Mrs. Singi smiled shyly. “Yes, please do. I work there too. Well, good-bye.”
“She’s a beautiful woman,” I said the minute the door closed behind Mrs. Singi.
“Funny you should say that, Mary.”
“Why?”
“The Hindu word for beautiful woman is Kamini.”
“Oh?”
As we began to leave the hallway behind and head for the living room, I dropped my humongous purse on a narrow wood table meant to hold small items like keys, wallets, and such. The table didn’t cave in, so I figured it was okay to leave my purse there from now on. “Auntie, how did you happen to meet, Kamini? On the elevator?”
“Doing laundry.”
“Ah, yes. That’s a good place to meet neighbors.” Especially those of the opposite sex.
My roommate veered towards the couch and I headed for the La-Z-Boy. The mutt wasn’t quite sure where she wanted to be. She stood in the middle of the room shaking her head. Not knowing how long she’d continue to do that before her head fell off, I called her over to me.
“Would you like your neck massaged, girl?”
She barked a soft, “Wuff, wuff,” and then she licked my hands.
“Isn’t that cute, Mary? She sure seems to understand us, doesn’t she?”
I stifled a long overdue yawn. “Yup.”
“So, what’s on the agenda for the rest of the day?”
“No plans. You’re on your own. All I want to do is decompress. Teaching a rowdy bunch of second graders is a piece of cake compared to this morning’s stressful activities.”
Chapter 11
It was only 7:00 a.m., but the sun was already working magic on my behalf, spreading its warm rays across my face, telling me it was time to get up. Darn. I had forgotten to overlap the two curtain panels before I went to bed. I opened my eyes and then shut them again. No sun was telling me what to do. Besides, I hadn’t gotten my much needed eight hours of beauty sleep yet.
A word of warning to those who liked to outsmart the sun—closed eyes alone don’t keep the pesky sun at bay. I sat up and reached for the mauve-colored bed sheet I’d tossed off during the night and quickly pulled it over my head. Unfortunately, being undercover didn’t help either. My body was rapidly heating up, and it didn’t have anything to do with a man sharing my bed. I threw the sheet off and grabbed the pillow. I know. I must be pretty stupid to think the pillow’s a good decision, right? But, hey, when your mind’s not running on all four cylinders, you do what you think makes sense at the time. For me, that was depriving my brain of oxygen, so I’d succumb to sleep.
In case you’re wondering, my lack of sleep had nothing whatsoever to do with too much caffeine racing through this size 16 body at full throttle before bedtime. My brain was simply being overtaxed with concerns regarding a new steering wheel. You see, since I didn’t have insight into the future, like so-called psychics, as soon as I received my pink slip, I sat down, analyzed every possible car-related scenario imaginable, and then I contacted my insurance agent and opted for a much higher deductible car insurance policy.
Obviously, the joke was on me. My so-called thrifty decision had one major flaw. It didn’t add a horse to the mix.
Gracie had slept on the floor below the bedroom window, and now she pressed her head on the mattress near my head and began to whine.
“Oh, for cry’n out loud, not you too,” I mumbled as I flung a hand towards her. “It’s bad enough the sun thinks I should be up.”
The mutt was no dummy. She knew who was in control. She whined again and then nuzzled my hand with her nose.
“All right. All right. I’m getting up, but you’re going to have to wait for breakfast.” I whipped the pillow off my face and slowly drew my sleepy body up.”
When I reached a decent sitting position, a loud, shrill, beeping noise emanated from outside my room. Gracie went wild. She tried to burrow under the bed. “What the . . . ?” Fully awake now, I jumped out of bed and bolted to the door. A fire alarm was sounding from somewhere in the building. All I could think of was poor Aunt Zoe asleep on the couch. I needed to get her out of the apartment pronto, no matter what I was wearing. This was no time for a style show. I swung my door open and made a mad dash down the hall.
“Aunt Zoe! Aunt Zoe! Wake up!” I frantically yelled as I continued on towards the living room. “There’s a fire! There’s a fire somewhere in the building.”
