need. He’ll even match the rate you’re paying here.”
“For a four-diamond resort?” says Mrs. DePinna.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, seeing how you helped us out….”
“Great!” Becca gushes. “The O’Malley’s will be here in like three hours. I’ll help you guys with your bags.”
“Does the Sea Breeze have a safe?” asks Connie.
Becca nods. “A huge one. Right behind the front desk.”
“Awesome!”
The DePinnas scurry away from the pool.
When they do, I can see the bright blue wad of a swimming diaper nestled in the net of Becca’s pool cleaning pole. She wants everybody to think she found the ring when she went diaper fishing.
I, however, have a different theory.
Ceepak takes the sack of jewelry back to headquarters. The FBI will probably give us both a medal.
With Ceepak’s permission, I hang at the motel. Make sure the DePinna Family Reunion packs up and takes its show over to the Sea Breeze, which is huge and has security guards who know how to handle unruly conventioneers who’ve had one too many umbrella drinks. They can probably handle the DePinnas, too.
When they’re all gone, and Becca’s looking semi-human again, I bop down Beach Lane to this veggie place to pick up a couple fruit smoothies and a freshly sliced organic cucumber.
“Thanks, Danny Boy,” Becca says, lying back on a poolside recliner, putting two cucumber slices over her eyes. Her whole body relaxes. “They’re gone. They’re really, really gone.”
She sips her smoothie through a straw.
“So,” I ask, “where are the O’Malleys? Stuck in traffic?”
“Oh. I forgot. They called while you were gone. Cancelled.”
“Uh-huh,” I say. “Too bad.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m glad you gave it back.”
Becca peels a cucumber slice off one eye.
“What?”
“The Galuppi diamond. You tossed the ring into the pool so you could be a hero. Ask the DePinnas to leave.”
“Says who?”
“Me. You snatched the ring off Connie’s bedside table this morning when you were hauling around the fresh linens. You used your passkey. Went in. Found the ring.”
“Prove it.”
I shrug. “I don’t have to. I figure people lose things in motels all the time. When you find them, you return them. Right?”
“Always.”
“It’s like the motel proprietor’s code or something.”
“Yeah.” Becca sits up. “Are you going to tell Ceepak? You know he won’t lie or steal or tolerate people who do.”
I smile. “That’s his code. I’ve got my own.”
“Really?”
“It’s a little more loosey-goosey. And includes this one clause that overrides all the others.”
“What?”
“Friends are family.”
Becca grins. “Does that mean we have to start screaming at each other?”
“Nah. We’ll leave that to the DePinnas.”
Like I said, some guys have very rigid codes they live by.
Other guys are more like trees.
They know when to bend a little.
