I looked at the name on my cell phone and cringed. In the months since I’d decided to hire a private investigator to find my long-lost skunk of a dad, it had been an up and down roller coaster ride of emotions.

Did I really want to find out what had happened to Felonius Chance III? Or was I better off living out my life not knowing?

Up until that moment, I’d let the decision float around on the winds of chance—no pun intended. But since PI Calford Amity was calling on a Thursday morning, rather than our usual Monday afternoon weekly meeting, I could only assume he’d found something.

Either that, or he’d finally succumbed to the voodoo I’d been practicing to make him fall in love with me. I wasn’t holding out much hope on that since I was a spoiled little rich girl from Indianapolis, Indiana and therefore pretty much stunk at voodoo.

Besides, I had an aversion to getting chicken blood on my clothes.

“Hey, Cal. What’s up?” I mentally braced for the husky magic of his deep voice, knowing it would roll over me like warm butter and turn me all gooey like a heated cinnamon bun.

“Miss Chance. I’ve found him.”

And there they were. The three words (okay five) that I’d been both praying for and dreading. I swallowed hard. “Are you sure?” Was that hope in my voice? Or dread? Hopeful dread?

“I’m sure. One of the coins has turned up.”

My gaze slid toward the closet, where the bag I’d packed in the first fever of parental loss sat ready and waiting beside my floor-to-ceiling purse rack. I grimaced. Nobody should have that many purses. “Where is he?”

“A place called Bent, Alabama. I’m booked on a flight out this morning. It leaves at eleven.”

I laughed. “Funny. Where is he really?” A stark silence met my question and I frowned, realizing he wasn’t kidding. “What’s he doing down there among the alligators?”

My always circumspect PI didn’t respond. That was probably just as well. If anybody knew the extent of my father’s debauchery at that point, it was oh-so-yummy Cal Amity. He’d been buried up to his perfect Greek nose in it for weeks.

“Get me a ticket too, please. I’m going with you.” And I was. I didn’t know why I’d decided to face my father’s perfidy up close and personal. But apparently I had. I was already reaching for my suitcase.

Cal started to object, but I said a cheerful goodbye and hung up on him, mid splutter.

I was heading to the Bayou.

Grimacing, I realized the dresses and heels I’d packed for the trip weren’t going to go with the hip waders and gator repellent I’d need.

Unzipping the bag, I disconnected and stood staring down at the three-inch heels I’d laid over the top of my favorite pink suit. Was there such a thing as gator repellent? If there was, I’d definitely need some.