Favor for a Friend

Lane Parker Mysteries #1

By Kate Kane

Copyright 2013 Kate Kane

License Notes: This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

Favor for a Friend is a work of fiction. Characters, Incidents, Names, and Places are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any events, locales, or Persons living or dead is completely coincidental.

Cover images courtesy of photos by catolla, canstock & Kaid Kane

Cover by Joleene Naylor

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 - Prologue

Chapter 2 - You've got a Friend in me

Chapter 3 - No one packs like a Parker

Chapter 4 - North by Northwest or How to get to Omaha

Chapter 5 - A Friend of yours is a friend of mine

Chapter 6 - Meet me in St. Louis

Chapter 7 - Seek and you shall find

Chapter 8 - Never trust a stranger

Chapter 9 - Confession is good for the soul

Chapter 10 - A tale of two guys and a girl

Chapter 11 - All's well that ends well

Italian Translations

Preview – Family Secrets

Dedication

While the Parker, Bellini, and Luciano families were born in my brain, I have to thank my own family for their encouragement and help.

Thank-you to my daughter Keey who helps with a really good one-liner almost every time I needed one.

Thank-you to my son Kaid who helped with the cover.

And thanks to both who listen, laugh, and encourage me as I talk about the disasters and dilemmas my other family faces.

Prologue

Things always look darkest when the sun goes down.

Jeff couldn't believe his luck, if luck was what you'd call it. It was dusk when he'd missed the turn that would have taken him to I80 and he was forced to continue down the gravel road near Gretna, Nebraska; then his truck had died. He checked the gas gage, half full. He tried the ignition again. Nothing, no clicking, no noise, nothing. He opened the door. No beep to tell him the key was in the ignition and the dome light was dark. Damn, it must be the battery. He checked his cell phone. It was dead too. Luckily, the truck had come to a stop within a short walk of a farmhouse. Unfortunately, no one answered as he pounded first on the front door and then on the back door. He walked back to his truck and opened the hood to check the connection for the battery. Everything looked good and he'd exhausted his knowledge of the inner workings of a car engine.

"Okay, what next?" He mumbled as he closed the hood. He looked up and couldn't believe how lucky he was to find an SUV had pulled up and parked behind his truck. He walked toward the SUV and as the window lowered, he saw a really hot blonde.

Jeff smiled as he approached the SUV.  "Hey, thanks for stopping. Don't suppose you've got jumper cables."

Her long blonde hair moved in waves as she shook her head and gave him a mega-watt smile. "I wouldn't even know what they looked like."

He wasn't surprised that she had no idea what jumper cables were. He smiled again. "Maybe I could just use your cell phone?"

She shook her head again.  "No bars, but I can offer you a ride."'

She looked harmless enough, and darkness had folded in around him since his truck had first died.  He shrugged his shoulders. What the heck. "A ride to a gas station would be great." Maybe he could call Triple A from a gas station.

Jeff opened the passenger door and climbed into the SUV.  He reached his hand toward her.  “My name’s Jeff.  I really appreciate the ride.”

She shook his hand.  “Star.  So, what brings you our here, Jeff?”

“I’m a project manager for a house builder.  We’re going to break ground on an acreage near here in a couple of weeks.  I was checking it out and missed my turn to get on the interstate.  Then my truck died.”

She nodded.  “Weird, huh?”

“So, what brings you out here?  Not that I’m complaining.  It’s really lucky that you happened by.”

“I have friends out here. I was going to visit them, but they weren't home.”

Jeff tried to be sociable by making small talk.  But, he was distracted; his mind kept going back to what was wrong with his truck. Since he was in the construction business, his truck was a work vehicle, and he always kept it in good repair. In fact, it was only six months old.  He was so lost in thought that he didn’t notice that the SUV stopped until he heard Star saying his name.

He opened the door and thanked her for the ride as he got out. He walked into the gas station, thankful that it was still open. He greeted the clerk, and asked about a pay phone.  His luck had run out.  That was the thing about the proliferation of cell phones; pay phones were going the way of the dinosaur.

He asked about using the landline, but the teenaged kid behind the counter said he wasn't allowed to let customers use the phone. Jeff let out an exasperated sigh.  What was he going to do?  As he glanced around the store, he noticed that there was a display of cell phone accessories. He turned the display case stopping when he saw an a/c charger for his i-Phone.

"So, if I buy this charger for my iPhone, have you got an outlet I can plug it into? Or is that against the rules too?"

The kid looked at him and shrugged. "You can use the outlet the men's room for anything you want."

Great, so now he had to sit in the men's room while his phone charged. Could this day get any worse? He paid for the overpriced charger and headed for the men's room. Hopefully, he'd have enough juice to make a call right away. Of course, that would require that he had service.

Jeff used his Swiss Army knife to open the theft preventative packaging that held the charger. He got the charger out, the phone connected to it and the whole thing plugged into the electrical outlet. Out of habit, he'd locked the door and he was leaning against it as he waited. He both heard and felt the knock. "Yeah, give me a minute." He said as he checked the phone. Woo hoo! Bars and it had enough power to make at least one quick call. He pulled the cord from the wall outlet and opened the door as he hit the send button. He got through to Triple "A" and gave the information about his whereabouts. The tow truck could meet him at the gas station and then they'd drive to his truck. The tow truck was coming from Lincoln, Nebraska and there was an estimated 45-minute wait. He'd noticed a bench in front of the building when he'd gone in. He grabbed a Diet Coke, paid the clerk, and stepped outside. He sat on the bench and noticed an electrical outlet next to it. He plugged the charger in and sent an e-mail to his mother telling her about the truck issue and explaining that he might not be able to pick up her new patio furniture the next day as he'd agreed earlier - it all depended on what was wrong with his truck.

Chapter 1

A Friend in Need

Lane sat in her office glancing out the window overlooking the expansive trimmed lawn, her hand still resting on the phone. She'd just hung up after talking to her best friend from childhood. Maggie Donaldson and Lane Parker had lived next door to each other and had been best friends from diapers through junior high school. After that, their lives had taken different paths and some thirty-five years later, they'd somehow lost touch.

The summer Lane turned thirteen, her Aunt Marta had sold the house Lane had grown up in, and moved her to Omaha. Through tear filled eyes, and cracking voices, she and Maggie had vowed to stay in touch.  It was before email and cell phones though and the girls had tried to stay touch through cards, letters, and phone calls. For a while, they even managed to spend a weekend with one another every month or so; but Maggie was playing sports and had basketball practices, softball practices, and track meets while Lane was busy with piano lessons and recitals.  Before long, they'd each made other friends, and the phone calls, cards, letters, and weekends became fewer and farther between.