Just as I got to the kitchen doorway, Aunt Zoe stuck her head out. I almost had a heart attack on the spot. Foam rollers the size of orange juice cans were holding her fiery red hair for ransom while a butter knife and tea towel kept her hands occupied. “What is it, Mary? What’s wrong?”
“A fire alarm went off. Didn’t you here it?”
My roommate brandished her black-specked knife in front of me. “Oh, that. It’s nothing to worry about. Go back to bed.”
“What do you mean nothing to worry about?” Before I could say anything further, the six-foot muscular-framed guy who lived to the left of Matt’s apartment, FBI agent Rod Thompson, made his way into our narrow hallway too. Dressed in a fine navy-blue suit, a solid powder-blue tie and shiny black wingtip shoes, he looked like he was part of an early morning wedding. Of course, I knew that wasn’t true. The man with the tousled blonde hair dressed like this every day when he was on duty. It was mandatory.
The minute Rod’s sapphire-blue eyes soaked in the view, me, he let loose with a whistle so earth shattering it could’ve caused a teakettle to explode. “Oo, la la. I love your ensemble, Mary. It beats the heck out of what you were wearing the last time I saw you.”
Oh, my God! My hands flew to my cotton bikini-cut Jockey underpants.
Aunt Zoe, bless her soul, sensed my embarrassment and was kind enough to pass me the towel she was holding. I tried to drape it around my bountiful hips without much success.
I was hoping Rod would leave once he saw how uncomfortable I was, but he didn’t. Obviously, he didn’t care how I felt. “You remind me of a water goddess,” he announced while wagging his index finger at me.
A low grunt escaped my lips, and then I shifted my attention to my roommate. “What’s going on here?”
Aunt Zoe didn’t answer. She simply motioned for us to enter the kitchen.
Rod didn’t take her up on her suggestion, thank goodness. “Gotta go. No time for coffee,” he shared. “Oh, Mary, make sure to wear that outfit again real soon,” and then he winked at me.
I threw the towel at him, but I missed my mark. It landed on Gracie’s head instead. She had followed Rod to the door.
With Rod gone, my aunt was forced to explain what happened. “I burnt the toast. I’m just not used to these new-fangled contraptions, Mary. My old toaster had just two narrow slots for bread, and I never had to touch the setting. Now, they’ve got a hole for bagels, one for waffles, one for toast and even one to warm up leftover pancakes. It drives me crazy. I tried fanning the smoke with the dishtowel, but all it did was set off the alarm. I didn’t realize it was so touchy.”
“How did you finally get the alarm to stop?”
“Why, that nice man, Rod, took care of the problem. Apparently, he knows some trick to silence it.”
I just bet he does. I cringed as I recalled how Rod’s eagle eyes traveled up and down my scantily-clad body and the stupid comments he’d made. What TV show did he glean those words from? No wonder he wasn’t married yet.
“What’s that frown for, Mary? You’re not upset with me, are you?”
“No, no,” I lied, and then I gave my roommate a hug. “It was just burnt toast after all.”
“Huh? That’s exactly what that young fellow said. Well, now that you’re up, do you want to join me for breakfast?”
Breakfast? Who was she talking to? I sure as heck wasn’t up to settling in for my ear
ly morning routine at the kitchen table when the air quality was hovering towards obnoxious. Think sauerkraut. For me, burnt toast ranked number one. I couldn’t possibly eat until something drastic was done to clear the air. Luckily, I knew relief, a canister of air freshener, was just down the hall. I immediately dashed to the bathroom, grabbed the lilac spray and returned to the kitchen where I swirled around the room like a twister, diffusing the flowery scent as fast as I could. Then I took a whiff. Ah, much better.
Unfortunately, what’s good for one person wasn’t necessarily good for the other party. Aunt Zoe was now gasping for air.
Since she hadn’t been chomping on anything before I spritzed the air, I knew I was to blame. Well, not me personally—the freshener. I dropped the can on the counter and quickly approached my aunt who was still stationed at the table. I began to fan the air surrounding her. Previous hand action similar to this had provided good results. After roughly twenty vigorous swipes, I let my hands fall to their natural position. “There that should do it.”
