it. He spoke to our visitor, who I couldn’t see from my vantage point, then looked at me with puzzlement. “This guy says where do we want them to put our new tent?”
The question tore me, because Jericho had started barking into his phone, which meant I could bend Bergman’s ear with my new plan. But not only was I beginning to feel sorry for whoever had invited SWAT guy’s anger, I badly wanted to know what he was saying. Luckily Cassandra and Bergman were shamelessly eavesdropping, so I shelved my brilliant idea and joined Cole at the door.
A short, round man wearing a white jumpsuit and a Stetson nodded at me. He spoke around a wad of chewing tobacco that threatened to leap out of his mouth with every other word.
“Good mornin’, little lady,” he said to me. “No need to trouble yourself with this mess. Your man here’s about to take care of it.”
Cole put his arm around me, an outwardly friendly gesture, but actually a warning.
“Name’s Tom Teller of Tom Teller Tents and Awnings.” Oops, a thin line of tobacco juice dribbled down his chin. He swiped it off with the cuff of his sleeve, leaned sideways, and spat. Problem was, he didn’t lean far enough. A huge, semisolid mass of material hit the zapper mat, which, being a Bergman prototype, turned out to be a tad more sensitive to liquids than originally intended.
After consulting a work order on the clipboard he held, Tom Teller told Cole, “We been hired by Chin Lang Acrobatics to clean up the mess from last night’s fire and erect a new performance tent with
Tom Teller lifted up on both toes, raised his hands in the air, and proceeded to do a remarkable imitation of the ballerina that had once danced in a circle every time I opened my jewelry box the year I was eight. Showing remarkable restraint in that he didn’t burst into laughter, Cole held out a hand while making sure not to touch our visitor. “Dude, are you okay?”
“What the hell was that?” Tom Teller demanded.
“I believe you’ve just been shocked by electric ants,” I told him, jabbing Cole with an elbow when I thought I heard a giggle.
“Are you kidding me? That felt like a damn ’lectric
“Well, they tell me everything’s bigger in Texas,” I replied, giving him Lucille’s sweetest, fakest smile.
He wiped a bead of sweat off his brow. “I guess I’ve heard that myself. Uh, I just wanted to know if you’d like the new tent in the same place as the old one. Some people got superstitchuns. They don’t want new stuff in the same
Again with the zappy dance. “Wow,” I said. “No doubt about it, we’re going to have to call an exterminator.” I looked up into a sky so blue it seemed to confirm every story I’d ever heard about heaven.
Behind me SWAT man blew up. “What the hell do you mean the case is closed? The case has barely started! A woman was assaulted last night! Some lizard face tried to kill a cop!” A moment’s pause. “I don’t give a crap what the governor—” I recognized the sound that followed because I had, in fact, made it myself a couple of times. It was the crack of a cell phone exploding against the wall.
Once again, Lucille Robinson came to the rescue. She smiled graciously at Tom Teller and said, “You know, that spot really worked well traffic-wise, so I think we’ll just keep it. Do you know when the work will be finished?”
He pranced from foot to fried foot, bobbing his head back and forth in an effort to see our furious guest. Cole pressed his mouth to my ear and whispered, “He looks like a constipated turkey.”
My smile went into rictus mode as Tom Teller spat another wad of chew onto the faulty mat.
“We should have it all done by five,” he told Cole.
“Did you hear that, boss?” he asked me brightly. “The tent will be up by five!”
I just wanted the idiot off the mat and to hell with my wounded pride. “Wonderful. Thank you so much.” I slammed the door in his face, and Cole and I helped each other back to the empty couch, where we traded stunned stares with Cassandra. On the one hand we wanted to laugh until we cried. On the other, we wondered just who Jericho meant to annihilate first.
Bergman had rescued the parts of his phone and taken them to the covered table, where he was trying to put them back together again. Jericho badly wanted to tear out the door and cave in somebody’s face, but he kept looking at Cassandra and she kept shaking her head. Uh-huh. No fractured skulls this morning, SWAT man.
“Cole,” I asked, “have we got any pop in the fridge?”
“Yeah, I just bought a case of orange soda yesterday.”
“Perfect.” I stood up. “Jericho, come with me.”
Twenty minutes later Cole returned the sledge to the ring-the-bell-if-you’re-man-enough-game guy, I put the last crushed can in the trash, and Jericho dropped into the chair beside Cassandra, looking nearly as calm as he had when he’d walked through our door. Only Bergman had stayed inside to work and watch the monitors.
Cole came back with fried ice cream for everyone, which we inhaled along with the orange-scented air.
Jericho wagged his finger at me. “That was genius. Where did you come up with the idea?”
“I had to be nice to a sick baby and two sleep-deprived, panicky new parents for three weeks. It was either this”—I waved at the trampled, soda-soaked grass beneath our feet—“or a killing spree through an upscale Indianapolis neighborhood.”
