Wild at Heart

It was nearly eight o'clock before the massive front door of the colonial mansion opened and Shannon Reichert stepped onto the front porch. Halfway down the block, Valerie Parker snapped to attention, adjusting the side mirror of her van just enough that she could watch the woman sashay down the sidewalk toward her late-model Lexus. She wore her red hair upswept in a wild, cascading style, complemented by a skimpy scarlet dress that was so hot it practically set the shrubs on fire. Red dress, red heels, red lips, red hair. Bingo. A manhunting ensemble if Val had ever seen one. If only Shannon's husband could see her now. Shannon got into her car and started it. As soon as she pulled away from the curb, Val waited a few moments, then made a U-turn with her van and followed at a discreet distance. The Lexus made its way down Augusta Drive, a swirling ribbon of road that ran through the heart of posh Waverly Park. They passed one extravagant home after another, all testimonies to just how lavishly one could live if one could swallow the price tag that went along with the lifestyle. Shannon turned left onto Russell Road and headed east. The Friday-night traffic in Tolosa, Texas, made surveillance in a moving vehicle a challenge, but the bumper beeper Val had slipped onto the Lexus, while not the world's most accurate apparatus, would at least help her zero in on the direction the car was traveling if she happened to lose it along the way. Every mile Shannon drove took her out of her home territory of exclusive shops and four-dollar cups of coffee and moved her closer to a neighborhood that Val swore she would have avoided at all costs. White collars became blue, Porsches became pickups, and the ethnic mix became obvious because there actually was one. To Val's surprise, Shannon pulled into the parking lot of a bar called the Blue Onion, one of those working-class establishments with a red neon sign out front, a trashy alley out back, and a considerable amount of after-hours relaxation going on in between. Val had been there only once, track- ing down a deadbeat dad who was known to spend his child- support money on alcohol and women. She knew people came to places like this for three reasons only: to play pool, to get drunk, and to get laid. By the way Shannon was advertising herself tonight, Val could only assume she was heavily focused on number three. Yes, Shannon was definitely going slumming. But for what purpose? To meet a current boyfriend, or to find a new one? That remained to be seen. Val hadn't recorded calls to anyone except Shannon's manicurist and yoga instructor. If she was planning a rendezvous with a lover, she hadn't used her home phone to confirm it. Val cruised along behind the Lexus, following its driver into God-knew-what situation. The games rich people played were positively amazing. Of course, Shannon was rich only by the grace of Jack Reichert, her fifty-four-year-old husband. She had exactly the kind of hot little body that would trip the trigger of a man who had enough money to buy just about anything he wanted except his youth back. Marrying a twenty-something woman was his way of reassuring himself and the rest of the world that his equipment was still intact and functioning, since the Porsche 911, the big-game hunting, and the hair-replacement surgery hadn't done the trick. And for Shannon, marrying a rich older man was her way of reassuring herself that she'd always have plenty of what she wanted most in the world: money. Then two days ago, Reichert coughed up some of that hard-earned wealth--a thousand dollars, to be exact--and instructed Val to find out what kinds of activities his young wife was engaging in whenever he was out of town on his frequent hunting trips. Reichert, like most men with gold-digging wives, felt he had a right to know if she was handing out to other men for free what he'd bought and paid for. In heGraves, Jane is the author of 'Wild at Heart', published 2002 under ISBN 9780804119696 and ISBN 0804119694.