“If you say so,” my roommate barely squeaked.
“Hmm?” Obviously, it was going to take more than mere air movement to get her voice back to normal. I moved behind her now and gently rubbed the top of her back. It was cloaked in a chartreuse floor-length cotton bathrobe. “You’ll be fine in a minute, I promise. I just overestimated the power of my hand on the nozzle.”
“That’s very reassuring,” she answered in a voice that had made it past a whisper.
The mutt had finally found her way to the kitchen and began begging for my attention again. I stopped rubbing my aunt’s back and moved to the cupboard under the sink where we stored Gracie’s box of Milkbones. “Here’s your breakfast,” I said as I dropped a few treats on the floor, “Now, let me get mine.” The dog happily snapped up her snacks before she sauntered over to the fridge and plopped down. Lucky for me, Aunt Zoe had left the carton of milk on the table, so no one would have to force Gracie to move anytime soon. She could be quite obstinate when she wanted to be.
With both the dog and my aunt nicely taken care of, I rummaged through the cupboards looking for a coffee mug and cereal bowl. It was amazing how long your mind retains the location of kitchen items stored in a previous household, but you can’t remember where you placed something in your new home just the night before.
Finding what I was searching for, finally, I quickly filled my coffee cup to the brim and plopped down with it and a bowl of Fruit Loops cereal. Since I wasn’t on any special diet today, I didn’t care what went in my body—tomorrow would be a different story.
“Mary, how come you never told me you had been involved with the man next door? Is that why you rushed to move in here?”
“What?” The spoonful of milk and cereal that had just entered my mouth spewed across the table. “We weren’t. We won’t,” I said as I began to mop up my mess with a napkin. “And, no, I won’t explain.” Aunt Zoe didn’t need to know about the evening I spent downtown barhopping with a bunch of gals. It wasn’t like we went out to get drunk on purpose. Because we didn’t. We were just helping a fellow teacher celebrate her upcoming nuptials. Of course, brother, Matt, got wind of the details prior to the big night and suggested that his baby sister crash at his apartment instead of driving home on snow-clogged streets, bombed out of her mind at two in the morning. So, I acquiesced to his request.
When I’d gotten to Matt’s after the party, I was feeling extremely happy and never bothered with the flannel nightie I’d brought. Instead, I donned an extra-large Twins T-shirt I discovered in the bathroom hamper. Little did I know my brother would forget about my stay and invite over his nemesis, Rod, for an early morning discussion about a dumb apartment issue. Matt told me later I was hanging half off the couch, snoring away with no blanket covering my butt.
Aunt Zoe cut into my thoughts now. “You can’t fool me, Mary,” she said pointing one of her chunky fingers at me. “I saw that little spark between the two of you. Why, you’d be perfect for each other.”
The words “No, thanks,” burnt my lips as they slid out. “There’s plenty of other fish in my pond to fry.” Yeah, right, Mary. In your dreams.
Chapter 12
Even though breakfast was over, there was no plan for a hasty retreat to clothe my half-naked body. Clearing my mind of stress had top priority. Besides, I knew there was no danger of Rod Thompson making another surprise appearance. He had left the premises and possibly the state I hoped.
I strolled out of the kitchen and made my way to the entrance closet, our catchall, where stuff went that had no other home. It caught a lot, including the Holy Grail—the Yellow Pages. That thick book could relieve any human being’s stress. It held the names of every business imaginable.
Several boxes had to be removed from the closet floor before I found the tattered Yellow Pages book. It had become one with the carpet. Surprisingly, it didn’t put up a fuss when I plucked it from its cushiony bed and hastily carted it back to the kitchen to page through it.
After spending an hour speaking with a half-dozen body shops, I discovered Paul’s Body Shop in Cambridge was my best bet for the type of repair Fiona required. Money or no money, I had to bite the bullet. Although, Dad’s been known to take pity on his baby girl. I suppose I could shed a tear or two in front of him when the job’s finished. With the repair scheduled, I moved on to the selection of a towing company.
