“The house stirs it up,” Patty decided. “Go on, Cilla, get cleaned up and come with us. This rain and gloom’s going to make us sad. We’re just not taking no for an answer.”

She supposed she went along as it was three against one, and because Cathy’s memory had made her sad. It surprised her that she enjoyed herself, poking around a mall, sitting through a weepy chick flick, drinking margaritas and eating grilled chicken Caesar salad.

In the restaurant ladies’ room, Angie joined her to fuss with her hair and lip gloss. “It’s no Rodeo Drive, premiere and dinner at the latest hot spot, but it was a pretty good day, huh?”

“I had fun. And Rodeo Drive wasn’t my usual stomping grounds.”

“It would be mine, if I lived out there. Even if I could only window-shop and fantasize. You really don’t miss it?”

“I really don’t miss it. I- Sorry,” she said when her phone rang. Drawing it out, Cilla saw her mother’s number on the readout, put it away without answering.

“You can take it. I’ll step out.”

“No. It’s the kind of call that’s guaranteed to spoil my nice, subtle margarita buzz. Do you do this a lot? Hang out with your mother on a rainy Saturday?”

“I guess. She’s fun to be around. We always tried to have a day together, and since I went to college, we try harder when I’m home on break. Sometimes we have friends along, sometimes just the two of us.”

“You’re lucky.”

Angie laid a hand on Cilla’s arm. “I know she’s not your mother, but I know, too, she’d really like to be your friend.”

“She is my friend. We just don’t know each other very well.”

“Yet?”

“Yet,” Cilla agreed, and made Angie smile.

WHEN SHE GOT HOME, Cilla checked her voice mail. Two from Ford, she noted-probably when she’d turned off her phone in the movie- and one from her mother.

She got her mother’s over with. It ran long, as expected, covering the gamut from cold disdain to angry resentment, with a short stint of teary tremor between.

Cilla deleted it, played Ford’s first.

“Hey. My mother decided to cook up spaghetti and meatballs, and told me to come over to pig out and bring a friend. You didn’t answer the door, and you’re not answering this. So now I’m wondering if I should worry, mind my own business or be insanely jealous because you ran off with some piece of beefcake named Antonio. Anyway, give me a call so I know.”

She played the second. “Ignore that message. My father ran into your father, so have fun with the girls. Ah, that was your father’s term. The girls. You’re going to miss some seriously awesome meatballs.”

“God, you’re so cute,” Cilla murmured. “And if I wasn’t so tired, I’d walk right over there and jump your bones.”

Yawning, she climbed the steps with two shopping bags. A real bed waited upstairs, she remembered. She could curl up on an actual mattress with actual sheets. Snuggle right in, sleep as late as she liked. The idea shimmered like heaven in her mind as she turned into the guest bath.

It was like being struck in the heart. The lovely floor lay broken-tiles chipped, shattered, heaved up from long cracks. The bowl of the new sink lay scattered over it in pieces. Shocked, she staggered back, the bags dropping out of her hands. The contents spilled out as she turned, with a fist twisting in her belly, to run to the newly tiled master.

The same senseless destruction met her.

A sledgehammer, she thought, maybe a pick. Someone had pounded, chipped, gashed the tiles, the glass block, the walls. Hours and hours of work, destroyed.

With ice coating that fist in her belly, she walked downstairs and outside into the rain to make the now familiar call to the police.

“CAME IN THROUGH the back door,” Wilson told her. “Broke the glass, reached in, turned the lock. It appears he used your tools-that short-handled sledgehammer, the pickax-to do the damage. Who knew you’d be out for the evening?”

“Nobody. I didn’t know I’d be out. It was spur of the moment.”

“And your car remained here, in full view from the road?”

“Yes. I left the veranda light on, and two lights on inside-one up, one down.”

“And you left here about two in the afternoon, you said?”

“Yes, about then. We went to the mall, to the movies, to dinner. I got back about ten-thirty.”

“The three women you were with knew your house would be vacant?”

“That’s right. My neighbor knew, as he called me while I was out. My father knew, and my neighbor’s parents. I suppose Mrs. Morrow’s husband knew, or could have. Basically, Detective, pretty much anyone who had any interest in my whereabouts could have known or found out.”

“Miss McGowan, I’m going to suggest you get yourself a security system.”

“Is that what you’d suggest?”

“This area is lightly developed, it’s part of its charm. You’re relatively remote here, and your property has been a repeated target of vandalism. We’re doing what we can. But if I were you, I’d take steps to protect my property.”

“You can believe I will.”

Cilla pushed to her feet when she heard Ford’s voice, raised in obvious frustration as he argued with one of the cops currently prowling her house and grounds. “That’s my neighbor. I’d like him to come in.”

Wilson signaled. A moment later Ford rushed in. “Are you hurt? Are you all right?” He took her face in his hands. “What happened now?”

“Someone broke in while I was out. They did a number on two of the second-floor bathrooms.”

“Mr. Sawyer, where were you this afternoon and evening, between two and eleven?”

“Detective Wilson-”

“It’s okay.” Ford took Cilla’s hand, squeezed it. “I was home working until about four. I went out to buy some wine and some flowers for my mother. I had dinner at my parents’, got there about five. Got home, I don’t know, about nine, maybe nine-thirty. I watched some TV, fell asleep on the couch. When I surfaced, I started upstairs. I looked out the front door-it’s a habit now-and I saw the cops.”

“Ms. McGowan stated you knew she wasn’t home.”

“Yeah, I called her to invite her to dinner at my parents’. No, walked over first to invite her. She didn’t answer, and I got a little worried with everything that’s been going on. Then I called. And a little while later, I talked to my father; my mother wanted me to stop and pick up some milk. I told him I was trying to reach Cilla to ask her over, and he said he’d run into her dad, and that she was out with girlfriends.”

“What time did you come over here?”

“Ah, about three, some after, I guess. I walked to the barn when you didn’t answer, but the lock was on, and I walked around the house. I was worried, a little. Everything looked okay. Where did they break in?”

“Back door,” she told him.

“The back door was fine when I did the walk-around. How bad is it?”

“Way bad enough.”

“You can fix it.” He reached for her hand. “You know how.”

She shook her head, walked over to sit on the steps. "I’m tired.” After scrubbing her hands over her face, she dropped them into her lap. “I’m tired of it all.”

“Why don’t you go over to my place, get some sleep? I’ll bunk here so somebody’s in the house.”

“If I leave, I’m not going to come back. I need to think about that. I need to see if staying here matters anymore. Because right now? I just don’t know.”

“I’ll stay with you. I’ll take the sleeping bag. Are you going to leave any cops here?” Ford demanded of Wilson.

Wilson nodded. “We’ll leave a radio car and two officers outside. Ms. McGowan? I don’t know if it makes any difference to the way you’re feeling, but this is starting to piss me off.”

She offered Wilson a sigh. “Get in line.”

WHILE FORD WENT over to get the dog, she fixed plywood over the broken glass herself-a kind of symbol. At that moment, Cilla wasn’t sure if it was a symbol of defense or defeat. When she set down the hammer, all she felt was brutal fatigue.