too much for granted."

"Dad had a role in that too," I told her. "It takes two people to ruin a marriage."

Lorenzo raised his thick eyebrows, causing the rhinestone to sway, and tapped on the second card, a seated man with nine chalices arranged on a ledge behind him. "But here in the present you are happy and comfortable. Life is your banquet right now!"

He smiled broadly, as though delighted to shift gears to some cheerful news. What a burden to have to constantly tell people the bare truths about their lives. Like working as a shrink, only worse, because folks probably put more stock in Lorenzo.

"And here." He pointed to the third card. "Ooh-la-la! I see love and friendship-a new relationship based on pa.s.sion and understanding. You will feel a connection experienced by few others. And could you possibly be discussing marriage?" His eyebrows arced almost to the line of his turban; his black eyes twinkled.

Mom giggled, fl.u.s.tered, and covered her eyes with one hand. "You must have given me Hayley's card-she's the one with the boyfriend. I'm all washed up in the romance department."

Lorenzo just grinned and pa.s.sed me his bottle of witch hazel hand sanitizer. I spritzed my hands and shuffled the cards, the feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach mushrooming.

Lorenzo turned over my three cards: the devil, the tower, reversed, and the emperor.

I groaned. "I knew I should have skipped this today."

Mom patted my leg, a worried frown playing on her lips. "It's only cards."

But I'd seen how happy she looked when Lorenzo turned over the two of cups and explained that true love lay in her future. She believed completely in this stuff. Two new customers, middle-aged women wearing tropical sundresses and heavy tans, approached Lorenzo's table and peered over my shoulder.

"Oh my gosh, she's got the tower," said one to the other, and then they backed away.

"The devil in us keeps us chained to other people's expectations," Lorenzo explained, speaking quickly as if he was suddenly pressed for time. "In the past, you may have been bound by your fears or by a situation that was unhealthy for you. Even an addiction of some kind."

I grimaced and nodded like a good sport. He probably hated giving me a lousy reading almost as much as I hated receiving it. And hadn't everyone been bound by fear at one time or another? For me lately, it had been the fear of relying on myself, rather than a man.

"Now, the tower in the present position"-he shifted in his seat and tried to smile with rea.s.surance-"represents the structure of defenses you've built around yourself. A shocking truth can shatter your perceptions. While it may seem that there is chaos all around you, you should consider welcoming the challenge, the change from the restrictions of your previous card. Some people say that moving on and rebuilding can only happen after such destruction has occurred," he said hopefully.

"The restrictions of the freaking devil." I sighed, barely able to listen to him yammer about my third card-the emperor. Something about a paternal figure and a quest for mastery that might not be progressing.

It made no sense to let myself react so strongly to a couple of colored cardboard cards, but the last time Lorenzo had turned up the tower, I'd nearly been killed by a crazy woman.

12.

The best moment of the day, he says, is when your knees are under the table.

-Colman Andrews We were both exhausted after our readings, though I tried not to show just how shaken I felt. "I'll stop by Fausto's Market on the way back. You go on home and have a gla.s.s of wine with Miss Gloria. What do you want to make for supper?"

After some discussion of possibilities that left me salivating even though I wouldn't be eating with them, we settled on Screw the Roux Stew, an old faithful recipe Mom had coaxed out of her cousin MK in Texas. She started back toward Tarpon Pier on her pink scooter, promising to chop the onions, celery, garlic, and peppers and start them sauteing before she and Gloria broke open the wine. I drove to Fausto's, the tiny grocery store halfway up Fleming Street, and hurried inside. I selected a roasted chicken, a length of smoked sausage, a half pound of Key West pinks-our local shrimp-and some frozen okra. Impossible to find decent fresh okra in January, even on a tropical island.