The convenient maps at the front of the phone book helped me surmise how far Fiona would have to travel from point A to point B, sixty-some miles. “Whoa!” Mike had warned me towing distance makes a huge difference in price, and sometimes the unsuspecting underdog is gouged even more than necessary. One hundred dollar bills flashed before my eyes.
It wasn’t like Cambridge or Princeton were connected to Woodbury’s boundaries like our Twin Cities—Minneapolis and St. Paul. Woodbury was east of St. Paul, and Cambridge and Princeton were north of the Minneapolis suburbs.
When it came to towing businesses, Carmichael’s appealed to me the most. Yes, I’ll admit their corny ad, We’ve always got your front and rear covered, day or night, could easily be misinterpreted, but I went with it anyway. As far as I was concerned, any business that thought outside the box during these tough economic times, including using a risqué sounding ad to get the job done, earns kudos for ingenuity in my book.
It took ten rings before someone actually picked up. “Judd here. What can I do for you?” an owlish male voice asked. I quickly explained my dilemma to the worker bee on the other end. “Sure. We can tow it for you. There’ll be an additional cost, of course.”
I almost snapped, Isn’t there always hidden costs? but thought better of it. I needed the job done pronto. “Of course.” Now that the last piece of the puzzle was at hand, my stomach started to do somersaults. Well, the money had to fall from my piggy bank not theirs. But you want Fiona back, don’t you? Yes.
I got up from the La-Z-Boy and began to pace back and forth on the ugly, moss-and-brown carpet. Indentations were left where my feet had been. I thought the movement would reverse my racing palpitations and headache that started in the moment I hung up the phone, but it didn’t. I inhaled deeply and then slowly puffed the air back out. You gotta calm down. You can’t afford a coronary, Mary, with everything else.
“What on earth are you doing?” Aunt Zoe inquired. “Is that some new dance your generation has created?”
I stood completely still. “Sorry. Was I disturbing you?”
My roommate suddenly dropped her hard copy of a Danielle Steele novel she was reading on her lap. “Not really. Your prancing around just caught my eye. What kind of step was that anyway?” She rambled on now without waiting for a reply. “I’ve always said dancing’s good for the body and the mind. Your Uncle Edward and I went dancing once a week no matter what country we found ourselves in.”
“Really?”
/> Dad’s sister bent her head slightly. “Um hmm. I bet you go dancing a lot too, Mary. Remember when you were real little and you’d dance like crazy whenever a cute tune came on?”
I flapped my hand at her. “That was before I reached puberty. Junior high teenagers are a different breed. They can be so cruel. When we took dance lessons in gym class, they made sure the whole world knew I had two left feet.”
My aunt laughed. “What did they know? Sounds like the little rascals were just jealous.”
“No, they were right. My dancing stinks.”
“You’re too hard on yourself. Why, the Malone clan’s limberness is a well recorded fact in Ireland.”
Facts in a book don’t make it so, I thought. Not wanting to insult my dad’s sister, I just said, “My klutzy ways probably come from my mom’s side of the family. You know the French. They’re too busy smooching everyone.”
Aunt Zoe scooted off the couch. “Well, I can teach you, Mary. There’s nothing to it. It just takes practice. Plus, dancing offers other great benefits.”
“Such as?”
“Meeting the opposite sex.”
“I . . . I don’t know.”
“Oh, it’ll be fun. Tell you what. I’ll check out what’s going on around town, and then you and I will go some night. Okay?”
I scratched my head. “I’m not making any promises.” Dancing. Yuk! I’d rather curl up in a fetal position in bed than don dance shoes for some dumb Don Juan.
The topic of dancing was dropped, and I was grateful, but then my aunt moved on to another wonderful topic. “So, have you found out where you can have the Volkswagen towed to yet?”
I glanced at my feet. “It seems the consensus is Cambridge.”
“Cambridge? Why, that’s quite a distance from here.”
Death at the Bar X Ranch Page 9