Read Online Sense of Deception by Victoria Laurie - Free Book Online

video games until two in the morning. It was a rut he’d gotten himself stuck in, and one both me and his ex-girlfriend really wanted him to get out of.
    So, I’d given him a reading and laid out all the many ways he could rather immediately improve his life. I’d told him in no uncertain terms to get his act together, find a house, buy it, get some new furniture that didn’t scream “frat house,” furnish said home, and show the girls how grown-up he could be.
    I mean, Oscar was a really good-looking guy and he’d been with the bureau since he was in his early twenties. Now in his mid-thirties, he had to be making some great coin, and he was otherwise a very responsible, kind, and decent man. I knew most girls would think him a total catch until he took them home. Then I suspected they’d suddenly remember a cat at their apartment that needed feeding.
    â€œI’ve been busy,” he said in reply to my remark about house hunting.
    I glared at him. “You
do
know I’ve got an inboard lie detector, right?”
    Oscar sighed. He knew he wasn’t gonna win this fight. “Change is hard for me, Cooper.”
    Candice was watching our back-and-forth with interest and a little gleam in her eye. “You know,” she said casually, “Abby has a pretty great eye for real estate.”
    I turned to her. “I do?”
    She ignored me. “And she’s also got a great eye for decorating.”
    Oscar’s brow furrowed and he leaned in. “She does?”
    Candice waved her arms around the house as if my living room spoke for itself. I took it all in, and I kinda had to admit, the place did look pretty good, but that was as much my flair as Dutch’s. Our styles blended nicely together.
    Oscar too was looking around and nodding his head. And then, as if he’d suddenly caught on to exactly what Candice was hinting at, he said, “Cooper, would you help me look for a house?”
    â€œUh . . . ,” I said.
    â€œShe’s got a really busy week next week,” Candice said for me.
    Now it was my turn to furrow my brow. What point was she trying to make?
    â€œShe’s taken on a new case, and all of her spare time is going to be spent chasing down leads.”
    â€œOh,” Oscar said, and I swore he looked disappointed.
    â€œThen again,” Candice said, as if an idea had suddenly occurred to her, “if she had help chasing down those leads, she’d have more free time to devote to your cause.”
    I rolled my eyes, but Oscar still looked puzzled. I decided to spell it out for him. “Oscar, if you want to spend your vacation helping me on a cold case I’ve just taken on, then I’ll help you hunt for a house and the furniture to fill it.”
    He perked right up. “Really?”
    â€œYes. But I’ll also need to take you to a department store. Or maybe the whole mall.”
    â€œWhat for?”
    â€œA new wardrobe, dude. Seriously.”
    He looked down at himself and grinned. “When you have a body this good, Cooper, you don’t need fancy clothes.”
    I crossed my arms and sat back on the couch, mimicking Candice’s pose. “Just out of curiosity, how many dates have you gone on lately?”
    His grin faltered. After a pause he said, “Okay, but just a couple of shirts and some shorts. Nothing too crazy.”
    Candice and I traded a look. “We’ll see,” was my only promise.
    We gave Oscar a lift to the garage next to the bureau offices, as he’d ridden to the poker game the night before with Dutch. Before leaving us, he promised to catch up with me later, after he’d taken another nap. Meanwhile, we girls drove just down the street to our new offices.
    Candice and I had been rather unceremoniously kicked out of our last office suite by a jerk of a landlord who had no legal standing to evict us, and even though we’d found awesome new digs not far