A Flight of Fantasy (Sarah Woods Mystery 12) by Jennifer L. Jennings Page B

parking lot but she continued on another few miles. We entered a town called Ashland, and eventually ended up in a nice residential neighborhood.
    When Rita pulled her car over to the side of the road and shut her lights off, Carter did the same. If Rita’s daughter was in the car, she must have been sleeping in the back seat, otherwise I had to assume the girl was at the neighbor’s house. “What the hell is she up to? Is she doing a house call?”
    Carter shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
    Rita never got out of her car. She just sat in the dark, doing who knows what.
    “Maybe she’s lost.”
    “She’s not lost,” Carter said. “She’s doing research.”
    “Research?” I asked.
    “Maybe there’s a poor sucker who lives in one of these houses, and she’s planning to steal his information, too.”
    “It’s a pretty nice neighborhood. If she’s targeting wealthy men, this makes sense.”
    Carter tapped my arm and pointed out the windshield. “Look, she’s getting out of her car.”
    I got my camera ready and took a bunch of shots of her strolling across the street, heading toward one of the bigger houses on the block. She went up to the door and lifted her hand to knock, but then stopped as she looked in the window. She just stood there, as if contemplating what to do. She lowered her head, stalling with some kind of inner turmoil. Eventually she backed up and ambled back to her car and got in.
    “That’s weird,” Carter said. “Why the change of heart?”
    “Is there any way you can find out who lives in that house?” I asked.
    He was already on his cell phone, punching in numbers. “I might be able to find out quickly by plugging in the address to my program.”
    Reece started her engine and took off. “What are we going to do? Should we follow her?”
    “I want to find out who lives in this house. We’ll know where she’s going.”
    Five minutes later, Carter had a name. “This house belongs to Dr. Darren Wheeler and his wife Sharon.”
    “What kind of doctor?” I asked.
    “No idea, but I can easily find out.”
    I unclasped my seat belt and zipped up my jacket. “While you do that, I’m going out for a little evening stroll. Maybe I can get a glimpse inside the window and see what’s going on.”
    “Okay, but try to be nonchalant about it.”
    It was fully dark at seven o’clock and the night air was chilly. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and meandered across the street toward the doctor’s house. As I slowly passed by, I noticed a light was on in one of the rooms on the first floor. Four people sat around a dining room table eating dinner. The couple was in their late forties and the boy and girl both had to be under twelve years old.
    It warmed my heart to see a family eating together and actually talking to one another. These days, such occurrences seem rare with the lure of technology, always texting on the cell phones, or playing games.
    I continued my stroll to the end of the block, turned around and slowly retraced my steps back. Catching another glimpse into the house, I got a better look at the father this time. He wore a preppy looking cardigan and he had a long, skinny face with a large Adam’s apple. Why would Rita show up at his house during dinnertime? Didn’t she know he had a family?
    Unless Carter was right. Maybe Rita was scoping him out for another reason that involved stealing credit card numbers or the like.
    When I got back to the Buick, there wasn’t much to tell Carter, but he had some information to tell me.
    “Dr. Wheeler is a child psychologist, has had his own practice for eight years. From what I can tell, he’s well respected in his field. No complaints against him. Never been arrested.”
    Warming my hands between my knees, I said, “He seems like a family man. He was having dinner with his wife and two kids.”
     
     
    “The only connection I can find here is that Reece and Dr. Wheeler both work with children.”
    “Dr. Wheeler