Page 95 of Maid For Each Other

“No, it can’t,” I said, even though I had no fucking clue. The shoes were good Italian leather so I was pretty confident no stinger was going to be able to penetrate the soles, but what the hell did I know about a scorpion’s range? “Now, if I fail and it runs away, keep your bare feet clear of him and get up on that toilet, you got it?”

Thank God the seat cover was down.

“Got it,” she said, nodding. “Are you going to do a countdown or something?”

“Well, we don’t want it to know our plan, do we?”

“What?” she said, and then I could see it in her eyes when she got it. “Do you really think this is a great time for jokes?”

“I’m not sure there’s ever been a better time for jokes,” I said, my eyes moving to thatthing.

“True,” she said, her voice almost a whisper. “Well, if you’re about to die, and I’m sure you’re not, I just want you to know I had fun with you.”

“Wow, that’s really quite an amazingly vanilla proclamation. I’ve adequately filled your time.”

“I’m trying to be speedy in this perilous situation.”

“Okay, let’s do this,” I said. “You ready, Abs?”

“Yes,” she said, nodding again.

“One, two—”

“Oh, my God!” she yelled, and I let out a very embarrassing screech as the thing started moving across the bathroom floor.

In my direction.

“Shit!” I scanned the area, looking for something to drop onhim. He wasn’t running, but the fact that he was moving felt like he had an armory of guns pointed at me and he was about to fucking take me out.

A vacuum was moving out in the hallway, so close to the door that I heard it bump, and I wondered if that was what triggered that fucking monster to move.

Shut the fuck up, housekeeping!

“Stay in the shower,” I yelled at Abi as I sidestepped over to the door and pulled it open, hoping that guy would leave on his own. The little fucker was still moving in my direction,come on, buddy, but suddenly I realized that I was going to send a killer out into the hallway in the direction of an oblivious housekeeper.

“Damn it!”

Without thinking, or even looking at the woman, I wrenched the vacuum from her hand and rushed back into the hotel room.

It was a Dyson, so maybe it would work.

I drove that vacuum over it, and holy fucking shit—it sucked up the scorpion.

Or didsomethingto it, by the sound of it.

My eyes frantically searched the floor, but it wasn’t there anymore.

“Did it work?” I heard Abi ask by the bathroom doorway.

“Was that a scorpion?” I heard from the housekeeper in the hallway.

“Did you get him?” Abi asked from where she was crouched.

I looked up and we stared at each other in disbelief, almost as if we each expected that thing to come creeping back out, even though the sound inside the vacuum made it clear that thing had been good and truly shredded.

I turned off the vacuum and literally threw it out into the hallway with both hands, yelling, “Sorry and thank you!”

And then I shut the door and locked it, as if that’d keep any future scorpions from coming into our room.

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