Page 34 of The Hard Way

I grabbed a pillow and whipped it into his face.

“Oh no you don’t,” Thor said.

“Oh my god, pillow fight!” I hit Zeus back. Suddenly Odin was in on it, grunting.

Just then there were steps outside the hall. We all froze. Then the steps receded. We followed them down the stairs.

“Please, God, let that have been the Texas people,” I said. “Because you know the words ‘pillow fight’ were way loud. And all of us were making noise.”

Thor snickered and tickled me. “The insurance investigations business has been very good to you, Ms. Jackie Trent.”

“Fuck off!” I laughed. “Come on!” I pushed him away. “I have to redo my nose now thanks to your shenanigans.” I went to the bathroom and pulled it off and washed and itched my face.

“We’re going to follow the trail,” Zeus announced when I came back out. “We think Andy Miller’s telling the truth, and we’ll assume your sisters are. What if theyareboth telling the truth? Is there another way for the cheese to have gotten from the dumpster to the store?”

“Thank you,” I said.

We finished our cookies and headed out. Margie was downstairs at her desk when we came through. She smiled uncertainly. “How’s the investigation going?”

“Okay,” I said. “We hit a snag, but we’re regrouping.”

She was looking at me really strangely. So she’d heard the pillow fight. I was officially the sexually voracious boss. I smiled back wanly.

“Um…” She glanced over at the cookie station.

Was she mad about us eating cookies in the room? How would she know?

“Did…um…” she began.

“What is it?” Thor asked sweetly.

“Did one of you leave your clipboard by the guest snack station?”

Gulp! The dirty cupid activities clipboard!

Had she looked at it? Of course she fucking looked at it! I didn’t need a mirror to know my face was utterly beet red.

“Oh, that would be me.” Zeus breezed over and grabbed it, like it was nothing. “We’re heading out to the Piggly Wiggly,” he said.

I wanted to say we didn’t really do those cupid things, but would that just make it worse? Why would she even believe me?

Zeus grabbed my hand. I smiled and walked. One foot and then another. Just get out.

“This is the worst,” I said once we were all buckled up in the rental car. “You know she read it.”

Zeus backed out of the driveway and headed west.

Odin grabbed the clipboard and read it. “Well,” he said after a while. “She’ll never look at thosecupids the same way again.”

“It’s not funny!” I turned to Zeus. “You need to tell her that we did not do any of those things! Tell her you were just fucking around. Like you were bored and just writing stuff.”

“She won’t believe me.”

“Tell her!”

“You look beautiful when you’re desperate.”

“You’re going to tell her,” I said. “What the fuck must she think? And you know she heard ‘pillow fight.’”

---