The Pinch Runner

by Robin Merrill

  “You’re not going unless I go.”

  Her eyes snapped toward him. “What? No!”

  “Yes. I think it’s about time I meet this Bob fella.”

  Chapter 32

  Nate poured Sandra a third cup of coffee. “Are you sure he didn’t give you a time?”

  For the third time, Sandra said no. “He’s an angel, Nate. I try not to make demands of him and boss him around. He said he was going to show up and I’m grateful he’s going to show up, so I didn’t nail down a time.”

  He gave her side eye. “You don’t need to be terse with me. You’re the one in the wrong here, don’t forget.”

  She looked down at her cup. She wasn’t going to argue with him, but she didn’t think she was in the wrong at all. She was trying to be a hero. There was a crash from the living room but neither of them looked. Ethel was in there with the children, and if one of them went rushing in there, they would only mess with her methodology.

  Nate sat down across from her and leaned back in the chair. “So, we wait.”

  “Yes, like I said. We be patient.”

  “And he’s not just going to show up invisible and whisk you away without my knowledge?”

  She snickered. “He may be here right now and be invisible and be furious that I’ve told you the plan. But I don’t know if he can make me invisible.” She figured that he probably could, but she wasn’t going to tell Nate that.

  “I can’t believe I’m the last one to meet him.”

  “You’re not. Joanna still hasn’t met him yet.”

  “That we know of.”

  Sandra snickered. This was true. Joanna could have been chatting with him for months. She had lots of invisible friends.

  “Sandra?” Bob said slowly.

  She looked around the room but couldn’t see him. “Yes?”

  “Yes, what?” Nate said. “Is he here? Is that him?”

  “What’s going on?” Bob said just as slowly.

  “I’m sorry, Bob. I didn’t mean to complicate things. My wonderful husband here found my bluff note in my purse. He wants to go with us on our mission—”

  “But first, I want to see you!”

  Sandra found Nate’s tone a bit too demanding for an angel.

  Apparently, Bob thought so too because he didn’t appear. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. The more people who go, the harder it will be to hide.”

  “Well? What’s he saying?” It was obvious that Nate did not appreciate the suspense.

  “He says that it’s not a good idea to take a bunch of people on this particular mission. We’re trying to be discreet.”

  “Stop calling it a mission! You’re going to drop a note off. And it’s not a bunch of people! It’s your husband!”

  Bob appeared right beside the table. “You make a good point, sir.”

  Nate let out a little shriek as he pushed his chair back away from the angel. The squawk of cheap furniture on flooring almost harmonized with the shriek that came out of his mouth. Then he froze and stared at the heavenly being in front of him. He opened his mouth but no sound came out.

  Sandra wondered if she had acted this shocked during her first encounter. She didn’t think she had. She knew Peter and Ethel hadn’t. And Sammy, well, Sammy hadn’t even blinked. “Honey, this is Bob. Bob, this is honey.” She laughed at the charm of her introduction.

  Nate did not laugh. He still hadn’t moved. Finally, he said, “You’re ... you?”

  Huh? Her husband was cracking under the pressure. He couldn’t even use words. She got up and rounded the table to take his hand. “It’s okay. I know it’s a lot, at first, but you’ll get used to him.”

  “He’s just ... not what I was expecting.”

  Bob furrowed his brow in obvious offense.

  “I thought you’d be ... bigger ... and—”

  “Okay, enough about that.” She looked at Bob. “Thanks for appearing to him. So, what’s the plan?”

  Bob looked at Nate. “You really want to be a part of this?”

  “Honestly?” Nate spoke slowly, as if he had to work to push out each syllable individually. “I’m not sure, but I don’t want my wife doing this unless I go to protect her.”

  Bob looked offended again. “I’m pretty sure I can protect her.”

  Nate stood up and puffed out his chest. “But she’s my wife.”

