Luckily, Suzie doesn’t require responses in a conversation. “Taylor told me that you were in his bed, which is wonderful! That’s how you get ahead in this business, Samantha. You were always such a prude.”
My jaw unhinged and fell to the duvet. Sam stirred next to me, but I couldn’t move. Horror had melted my bones into one another. Maybe I’d turned to a pillar of salt.
Suzie sighed. “But then to get your period—really. You lack self-control! You march down here to set right now and arrange a new tryst with him. Although Diego says that we obviously need to show you how it’s done.”
My jaw crawled to the edge of the bed, fell to the floor, and bolted toward the door. I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it. I was hallucinating. Yeah. I’m still dreaming, that’s the ticket!
“Samantha!” she screamed loud enough for me to hear even though the phone was a safe distance away. “At least send him a naked picture! We call it ‘sexting’. You can always Photoshop out the flab.”
Sam grabbed the phone and ended the call. He wiped the crust out of his eyes. “I don’t know what the hell she was talking about, but it needed to stop.” He ran a sweet hand down my arm. “Samantha?” He sat up.
The phone rang again.
“What the hell was that about? Do you have to be at work now?” His pretty green gaze clouded with worry.
I ran a finger along his stubbly jaw and made a conscious decision not to remember what that adorable stubble felt like on my inner thighs. It almost worked. “No, I’m not called today. Mom, um…”
He settled in with a grin on his face. “This is good, isn’t it?”
“Good? I think I’m scarred forever!”
His smile got wider.
“Fine.” I hid my face in my hands. “My mother just criticized me for not wife-swapping with Taylor, and for having such poor uterus control that I got my period at the wrong time.”
His jaw joined mine in the other room, where they pretended we didn’t exist.
“Then—”
“There’s a then?” His voice shot into the next octave.
“Then she said that she and Diego would volunteer to replace us, because that’s how you get ahead in the film business.”
He made a gagging-choking noise that sounded like Taco with a hairball. I patted him on the shoulder. “We have to get the evidence against Taylor to the police right away, before he can bone my mother. Oh, God, I just said that out loud. I need to bleach my tongue.”
“So will your mom.”
I whimpered.
He began to laugh, but thought the better of it. Wisely. “Put your head between your knees so you don’t throw up.”
I did so. He returned my comfort-patting, then retrieved his own phone from the nightstand. After a few minutes, I heard a breathy, “Shit.”
“Now what?”
He swiped a hand across his face and opened his eyes wider. “Last night, I sent one of the files from the hard drive to a buddy who breaks into encrypted stuff. For a nominal fee, of course.” He read more of the email and made a ‘wow’ whistling noise. “It was plans for a stealth drone.”
I bolted nearly into the air. “Like a government drone?”
“Yes.” His phone sank to the duvet.
We gaped at one another.
“So…he’s a…what? Arms dealer? Spy?”
“Something not good.”
And just like that, Taylor went from buffoonish, smelly beard promoter who was dangerous to international espionage whackadoo, which is three levels up on the Evil Scale. And he was the kind of person who would discuss an aborted foursome with your mother! That bastard!
“We need to get this info to someone important,” I told Sam.
“The Feds?”
“I said important! Screw those FBI assholes who keep coming in our house and threatening us.”
He grimaced. “Mostly me.”
“Mostly you. We’re going to bring this to Nicolette, super cop extraordinaire. She was the one originally working your case.”
The dimple emerged for the first time today. “I like it. Fuck J. Edgar.”
“No, thank you.” I made the move to get up, but a big, strong man arm swept across my waist to haul me back down.
Mmmmmm. I settled into him, butt to crotch, as I still had that good old morning breath, and I wanted to create some sort of allure besides being on my period. How the man still had morning wood after the discussion we’d shared was a mystery, but perhaps my matted and greasy hair held more sexual charisma than previously thought.
“I just want a cuddle,” he said.
“Second date cuddle?”
“We’re still on the first date.”
