Page 31 of What a Wolf Wants
“Yeah, that was something else I checked into. She was an only child, never married, no kids, her parents are gone. She doesn’t have any living relatives. So we figured she was the perfect choice to approach with the offer of purchasing a couple of cars through her.”
“You are doing a great job of checking into this,” Ethan said.
“Well, when I learned who owned the car, it made me curious, and I couldn’t quit looking into it. Adam has been giving me a hard time about it—in his humorous way. I want to go ask her about the cars, but I’m afraid that will spook her, and she’ll tell whoever it was who gave her the money that a police officer is asking questions.”
“Okay, well, be careful, Tori. Not only do we not want to spook Kroner and his cohorts, we don’t want you to get hurt in the process,” Ethan said.
“I’ll be careful.”
“Let us know what you discover,” Ethan said.
After that, they ended the call and he and Charlene walked inside the deli. Black chairs and white tables and booths on a black-and-white-checkered floor set the scene. Black-and-white pictures of sea creatures hung on the walls. She pointed them out to Ethan. “That’s what gave me the idea of taking photos of marine life, but in color, to add to the walls in my home and the rental homes.”
“That would be so nice. I like the idea of having photographs in color too.”
They took a seat in one of the booths and ordered a grilled chicken, bacon, and cheese sandwich for her and a hot pastrami and Swiss on rye sandwich for him.
When the server left to put in their orders, Ethan asked Charlene, “Okay, does anyone working here seem familiar, or do you recall if any customer seemed unduly interested in you?”
“No, nothing. I really wasn’t paying any attention to anyone. Even though as wolves we often are wary of oursurroundings, I was just focused on eating. The food was great.”
“Totally understandable.” He was certain she would have seen someone if they were obviously watching her since she was a wolf, and though she’d been enjoying her meal, wolves did notice things that might make them wary. He was glad to have some enjoyable time to spend with her like this.
Their sandwiches were soon delivered to their table, and they began to eat.
“I can see why you enjoyed this place. The food is great,” Ethan said.
“Yeah, even if my secret admirer isn’t from here, I’m glad we came here for lunch.” She took another bite of her sandwich.
“Me too. Have you ever been on a whale trip?”
“No, not me. I’m really looking forward to it. What about you?”
“No, never.”
“Don’t tell me. You work too much.”
He laughed. “If some of my friends had wanted to do it, I would have gone along. But going by myself? Nah.”
“Oh, sure. The same with me. This is going to be fun. We need to drop by my place so I can change into tennis shoes for the boat trip and grab a jacket. It’ll be cold on the water.”
“Absolutely. I’m wearing rubber-soled shoes and I have a jacket in the car so I’m all set.”
After lunch, they drove over to Charlene’s place, and she changed shoes and grabbed her jacket. Then they headed over to the boat docks where they would take off on asmaller Zodiac boat. Unlike some of the large boats that carried thirty to forty people to watch whales, the Zodiac would take a max of five customers. For this trip, it was just the two of them, so this was nice and personalized.
They met Captain Rusty, who greeted them and then gave them safety tips and made sure they had life vests on before he headed out. “Okay, are you ready to go see some whales?”
“We sure are,” Charlene said.
The captain motored out through the narrow harbor, and they saw sunbathing seals.
“Oh, wonderful.” Charlene began taking pictures. “They’re beautiful.”
The sun was shining off the choppy water as the captain steered into the bay. He moved into calmer water as soon as he could. They began trolling for whales, and it wasn’t long before they saw a pod of dolphins.
“Those are Pacific white-sided dolphins,” the captain said.
The dolphins approached the boat and rode the bow waves and looked eager to make their acquaintance.