  Bob held up both hands. “Of course. I have no designs on her in that way. I didn’t mean to suggest—”

  “We know that,” Nate interrupted, his tone softening. “I didn’t mean to suggest that either. I’m just saying that I want to be there. If she’s there, I should be there. There’s no such thing as too much protection.”

  Sandra wasn’t sure this was true and thought about letting Bob go off and leave the note by himself, but she didn’t want to miss anything. “Okay, so I ask again, what is the plan?”

  Bob took a deep breath. “I see that Ethel is here. Perfect. Right now, Daphne is home, and her vehicle is parked out front—”

  “Where does she live, exactly?” Nate asked.

  “At the end of a very long driveway on Osborne Hill Road.”

  “In the new housing development?”

  Sandra tried to shush him with her eyes. Did he really need an address at this point?

  “Is that near where Richard lives?”

  Bob narrowed his eyes. “They all live in the same house.”

  “Really?” Nate looked incredulous.

  Sandra couldn’t imagine why he cared so much.

  “It’s a really big house,” Bob said. “And I don’t know how long she’ll be there, so we should get going.” He stared at them expectantly.

  Sandra grabbed her purse and headed for the door. When she reached for the doorknob, she realized her husband hadn’t moved. Vaguely, she wondered if it was wrong how unenthusiastic she felt about his joining her unofficial detective agency. She looked back at him and tried not to sound snippy when she said, “Are you coming?”

  “How does this work, exactly?” he asked, still not moving his feet.

  How does what work, exactly? And when had her brilliant husband become so daft?

  No one answered him, so he clarified, “How do we get there?”

  Did he think they were going to fly? She held up the keys. “We take the minivan.”

  His feet began to move then, and his eyes dropped to watch them. “Oh, okay.”

  Chapter 33

  For several reasons, Sandra wasn’t thrilled when Bob instructed Nate to park behind an abandoned chicken barn a mile away from the Barney mansion. First, though the chicken barn had long ago bid adieu to its last chicken resident, it still smelled nightmarish, and she feared the stench would stick to her beloved minivan. Second, she wasn’t in the mood for a long walk through the woods with her husband. And third, it wasn’t soccer season and she was a bit out of shape, so she didn’t really want to take a long walk at all.

  Bob must have sensed some of this, as he promised to begin the journey with them. He led the way through the forest, and it wasn’t smooth going. This wasn’t a maintained path through a state park. This was a thicket. She had to be circumspect with just about every step, lest she roll an ankle, get her foot caught, trip, fall off a cliff, step on a hornets’ nest, kick a baby black bear, or some simultaneous combination of the aforementioned. And though she was focused mostly on her feet, her arms were doing some crazy version of the salsa dance as she tried to ward off swarms of rabid mosquitoes. The only comfort was that her darling husband seemed to be having just as much trouble: the more he slapped himself in the face, the harder she had to work not to laugh at him.

  Finally, Bob told them to pause. “We’re almost there,” he whispered. It wasn’t fair. He didn’t seem out of breath, and hadn’t been assaulted by a single mosquito. Did mosquitoes not eat angels? That didn’t seem fair. “Just past those trees,” he said, as if she could possibly know which trees he meant. All she could see was trees in all directions
, “there is a clearing. That is their land, but don’t worry, they can’t see you from the house. But we’ll cross the clearing, and there will be a hedge that lines their driveway. If you go past that hedge, the security cameras will be able to pick you up—”

  “They have security cameras?” Nate cried and slapped himself in the forehead like an exclamation point.

  Of course they have security cameras. They are rich.

  “Yes,” Bob said, “they don’t want anyone to steal their Cat Vacs.” Bob laughed at his own joke. He was the only one who did. “Anyway, so stay hidden behind the hedge. I’ll go ahead and leave the note. Then I’ll rejoin you.”

  “Then what?” Nate whispered.

  “Then we wait.” He headed away from them.

  Sandra put her head down and followed, and the grunt she heard to her right signaled that Nate had gotten underway again as well.