I sank into his body. My mind sank into the pillow. And I burst into tears, because that’s how I do. I blame my hormones, and Taylor, and definitely my mother, and Samnesia, and the fact that there was no bacon in the room.
Sam stroked my hair, saying, “It’s going to be okay”—the magic words that hold no actual facts, but that are necessary for all of us to hear in order to continue living our self-deluded existences on earth, the spinning universe accident upon which we flail.
They were the perfect words.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my tears splatting on his hand.
He wiped them on my shirt like a gentleman. “It’s okay. I’m getting used to it. We’ve solved the mystery, though, Scooby! Our hipster nightmare is almost over.”
Mostly, I’d been crying over him, though. My thief nightmare was the ongoing one.
“Let me go clean up.” I removed his limbs—I had finally killed his boner, um…yippee?—and retreated to the bathroom, wherein I attempted to make pretty with some water and some water. Good thing nobody in New York paid attention to anyone else, for I looked like a lady who’d slept in her clothes and possessed no hairbrush. After careful use of my ponytail holder, I had a messy side bun that a salon would probably charge me three hundred dollars for.
“You want room service breakfast?” Sam called.
I opened the door. “Nah, let’s just get to Ellen’s place. I want this over. We’ll grab a coffee on the way and beg her to feed us.”
I texted her the feeding-us plan, which she objected to, and told her to have Nicolette meet us at her place, which she was pleased about, because the word ‘Nicolette’ was the most beautiful word in the universe to my head-over-heels BFF, and I was so happy for her. And jealous. But happy.
A deep “Oh, shit” came from behind me.
I pulled my purse onto my body and turned to learn what fresh hell this was.
Sam held up the flash drive.
“I—I thought you’d put it back.”
“I meant to.” His eyebrows crowded together. “I must have just slipped it in my pocket and gotten distracted by them coming home.”
I bit my lip. “Think he’ll discover that it’s missing?”
He didn’t reply, but the expression on his face was not hopeful. It was the opposite of hope. It was vegan cheese.
We left a tip for the maids and slunk out the back, for slinkery and sneakery are what you do with Sam. The kitchen led into the alley, and the frigid morning air awoke me from my morning fog. The streets were packed with a cacophony of frustrated commuters, their grumbles and honks echoing my general mood.
We secured coffees then kept walking and walking, unable to commandeer a cab. Three, five, eight blocks while my angry belly growled. “Soon, my pet,” I whispered to her with a nice pat.
Sam gave me an eye-roll and tried again to hail a cab. This time, a yellow blur stopped next to us, hooray! But a Wall Street type attacked us with a briefcase despite Sam’s scary-looking face. We were knocked clean away while the asshole took our ride, my coffee flying out of my hands. I hurtled curses as they drove away, smug in the knowledge that that guy’s dick would surely fall off because I wished it.
“Hey, lady, are you Samantha Lytton?”
I looked down to see an adorab
le little girl in head-to-toe pink. She even had pigtails. Aw. Ew, her hands appeared to be dirty. I took a step back and said, “Yes, hi. Why do you ask, young miss? Do you want an autograph?”
“No.” She began to pick her nose. My fandom, ladies and gentlemen.
Sam cracked up so hard he bumped into the hotdog seller. Why hotdogs at eight a.m.? Wait, they actually smelled kinda good.
The imp continued speaking, “Those guys over there asked me to ask you, lady. They paid me ten bucks!”
My adorable fan pointed to two bony hipsters standing just inside an alley.
“Wh-where are your parents? You shouldn’t be talking to youths!” I made a move to hug her, but then I remembered that she was covered in boogers. I leaned down. “Can I pay you twenty to tell them it’s not me?” I asked.
I did not get the chance, as Sam had grabbed my arm and started running. Ugh, children—they’re noisy and messy and give you up to the hoodlums chasing you.
“Always negotiate for a better offer!” I yelled back to her as we sprinted toward the subway. “Don’t let men take advantage of you! And take a bath every day!”
