We kept laughing.
“You know,” Nicole said, looking back to her father, “I came back, figuring I would make dinner for you, but you know what? You can just forget it now! Order a damn pizza or something!”
Nicole stomped up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door, leaving us staring at the stairs, our mouths open in awe.
“You gonna tell her we already ordered one?” I asked.
“Oh, hell no,” he replied. “I might cry when I eat it, just to make a point.”
“What point?” I asked.
“Not really sure,” he replied, “but it will probably make her feel vindicated.”
Shakespeare probably would have mentioned at this point that “the commons here in Kent are up in arms.” Somehow, I thought Sheriff Skye would have preferred a horde of angry villagers to the wrath of his daughter.
Now, would she also notice how quickly the pizza got delivered?
CHAPTER 14
OWN GOAL
“So then she comes out of the kitchen,” Sheriff Skye was saying through his chuckles, “and she has the gigantic hunk of Swiss cheese in her hands. I mean, it’s about as big as her head—and there are these little teeth marks all over it and a trail of cheese bits all over the floor…”
I laughed again, trying to keep from choking on my last bite of pizza. I took a big swig of Coke to wash it down and ended up with bubbles in my nose. The sheriff thought that was particularly funny, and we both started laughing hard again.
Nicole walked in the kitchen and glared at both of us, then glared at the almost empty box of pizza, and followed up with a good nasty look at the empty beer and Coke cans, stacked in an elaborate pyramid on the kitchen table. Without a word, she walked over to the refrigerator and started pulling things out. There was a green lumpy-looking thing and a yellowish-orange thing that might have been a fruit of some kind. She got busy chopping things up on a cutting board and basically ignoring the two of us.
“Hey, Rumple,” I said softly, hoping maybe a little Malone charm just might do the trick. I was rewarded with the daggers of hell out of her eyes instead. I tried smiling, but she wasn’t buying it. She slammed her hand down on the counter instead.
“Don’t call me that!”
“What are you so mad about?”
“What, the sneaking out for cigarettes and lying for each other isn’t good enough?”
“Well…it could be worse,” I offered.
“You better shut your mouth, son,” Sheriff Skye said under his breath, “or she’s going to remove something important to you.”
“You’re right,” Nicole said softly as she nodded to me. She smiled sweetly, and I glanced at the sheriff and gave him a little wink. It didn’t make me feel too secure, though, when he shook his head slowly and planted his face in the palm of his hand.
“Well, considering the budding ‘bromance’ you two seem to have going on,” Nicole sneered, “I guess I’m lucky I didn’t walk in on anything else!”
Sheriff Skye spit beer onto the pizza box, grabbed for it, and knocked the entire can pyramid onto the floor. Nicole turned on her heel and started gathering up whatever the hell she was making. Sheriff Skye looked at me and raised his eyebrows before nonchalantly taking another bite of pizza and another swig of beer. I had to bite down on my lip to keep from laughing again. I glanced over at my Rumple-kitten, but she obviously wasn’t going to look at us. I went back to my pizza, but things were pretty quiet except for the noise from a couple of cans that were still rolling around. Nicole finished making herself some elaborate salad or salsa or something like that, warmed up what looked to be fresh bread, put it all on a plate, and huffed at us on the way out of the kitchen.
We busted out laughing as soon as she was out of earshot.
“I have never heard that word before,” Sheriff Skye said, “but I don’t think I approve.”
I snickered.
“I should probably go talk to her or something, shouldn’t I?”
“At your own risk,” he replied. “Though I think it’s really me she’s pissed at.”
I took a deep breath to prepare myself, got up from the table, and made my way upstairs. Her door was closed, so I did a little more deep breathing preparation before I knocked.
“What?”