Chapter 17
What do you call a Private Investigator who is bad at his job? A Defective! ~ Text from Hailey to Suzie
Suzie skips into the office the next morning. And I do mean hippity-hoppity skips. “Good morning! You won’t believe what happened to me this morning.”
Nothing ever ‘happens’ to Suzie. No. She causes chaos and then looks around at the mess she created with this innocent expression on her face like ‘What happened?’. Innocent, my ass. You can’t call someone a Nazi goat-fucker and then act surprised when he decides to beat the everliving shit out of you.
“What now?”
She halts her skipping to stare at me. “You didn’t use your snarky voice to ask.” She comes closer and peers into my eyes. Suddenly, her eyes widen, and she claps. “You got laid last night!”
“Phoebe,” she shouts. “You owe me ten bucks.”
Phoebe rushes in. “Ten dollars for what? Is it someone’s birthday?”
“No, I bet Hailey and Aiden would seal the deal last night. I win. You lose.” Suzie puts out her hand expecting Phoebe to slap ten bucks into it.
Phoebe’s forehead wrinkles. “I never bet with you. And I certainly wouldn’t make a bet about when Hailey and Aiden would seal the deal.”
“Oh, right. It’s the uncles.” Suzie whips out her phone. No doubt to call my uncles and Pops and tell them Aiden and I had sex last night. Not happening.
I jump up and rush her. I grab her phone and hold it above my head. “No one is telling anyone I had sex last night.”
She grabs my arm and tries to climb me like a tree to reach her phone. I push her away and she goes reeling toward the wall. She catches herself right before she falls to the floor. She sticks out her bottom lip and pouts. “But mama has her eyes on a new fermentation bucket.”
“You didn’t win the bet. Aiden and I didn’t have sex last night,” I hiss at her and feel my face heat.
“Oh.” Her shoulders drop. “Why not?”
I ignore her and return to my desk. “Don’t we have a new client coming in soon?”
My phone dings and – even though I know looking at my phone while Suzie is in the room is the worst idea ever – I can’t stop myself from reading the text.
I can still taste you on my lips.
Oh boy. Aiden is a dirty boy. And I like it. I fan my face.
“What happened? Who is the message from?”
Oops. I forgot she was in the room for a second there.
“Let Hailey have her little secret,” Phoebe says as she tries to pull Suzie out of my office.
Suzie plants her feet and refuses to budge. “You would know all about having secrets, wouldn’t you?”
Phoebe’s face turns bright red. Seriously. Her face matches the bottom of her Louboutins. She looks at me with wide eyes.
“Suzie, Suzie, Suzie,” I call her name until she looks at me. “Everyone has secrets we don’t want everyone to know.” She opens her mouth to say who knows what, but I shut her up. “Like the time in junior high when you—”
She screams and rushes me to cover my face with her hands. “No. We don’t talk about the Carrie day – ever. You promised.”
I pry her hands off of my face. “Well, then, I guess you won’t be bugging Phoebe about her secrets any time soon.”
She flutters her lashes at me. “But I’m curious.”
“You know what they say, curiosity killed the cat.” I’m curious as hell, too. But I’m not going to bug Phoebe to reveal her secrets. I have a feeling if we push her too far, she’ll run. And not run away for the day to drown herself in ice cream like a normal woman. No, she’ll take off, never to be heard from again.
The door to You Cheat, We Eat opens and the security alarm buzzes.