“Of course it was your fault,” Morelli said. “It's always your fault.”
I did an eye roll.
“Bob misses you.”
“Bob should call me sometime. Leave a message on my machine.”
Morelli slouched back on the bench. “What were you doing in Soder's bar?”
“I wanted to talk to him about Evelyn and Annie, but he wasn't in a good mood.”
“Did his mood take a downturn before or after he got clocked with the shoulder bag?”
“He was actually more mellow after Lula hit him.”
“Dazed, was the word Butch used.”
“Dazed could be accurate. We didn't stay around long enough to find out.”
&nbs
p; Bob returned from the squirrel chase and woofed at Morelli.
“Bob's restless,” Morelli said. “I promised him we'd walk around the lake. Which direction are you headed?”
It was one mile if I retraced my steps and three miles if I continued around the lake with Morelli. Morelli looked very fine with his pants rolled up, and I was sorely tempted. Unfortunately, I had a blister on my heel, I still had a cramp in my side, and I suspected I wasn't at my most attractive. “I'm headed for the lot,” I said.
There was an awkward moment where I waited for Morelli to prolong our time together. I would have liked him to walk back to the car with me. Truth is, I missed Morelli. I missed the passion, and I missed the affectionate teasing. He never tugged at my hair anymore. He didn't try to look down my shirt or up my skirt. We were at an impasse, and I was at a loss as to how to end it.
“Try to be careful,” Morelli said. We stared at each other for a moment, and we each went our own way.
Stephanie Plum 8 - Hard Eight
7
I LIMPED BACK to the concession stand and got a Coke and a box of Cracker Jacks. Cracker jacks don't count as junk food because they're corn and peanuts, which we know to be high in nutrition. And they have a prize inside.
I walked the short distance to the water's edge, opened the box of Cracker jacks, and a goose rushed up to me and pecked me in the knee. I jumped back, but he kept coming at me, honking and pecking. I threw a Cracker Jack as far as I could, and the goose scrambled after it. Big mistake. Turns out, tossing a Cracker Jack is the goose equivalent to a party invitation. Suddenly geese were rushing at me from every corner of the park, running on their stupid goose webbed feet, waggling their fat goose asses, flapping their big goose wings, their beady, black goose eyes fixed on my Cracker Jacks. They fought among themselves as they charged me, squawking, honking, viciously snapping, jockeying for position.
“Run for your life, honey! Give them the Cracker Jacks,” an old lady yelled from a nearby bench. “Throw them the box, or those honkers'll eat you alive!”
I held tight to my box. “I didn't get to the prize. The prize is still in the box.”
“Forget the prize!”
There were geese flying in from across the lake. Hell, for all I knew they could have been flying in from Canada. One of them hit me square in the chest and sent me sprawling. I let out a shriek and lost my grip on the box. The geese attacked with no regard for human or goose life. The noise was deafening. Goose wings beat against me, and goose toenails ripped holes in my T-shirt.
It seemed like the feeding frenzy lasted for hours, but in fact it was maybe a minute. The geese departed as quickly as they came, and all that was left were goose feathers and goose poop. Huge, gelatinous gobs of goose poop . . . as far as the eye could see.
An old man was on the bench with the old woman. “You don't know much, do you?” he said to me.
I picked myself up, crept to my car, opened the door with the remote, and numbly wedged myself behind the wheel. So much for exercise. I drove on autopilot out of the lot and somehow found my way to Hamilton Avenue. I was a couple blocks from my apartment building when I sensed movement on the seat next to me. I turned my head to look, and a spider the size of a dinner plate jumped at me.
“Eeeeyow! Holy shit! HOLY SHIT!” I sideswiped a parked car, took the curb, and came to a stop on a patch of lawn. I threw my door open and hurled myself out of the car. I was still jumping around, shaking my hair out, when the first cops arrived.
“Let me get this straight,” one of the cops said. “You almost totaled the Toyota that's parked at the curb, not to mention major damage on your CR-V, because you were attacked by a spider?”
“Not just a spider. We're talking more than one. And big. Possibly mutant spiders. A herd of mutant spiders.”