Chapter Twelve
The Flying Lytton
Down the stinking subway stairs we ran, Sam nearly wiping out across one. I caught him, landed hard on my butt, and pushed him upright again. We didn’t look behind, but kept going. Sam jumped the turnstyle in true criminal fashion, but I had my MTA card on me, so I paid like a responsible adult.
“Oh, quit with your face, Miss Upstanding,” he grumbled.
We flew through the next set of stairs, him muttering about ‘Samantha faces’. Disgruntled office workers bounced off either side of us. I kept my head down, and my shades pressed to my face. Everything seemed dark for some reason.
The echoing roar of the train filled the crowded platform, and we kept running to the end. Finally, headlights flashed on the left track. We ducked behind a pillar, holding our breath that the train would arrive before our greasy pursuers did. Crouched low, I poked my head around, but didn’t see our child-corrupting buddies. I almost said something like ‘We lost them,’ but sentiments like that never, ever work out.
“I think we lost them,” Sam said.
Great. We pushed onto the train, a dude in a suit nearly elbowing me in the jaw to get my spot. One murderous glare from Sam, who now resembled a horror movie with all his bruises, made the dude actually back up and off the train. Heh heh. Sam grabbed my arm again and hauled us to the end of the car to huddle against the wall so we could observe the populace. Well, he could see them. Shorty me spied backpacks and a neck tattoo of Sailor Moon that I thought ill-advised.
But no evil hipsters!
In the dark tunnel, my sunglasses nearly blinded me, but still I did not take them off. One, they prevented eye poking by the lady next to me who was swaying to Katy Perry and flapping her arms. Two, I was hiding, duh.
The train’s connector door beside us opened, and the tunnel’s clatter roared into a fury. Sam and I turned as one to see who’d come through, and, because Sam had cursed us by saying the stupid thing, it was our dudes. Our fate wasn’t foreshadowed so much as forestupided. One pasty jerk wore a black turtleneck, a Mexican headband, and a crocheted poncho done in shades of lavender. The other, a bow tie atop a cardigan, his bird-like, bare chest heaving in the cold. I guess nobody had made him a gross poncho with matted tassels hanging off it. Now I knew what to get him for Asshole Day.
While I savored mean thoughts about our pursuers, Sam shielded me with his body, and we bunched as far into the corner as possible. Thankfully, an enormous dude in a bright red tracksuit entered our vacated space, and the glow from his eye-searing fashion must have blinded the hipsters, for they kept searching the train car. Sam’s voice blew humidly against my ear, “When the train stops, we’re going into the next car.”
“Through the door over the tracks? It’s dangerous. I’ll fall through!”
He scoffed all over my face. “Your magnificent boobs will save you. Nah—your butt will stop you first. Your mother is dangerous—this is a walk in the park.”
I couldn’t argue with that. The train slowed, and the lights of the next station flickered like an old movie through the grimy windows. A pleasant automated voice announced the station, and I held my breath and Sam’s hand. It’s times like these when being short really freaking blows. My vision glommed with shoulders, backs and bags, and most of them were sailing toward my eyeballs.
The doors opened. Sam dragged me opposite the tide of people and opened the door between the trains. At least it wasn’t moving, and we traversed the small gap between the cars to open the next door. Once we were in the new car, a wall of people again pushed us everywhere at once. I looked back into our old car and came face to window to window to face with poncho dude!
“Shit!” It was my turn to drag Sam along, but the crowd between us and the exit loomed massive, and the pleasant voice said the doors were closing. I put my head down, unleashed an unholy roar that originated from somewhere south of my bowels, and head-butted the entirety of New York City.
The doors began their closure. I yelled at them, as if they could hear me. Sam gave me a mighty push, and I flew through the gap that seemed two inches wide, but was perhaps larger since my ass fit through it. Sam landed atop me, and I smacked onto the filthy station floor. Face first. My mouth. Was on the floor. Of the subway.
I shrieked and spit and waved behind me to make Sam get off. That’s when someone took a picture.
“Smile, Samantha!” she said, rather belatedly, I thought. I dutifully turned and grinned. Hey—photos on the ground with no makeup and slept-in clothes always look better with a smile.
