Naru Springsteen: Lover Detective

My sacred, cardinal, Number One Rule: Never become emotionally involved with a client.

My unfailing, unremitting, forever Number One Problem: It seems that I am always in violation of Number One Rule.

The truth, of course, is that I am in the wrong line of work. I should have been an actress, or maybe a model. I could probably get away with those sportsgirl-type ads. A stuntwoman, maybe, except that I really do not take any particular delight in flinging my life recklessly toward the closing jaws of death.

I am almost a lawyer, but not quite—almost a psychologist, but I got bored with a term paper. Could have been a cop, I guess, but discovered in time that the pay and benefits are about equal to that of a garbage collector—and, when you think about it, the work is about the same. Not that both jobs are not vital to a civilized society. I'd just rather someone else handle the trash work.

I was actually trained to be a spy, courtesy of the United States Navy. Naturally they did not call it that. But, hell, a spy is a spy by whatever tag or acronym. Not cut out for that, either.

Maybe I wasn't cut out for anything in particular. I think I would like to conduct the Boston Pops. I have never been invited to do so. I would give it a shot, though, if they would give me time for a crash course in music theory.

This is all very dumb, isn't it? I know what I'm cut out for, why I'm doing what I do for a living—and, to tell the truth, I could not conceive of ever doing anything else. I love my work, with all its built-in problems and uncertainties. I am where I need to be, doing what I need to do. I even enjoyed it. Well... most of it.

For the record, I am Naru Springsteen. American born and educated. No connection to that famous American rockstar. The name “Naru” came from the Japanese word Naruto (fishcake), I guess. It was a result of Mother's weird sense of humor. Seems that I was conceived in the kitchen of a Ramen restaurant. She was a South Carolina woman, from a family with roots in the American Revolution. I was born when she was twenty, living independently and comfortably on a nice trust from her grandmother, amoral. I use that last word in the kindest sense possible. Mother was a hell of a lady. Free thinker, that's all. Never married, never wanted to. Never told me who my father is, and I never asked. Just thankful that the name on my birth certificate is not noodle or pork-meat.

Great-grandfather Springsteen was a naval hero of sorts. I was raised in naval academies, went on to Annapolis and several war colleges, ended up in Strategic Studies—the "Star Wars" stuff—got out as quick as my obligation would allow.

That's enough background for now. It's enough to know, at this point, that I am where I need to be, doing what I need to do—emotionally involved with troubled ladies. And these beautiful, lovable, vulnerable young ladies had a hell of a problem that no amount of loving would help.

I neglected to reveal that I am a sometimes-psychic. Some have called me a "mystic," but I would not go that far. What I am, I guess, actually, is a lover. So how did a nice gal like me get mixed up in a case with them? That is exactly what I am about to tell you.