Read Online Unforced Error by Michael Bowen - Free Book Online Page A

her shoulders and Melissa could guess with considerable confidence that his dinner had involved pepperoni.
    â€œLet me out right
now
,” Melissa said in a quietly fierce voice. She swung her right fist toward his chops, but she had a bad angle and no leverage in the cramped quarters. She landed a pathetic love-tap instead of an eye-opener.
    â€œYEOOWWW!” Quinlan nevertheless yelped, to Melissa’s vast surprise. He leaped back, smacking his head on the upswung door in the process.
    â€œI think you should take that as a no, dearie,” a richly rolling female voice said.
    â€œHey, CT, fun’s fun but that really hurt!”
    â€œIf it didn’t hurt, then Big Dee’s Tack and Veterinary Supply Company gypped me out of thirty-nine-ninety-five plus shipping and handling.”
    CT?
Melissa thought.
Trouble with the English subjunctive? Could it be?
    Melissa climbed out. She saw Quinlan rubbing his bottom with one hand while he cradled his pot with the other. Confronting him was a stocky woman with frosted blond hair. Dressed in full English hunting pinks and knee-high black leather stirrup boots and swishing a wicked-looking riding crop, she carried fifty-plus years with stolid confidence.
    â€œChelsea Tuttle, if I’m not mistaken,” Melissa said. “I’m Melissa Pennyworth. Thanks.”
    â€œ
Du rien, ma soeur
. I just came from a reading at the Kansas City Hunt Club which Mr. Quinlan didn’t bother to attend, and I found that little flick quite cathartic.”
    â€œYou never can tell when a riding crop will come in handy.”
    â€œJust so. When I bought the thing I was afraid it might be a little too-too. The only other prop that works with hunting pinks is a cigarette holder, though, and smoking is such a
dreary
cliché for writers my age. Joan Didion ruined it for all of us.”
    â€œLook, CT,” Quinlan said, “I’m sorry about the reading, but you do one of the goddamn things about every three weeks and something came up.”
    â€œKeep your eyes and ears open and your mouth shut before you get in more trouble than you already are,” Tuttle advised Quinlan sternly. She emphasized the point by poking him in the chest with the crop’s tip. “We have to talk. That is to say, I have to talk and you have to listen.”
    â€œTalk about what?” Quinlan asked.
    â€œYou know bloody well what, you callow rotter. And if you don’t I just left a note in your office that should clue you in. I’ll see you at noon tomorrow, and if you have any brains at all you’ll have the champagne chilled.”
    â€œTime out,” Quinlan said. “I have a command performance around midnight, and I don’t know how long it’s going to go. I may not be out of bed by noon. If your problem is that important, let’s go up and talk right now.”
    Melissa’s pulse jumped at that comment, but she needn’t have worried.
    â€œNoon tomorrow, dear heart,” Tuttle said. “I’ll be devoting the rest of the night to an in-depth study of marine biology. T-T-F-N.”
    She executed an about-face and strolled regally down the driveway, into the darkness. Melissa stole away as well, dispensing with formalities, for as she turned toward the back door she saw Rep coming around the corner of the house. Melissa hustled over to him, fussily lifting her skirt to keep from tripping over its hem and feeling as she did so that she must look like Aunt Polly from
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
    â€œWhat’s up?” she asked. “Where are Peter and Linda?”
    â€œWell, Linda is apparently in the ladies’ room upstairs, and Peter by now is presumably waiting impatiently outside of it. He tracked me down and told me she’d been in there for an uncomfortably long time. He feels silly asking, but he’d like you to go in and make sure she’s all right.”
    Uh-oh
, Melissa thought. She chanced a