By the time I reached the dock and parked my scooter, I could smell the vegetables cooking from seventy-five yards up the finger. Mom and Miss Gloria were sitting on the deck of the houseboat, sipping white wine out of tiny cut-gla.s.s snifters, our two cats lounging beside them. When I got to the boat, Evinrude meowed and then sprang up and wound between my legs, half greeting, half complaint. Sparky leaped onto Miss Gloria's lap, splashing wine on the blue Conch Republic flag emblazoned across her white sweatshirt. She dropped him back on the deck and shuffled inside in her green rubber Crocs to help me unload the groceries.

"Are you sure you won't trip in those things?" I pointed to her clogs, and then instantly felt bad about saying anything. We were still working out the boundaries of our domestic partnership. I hated to insinuate that she was decrepit or frail, but on the other hand, her son was counting on me to keep her safe. And his confidence in me was all that stood between her and an old-age home in Detroit.

"You want her to wear old-lady lace-ups?" Mom asked as she followed us inside. "Give her the sausage, Hayley. I'll take the chicken."

"I made up my layered lime-carrot-pineapple Jell-O mold this afternoon," Miss Gloria announced proudly. "I haven't really cooked in years, but you ladies inspire me. We can have it for dessert since I finished eating your chocolate pie this afternoon."

Jell-O mold? Mom and I exchanged rueful grins behind her back and I suspected she was hoping, as I was, that one of the layers didn't turn out to be a jar of mayonnaise.

"Shall we invite Connie too?" Gloria asked.

"The more the merrier," said Mom. She began to shred the roasted chicken while Miss Gloria chopped the sausage and I sh.e.l.led the shrimp.

Connie arrived as the rice was almost done and the stew bubbled on the stove, filling the houseboat with luscious, spicy smells. I dumped in the frozen okra, turned down the heat, and we settled on the deck with freshened drinks. Every evening spent on Miss Gloria's porch, tiny lights winking, water gently sloshing, made me feel as though I couldn't get any luckier.

"How's your business going?" Mom asked Connie.

"Not bad," said Connie. "Hayley helped me land some weekly cleaning contracts at the Truman Annex, and those are starting to kick in now with the s...o...b..rds arriving in town. Before Christmas, it's more maintenance and getting places ready." She glanced down at her clasped hands and then up at us, grinning. "But I have some news. Ray and I are engaged!"

Mom shrieked and leaped up to hug her. "Hot dog! I'm so thrilled for you! Hayley's told me all about what a sweet man Ray is. Let's see the ring."

Connie held out her hand, where a slim gold band studded with a small ruby circled the ring finger. "We were out fishing this morning early. He'd hidden it in the tackle box and it got caught on the hook of one of his skitter pop lures. Almost a goner."

I laughed and came over to hug her once Mom let her go. "That's so Ray. I'm happy for you-you landed a keeper."

She hugged me back. "Thanks. He says I'm worth a big whopping diamond, and if his paintings ever catch on, that's what I'll get." I felt the tiniest twinge of envy, wondering if I'd ever find a guy who loved me the way Ray adored Connie.

"If there's any way I can help at all," my mother said. "With the wedding or anything. This is such a happy time, but it must be hard without your mother."

Connie nodded, her eyes bright with tears. Her mom had died of breast cancer when we were college roommates. We didn't talk much about the empty s.p.a.ce her mother's death had left in her life, but I could imagine how lonely it would feel not to be able to share a moment like this. Which made me appreciate Mom even more. In spite of my intermittent urges to wring her neck.

"You haven't told us anything about your date last night," Connie said to me.

"He's pretty much impossible," I said.

"You haven't given him much of a chance," Mom protested. "He's a traditional kind of guy-like your father was. For heaven's sake, let him pay the check once in a while. Or maybe if you feed him dinner instead of going out all the time-that's how I won your dad over."

I choked back my first response, which was that Mom wasn't perhaps the very best person to give advice on this topic. Dad's parting words when I was ten were burned into my brain like a chop steak seared in a hot cast-iron pan. I had crouched on the landing above the living room, listening to them argue.

