“Good,” Mustang said.“Once you locate these items, what next?”
“I find the delivery truck of liquor and go steal it,” she said.“Next, I take the food for the party from the catering service or even burn them out to kill their business for servicing such a sick bitch.Then I go after her property and money and finally her life.”
Mustang didn't know what to say behind any of that.Helen finished her meal, rose to clean the kitchen, and returned to the table with her 9mm and weapon cleaning kit.He watched her break down the weapon in less than ten seconds, thinking of how she had timed him, Apple, and Ricky when she was faster than them all.His man brain shuddered as he began to put the pieces together.
Woman clean gun = Woman fired gun.
The calm was leaving him by the second as he watched her.He could smell the carbon and said, “You fired the weapon today.”
She looked up at him as if he'd said the dumbest shit in the world.She pointed at her lip and lowered her head to continue working.
He needed to bring Helen back to the table.“Honey,” he said softly, “I spoke with Apple about the father-son weekend.”
Helen looked up, the darkness in her eyes dissipating.She was watching his lips as he spoke.
“Apple is going to bring Oscar here,” he said, “And I was thinking that since we need the electrical work done on your office, Apple could stay and work on that while Oscar and I head out for the weekend.I mean, it wouldn't make any sense for him to drive back the five hours and then have to come back and get him, or we’d have to take him to Wisconsin.Would you be okay with Apple being here working on your office that weekend?”
She blinked.“Is that your way of making sure I'm not here alone while you're gone for the weekend?”
“Maybe.If it is, will it get me snuggles and cuddles?”
“Snuggles and cuddles?”
“Yeah, I can't ask for kisses since some ass muncher hit you in that sexy mouth,” he said.“I'm glad you put a bullet in him so I don't have to go track him down and do the same.”
It was then that she smiled.She smiled wide with a lopsided, fat lip grin.“I was trying to do the stupid math to take him down using the methods that Passion Fruit taught me because he was twice my size.He back handed me so hard, it lifted me off my feet.After that, I shot his ass then punched him in his ugly nose,” Helen said.“I think I broke it.”
“He's alive?”
“Jay, I'm not going to take a life for hitting me in the mouth,” she said, scowling.“I should have shot off his junk that was hanging out of his pants on the ready.Asshole.”
His eyebrows raised.“Are you good?”
“The comedown is hard,” she said.
“What do you need?”
“Just what you did.I love you so much that it scares me sometimes that you see me and get me,” Helen said.“Thanks for allowing the air to breathe before doing or saying anything.You helped me sort through the thoughts in my head and organize the chaos.Jay, I love you.”
“I love you as well,” he said, getting the squishy feeling in his gut.
She smiled at him again.The fat lip hurt, but the swelling was not as pronounced as earlier.“So, how was your day?”
He laughed and began to tell her about the new crop of students.James, his coworker who liked to fish, was surprised when Mustang had signed up for the father son weekend, not knowing that Jay enjoyed camping or had a son, which he didn't correct.Helen picked up on it as well.She said nothing, thinking of the unfurnished second bedroom which would be needed as room for the boy, but she wasn't giving up her craft room for anyone.
****
THE WOMAN’S CRAFTINESSneeded to be admired.Donovan arrived in Chicago at the Velvet Bunny Room, surprised to see so many cars in the parking lot in the middle of the day.Curiosity propelled him to enter the club and pay the fifty-dollar cover charge at the door.An all you can eat buffet was set up for men during the lunch hour.He found it distasteful that in one hand a beer bellied bastard held a hot wing and in the other, sat rubbing his junk as a young Hispanic woman shook body parts at him from the stage.
A tracker he’d placed on The Cranberry’s car led him here.He couldn't fathom why the woman would be at this club or a place like this, and in the parking lot, he didn't see the black Ford Explorer.He spotted a similar vehicle, but it didn't have Michigan plates.When he ran the plates on her vehicle, they came back to an unknown Alphabet Agency.
Initially, he didn’t think he'd located the right woman.He most definitely didn't think his cover story would work to get him in the door of the other woman's house, let alone into her bed, but it did.Oddly enough, The Cranberry didn't trust him, although she took care of his frostbite and him, in his time of cold weather injury needs.However, he was puzzled.
He'd been hired to track and find the woman, which he did.It had taken months, and he just happened to have dated a crazy woman who was getting all up in his shit, which made the perfect cover story.When the Chrysalis presented the pattern of what the woman was doing, spending time in each bowl with the Fruits of the Great Lakes, he logically deduced she would either head to Michigan or Minnesota next.Michigan dead ended, and he tracked the money of the Sour Grapes to end up on her front door.
Looking at The Cranberry, he thought he'd gotten it wrong.That little, unassuming woman couldn't be a Technician; she didn't even seem like she had the hutzpah to pull a trigger.He was so wrong about her on many levels.
His phone beeped, indicating the tracker was on the move.He would give it at least fifteen minutes of lead time before making a point to follow it to the next stop, but he was also disappointed in himself.He'd messed up.