Making my grin even wider—the platform was hipster-free! Well, not completely, but our particular specimens were not in attendance. Sam pulled me to my feet.
“Wow, you really wanted to get off that subway,” said the picture-taker. “Stars—they’re just like us!”
I took pictures with the couple of people who wanted them—likely for a feature in Under-Eye Bags of the Rich and Famous. We then sprinted up and into the daylight. From there, we grabbed a cab—we let the first one go to another passenger, for our paranoia was now extreme. What, did Taylor have a fleet of youths in poor fashion at his command? Where did he recruit, the Cultural Appropriation Festival? Relief washed through me as we got in the taxi and sped to safety. Thank goodness these Taylor wannabes didn’t seem to be very professional at their jobs.
Well, except for the ones who’d smashed Sam in the noggin.
We made it to Ellen’s building with no additional problems, and I massively overpaid the cabbie as a reward for not kidnapping us. Everyone should learn to appreciate the little things.
“You brought him?” said Ellen at her open door.
“I asked her not to.” Sam breezed through with a grin, which Ellen begrudgingly returned.
Ellen followed us inside and led us into the living room, where Nicolette awaited us on the sofa. She sat poised in a sharp-cut gray blazer, ready to spring into Super Cop Action! Her colors complemented their place, which was done in gray, blacks and whites in the art deco style that Ellen loved.
Ellen said, “You look even handsomer than usual, Sam.”
The dimple struggled to be seen in the sea of bruises. “It’s all for you, E.”
Ellen plopped next to her lady love. “Okay, what do you want?”
“It’s what Nicolette wants.” Sam smirked and whipped out the flash drive. “I found this inside a painting in Taylor Monroe’s house. It contains encrypted files of blueprints for a new government stealth drone.”
Our cop’s eyes nearly popped from her head. “You’re not joking?”
We shook our heads in unison. Take that, synchronized FBI agents.
She sat back and crossed her legs, her face settling into a peculiar look. “And you took it from his home. I mean, you stole it, so there’s no chain of evidence, no proof it was there.”
/> “It might have fingerprints?” I said.
“You want me to go and run the prints on that thing at my police precinct?”
“Nope,” Sam said. He flicked a glance at me. “I’m in witness protection, but they still don’t want me anywhere near an NYPD computer.” He slid into a chair across from Nicolette. “I know you can’t use this now. Sorry. We got surprised in the middle of the…mission.”
“If he knows it’s gone, the rest of his house will be cleaned out. Probably already. Do you think he knows?”
I clapped my hand over my mouth. “He sent someone after us this morning.”
Nicolette shook her head and whipped out her cell phone. She walked into another room, dissatisfaction thudding in her every step.
“Good job, thief,” Ellen said. Upon receiving my glare, she continued, “How about breakfast?”
Smart gal. You can insult my thief, but you’d better have a pancake chaser.
I followed her into the kitchen, a happy room of butter yellow that already smelled like coffee and bacon. I know the love of bacon is cliché at this point, but that’s kinda like saying that love of sex is cliché. There are just some truths in life that shouldn’t be questioned.
I delivered coffee to Sam, who’d stayed in the living room in an obvious gesture to give me solo Ellen time. I gave him a kiss for it, and he returned it with a tired smile.
I mixed pancake batter for Ellen while she minded the bacon and cut up some fruit. “How’s the book coming?” I asked.
She growled, like a lion with writer’s block. “It’s not. It’s just crap. Crap. But at least I’m only adding a couple of hundred words of the crap a day. Oh, God, my publisher is gonna drop me.” Her head thunked to the countertop.
“Nooooo!” I ran around the island to hug her from behind. Ellen wrote amazing YA paranormal adventures, and had an enormous following—fan blogs, the works. “I bet your hundred words a day is better than most people’s thousands! I know you can do it—you’re brilliant and talented. Maybe you just need a break. Take up scrapbooking or something.”
Her head lifted up. “Can I scrapbook porn?”
The Wrath of Dimple Page 17