The Guy on the Right (The Underdogs 1)

The screen door slaps behind her before she finally erupts with laughter.

“If you put ketchup on these, I’m going back to rough the woods.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she calls from where she stands at the stove, “these taste much better dipped in honey mustard.”

“You are one strange bird.”

“What an amazin’ choice of words.”

“You are testing me,” I growl, which earns me a smile. “So, what is the slingshot really for? Surely not for protection.”

“I know it’s not much, but it’s my only option. I used to carry a taser. But I had to get rid of it.”

“Had to?”

She pauses, before pulling some tin foil out of a drawer. “Due to a little trauma. I don’t trust myself with one, and those around me are safer for it.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Too quick to deny, you’re guilty.”

“Nothing serious,” she wrinkles her nose, “well serious in the sense of serious. But not before it happened. It got serious, if you know what I mean.”

“Nope, not at all.”

“You’re just going to laugh at me.”

“Probably, and it’s deserved, so come out with it.”

She puts both hands on her hips and blows out a breath.

“I accidentally tasered a cop.”

“Nooo,” I say through a chuckle. “Not you.”

She grins. “Shut up. I was getting out my license and registration, and I wanted to show I had a weapon, you know, for full disclosure and all.”

“Uh huh.”

“Well, I must not have watched enough episodes of Cops because you’re not supposed to show, you’re supposed to tell. And well, I was so nervous, instead of giving him proof of insurance, I gave him a shitload of volts.”

“Jesus, Laney.”

“When he came to, he was not happy. Thank God, he was an old friend of Gran’s. I could have done some serious time for assault. I think I got away with it because he was too embarrassed to admit it happened. Whoops.”

“Only you would call a felony a whoops.”

“Trust me, I did not think it was funny at the time,” she says scrolling through her phone. “You aren’t going to believe this, but snipe huntin’ already has six hundred likes.”

“I thought we only had seven hundred followers.”

“You mean me.”

“Fine, you.”

“Triple that now.”