Page 44 of Fierce

It was such a perfect description of Hope, I almost smiled, but I frowned instead. “Not the way you mean. But she may like me a bit better. Took her to the rose garden today and all. Looked after her a little, maybe.”

He shook his head and sighed. “You know, sometime I’d like Debra to be wrong. Just one time. Make life a hell of a lot more comfortable if I could look at her and say, ‘Remember that time you was wrong?’, and she’d have to say, ‘Oh, yeah, that one time.’” He got behind the bag again. “Break’s over. Go.”

“One moment,” I said, and he stood back. “Debra. She still do some kind of…health thing? For work, I mean.”

“Home health care. Some. Got her LVN and all. That’s nursing,” he added at my blank look.

“This girl,” I said. “Hope, her name is.”

“Little, blonde, and Hope? You’re a dead man.”

I waved that away. “I need somebody to stay with her sister while Hope’s in Paris for the show, and I need to arrange it personally, as—”

“As she’s workin’ for you,” he finished, “and you’re keepin’ it on the down low.” You didn’t have to draw Eugene a map.

“Yeh. Anyway. Her sister’s fifteen. She was ill today, and Hope’s worried about her, may not want to come along, I’m thinking, unless Karen’s well looked after. And she could be a bit of a handful, I’m thinking. Karen, that is.”

“Sounds like they got that in common,” Eugene said. “Why’s this Hope takin’ care of her sister?”

“No parents. So what d’you reckon? A week, ten days, something in there?”

“I’ll find out. And let’s go.” He moved behind the bag again. “I don’t have time to waste, and this Hope ain’t gonna love no guy with a gut.”

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