  They made good time, and when they hit the mowed clearing, the ground evened out, and they were able to speed up. Within a few minutes, they arrived at the coveted hedge, and Nate collapsed into the meager morning shade it offered. Sandra fought not to roll her eyes as she looked at Bob. “What do we do if someone comes?”

  Bob looked back at the woods from whence they’d come. “Run.” His face exploded into a lopsided grin she found both endearing and frustrating and then he vanished.

  “Where’d he go?” Nate’s head swiveled in a panic.

  She collapsed onto the ground beside him, and though she hadn’t felt particularly warm on their trek, the ground felt blessedly cool. “Get used to it. He likes to disappear on people, got a flair for the dramatic.”

  “He’s really not what I pictured,” he whispered.

  “Yeah, I gathered that. But don’t underestimate him. He’ll surprise you.”

  And then he was there beside her again, sitting in the dirt as if he’d been there all along.

  “That was quick,” Nate said.

  “I told you,” she said.

  Bob rolled over onto his belly and peered out through a hole between the bottoms of the bushes.

  “Can you see anything like that?” she asked.

  “Not really.” He sounded surprised and disappointed. He pushed himself back up to a seated position and started breaking branches so he could have a small peep hole between the bushes.

  “Can’t you just hover in the sky and watch?”

  She glared at her husband, not appreciating his critical tone, but he was oblivious to her silent scolding.

  “Of course I can, but I thought it would be nice to hang out with you guys.”

  Aww. She was touched. She spun around on her butt and started breaking branches to make her own peep hole.

  “Don’t shake the bushes too much,” Nate scolded, as if he were the expert. “They’ll see you!”

  “Brendan’s not home,” Bob said. “It’s just Daphne and the girls.”

  This news unsettled Sandra.

  “How do you know that?” Again with the criticism. Was Nate feeling threatened by the angel, and if so, wasn’t that a little silly? He was an angel.

  “I can hear them.”

  “You can hear that he’s not there?”

  Bob finally sounded annoyed with his critic. “No, but I would be able to hear him if he was.”

  “You could hear him just sitting there doing nothing?”

  Sandra tried to sew her husband’s lips shut with her mind.

  “No, but I would be able to hear him breathing. Right now I can hear your adrenal glands releasing adrenaline.”

  Nate looked down at his torso as if to verify his adrenal glands were doing this, but he didn’t seem to know where those glands were, so he looked at Sandra instead.

  “I told you,” she said through gritted teeth, “not to underestimate him. Superman hearing is just one of his many abilities.”

  Bob snorted. “Superman.”

  “Bob, do you know where Brendan is right now?”

  “No idea.”

  “What if he comes home while we’re sitting out here?”

  “He won’t be able to see us.”

  She wasn’t so sure.

  Nate finally succumbed to creating his own peep hole, and then soon they were all sitting perfectly still, peering through the hedge.

  “Are you sure the cameras can’t see our eyeballs?” Nate asked.

  “No,” Bob said.

  Thirty seconds went by.

  “Are you sure she’s going to come out of the house, today?” Nate asked.

  “No,” Bob said.

  Ten seconds went by.

  “What if she doesn’t?” Nate asked.

  “Nate!” Sandra said.

  “What?”

  “Be quiet!”

  He was quiet.

  They sat there for what felt like forever. Except for the random swat at a mosquito, it was a peaceful wait. The shade began to shrink as the sun rose in the sky and as the temperature rose, the mosquitoes headed for the cooler temperatures of the trees.

  The sun on Sandra’s back made her sleepy, and just when she was having trouble focusing, she saw, through her tiny field of vision, a little girl come around the edge of the mansion. She opened her mouth to let her partners know that there was a small Barney on the scene when the usually-masculine man beside her let out a shriek that rivaled any terrified cheerleader.

  Sandra’s first thought was that her husband was terrified of the small Barney, and she couldn’t imagine how this could be. She didn’t take her eyes off the little girl, who of course, had now turned and was staring directly at them.