"Life isn't all about dinner parties and recipes, Janet," he'd said. "I always thought you'd find a career, develop your intellect and your interests. Not stay home permanently as a housewife." His lips had curled in mild disgust. "We have nothing in common anymore."

"We have Hayley," Mom answered, and then begged him to give her another chance. But ten years of an unfulfilling marriage were enough for my father. He hadn't wanted a stay-at-home wife. He'd expected my mom to challenge him-and herself-and contribute to the household. Once it became clear that his picture of marriage would not materialize, he wanted to move on while they were still young and had prospects of meeting someone more compatible. Soon after they split, he had met someone.

My mother spent the first few weeks without him in the local hospital's psychiatry unit. No wonder I'd always felt like he could manage life without me in its center, but her? Unlikely. The highlight of Mom's life seemed to be talking to me on Sunday evenings. We chatted a lot more often than that, but on Sundays Mom settled in her living room with a cup of tea and the phone to catch up on everything. Everything.

"Men are different animals," said Miss Gloria, interrupting my thoughts. "They need a lot more support than we do. And compliments too. And the funny thing is, they don't even realize it." She clucked her tongue and set her empty gla.s.s on the table. "My Harry always thought he was looking after me, but in truth, it's a good thing he went first." She told a story about a time she'd been laid up after her son's birth. Harry had flooded the laundry room and then started a fire in the oven when he'd tried to bake a ca.s.serole in a plastic container. "Three trucks responded and all those big fire department lugs came tromping through my kitchen. I knew I had to get up and take over or the house would be destroyed."

I was embarra.s.sed to realize I hadn't imagined Miss Gloria as anything other than a senior citizen. s.p.u.n.ky, yes, but elderly all the same. I'd filed her away in the old lady slot in my mind, not thinking she'd been my age once, with big hopes and dreams for her life and her family.

"You should start dating someone, Janet," Connie said.

"Whoa!" I said. "Ding, ding, ding. Major off-limits conversation alert!"

"Hayley's father was one in a lifetime," Mom said, sipping her wine and smiling at me. Then a funny expression crossed her face, which I took to mean subject closed.

"Awww," said Miss Gloria. "That's so romantic."

And slightly pathetic, I thought, realizing yet one more time why establishing my career felt so important. A girl shouldn't rely on a man to give her life meaning. "Soup's on," I said.

We moved to the card table we'd set up in Miss Gloria's tiny galley. She'd covered the table with an old lace tablecloth, faded blue linen napkins, and the remnants of her good china. Mom ladled the stew over bowls of rice while I retrieved the cornmeal-cheddar scones I'd taken from the freezer and warmed in the oven. I took just a small taste of everything. At this point, I would have preferred to stay home, but I'd paid dearly for the special seven-course dinner offering at Louie's Backyard. If I didn't write it up, there would be no turning in the receipt to Key Zest and no restaurant review. And no insider buzz about the conference-or the murders-from the other diners.

Connie and Miss Gloria proclaimed the stew and the biscuits delicious.

"Better with fresh okra, if you can get it," Mom said. "If you make this for your new husband, take care the sausage isn't so strong it overwhelms the rest of the ingredients." She waggled a finger at Connie and grinned. "I'll write out some of my recipes for your trousseau. Never mind the fancy underwear."

"How was the conference today?" Connie asked.

Mom and I exchanged glances. "Not great," we said at the same time. The sickening vision of Yoshe King's body splayed out on the boulders, drenched in seawater, rushed to mind. I sighed, and described our discovery.

"That's horrible!" said Miss Gloria, then added, "Why didn't you tell us right away?"

"There's nothing to be done about it now," said my mother. "I suppose we were resting from the day." Connie leaned over and gave her a quick hug.

"Who's killing the food critics of Key West? Wasn't that a movie?" By now Miss Gloria sounded a little tipsy-I was sure her son would not approve.

"We shouldn't a.s.sume the two deaths are related," I said, standing up to clear the table and make room for Miss Gloria's wiggly mold and a plate of cookies. "Or even that she was murdered."