  There was a scuffle as Bob scooted around her to deal with whatever ridiculous crisis had suddenly befell her husband.

  And then the little girl turned and sprinted for the front door, and Sandra turned to glare at her husband.

  “What the—”

  The sickly pallor of his face dialed her rage back from a ten to a nine. “What happened?” she asked through clenched teeth.

  Bob held a small snake up to show her and then tossed it behind them into the lawn.

  “Why’d you do that?” Nate asked, breathless. “Now it can just come back.”

  “We should go,” Bob said.

  “No!” Sandra didn’t want to leave, not after all this work.

  “I’m pretty sure our cover’s blown,” Bob said. “You guys should go.”

  “No!” Sandra said again. “She just went to get her mother. She’ll be here in seconds. If we leave now, she’ll be able to see us going across the lawn. We’re better off hiding here.”

  The front door opened, and Daphne and the B—Sandra was pretty sure it was Beatrice—stepped out onto the porch. The sight of Daphne made Sandra’s stomach turn. How could she possibly look that perfect so early in the morning, when she hadn’t even left the house yet? She wore a pale yellow sleeveless button-up blouse and olive capris, an outfit that made her look like a frail flower. Her perfect blond hair was coiled on top of her head in a poofy bun. Sandra wanted to go find that snake and slip it up her pant leg. But Daphne wasn’t completely perfect, because she was obviously disinterested in her daughter’s crisis.

  The small Barney pointed directly at them and said something Sandra couldn’t hear.

  “It’s okay. It’s probably just a bird.” Daphne’s mind was obviously elsewhere. Then her eyes drifted to her vehicle and she saw the note. Jackpot. “Beatrice, go inside.”

  “But, Mommy!”

  “Now!” Daphne pushed her inside and shut the door. Then Daphne stared directly at them with such intensity that Sandra was sure she could see them. Sandra held her breath. Slowly, Daphne came down off the porch and headed for her vehicle. As her feet crunched on the gravel, she looked around in every direction. She could probably feel their eyes on her, but she didn’t seem to know where that feeling was coming from.

  She snatched the note from under her wiper blade and unfolded it. Sandra could feel Bob smiling beside her. Daphne read it in an instant a
nd then her eyes whipped around her property again. Suddenly, Sandra was certain they were about to get caught. Daphne headed straight for them, and Sandra pulled her eyes away from the approaching psychopath to look at Bob for help. But he was no longer there. Argh! That angel!

  Sandra started to panic and was getting up to make a run for it. She knew she could outrun Daphne Barney. She wasn’t sure her husband could, though. Then she heard an approaching engine and she froze. This had just gotten so much worse. Brendan Barney was home. She looked at Nate. “Run!” she hissed and turned to go, but then from behind the house there was an explosion of shattering glass. The angel! She didn’t know if Bob had actually broken something or had just made the noise for a diversion, but it worked. Daphne turned and headed that way as her husband parked his truck.

  “What’s wrong?” Brendan called out.

  Sandra couldn’t see him, but the sound of his voice gave her the shivers.

  “I just heard breaking glass in the backyard.” Daphne sounded so terrified that Sandra actually felt guilty.

  “Glass? There isn’t any glass in the backyard.”

  “Yes, I know. Will you go check it out?”

  “What’s that?” Brendan asked.

  Daphne shoved their bluff note into the pocket of her wrinkle-free capris. “Nothing.”

  Brendan stepped closer to her and into Sandra’s sight. “Tell me what it is.”

  Daphne turned away from him. “I just wrote a to-do list to remind myself of everything I have to do today. Now, will you please go see if someone’s in the backyard?”

  Brendan headed that way, and after one more glance in Sandra’s direction, Daphne followed her husband. As soon as they rounded the corner of the building and went out of sight, Sandra turned to her husband and said, “Run!” again. And this time, they ran.

  Chapter 34

  “Did you really break something?” Sandra asked. She was out of breath, leaning against the chicken barn with her hands on her knees.