Heart Song Anthology by Carolyn Faulkner (e reader pdf best TXT) 📕

from Neil, but something warned her that all was not right, and the smile on her face faded quickly.

“Oh, my God!” she cried. “Is everything okay? You’re so late; we were beginning to get worried. My God, Neil! You look terrible. Did anything happen on the trip up here? An accident or something?”

Janet pointed in Neil’s direction and rolled her eyes. “Ask Old Man Moses, there. He was the one poking along at ten miles an hour, afraid of his own shadow. God! And they talk about women drivers!” When she asked where the bathroom was and disappeared down the hall, I sank onto the couch and watched Neil dragging in the luggage, most of which was Janet’s. My sexy little black nightgown was crammed in my overnight bag, along with the three changes of clothes I’d assumed would be plenty for two nights.

“Dump Janet’s stuff in the room at the end of the hall,” Sandy said to Neil. “I put you guys upstairs, at the back. It’s the quietest room in the house, and the most private.” She gave him a playful poke in the ribs. “After that much time in the car with Janet, you’re going to need it, right?” From the look Neil gave me as he stalked by, I suspected I was going to appreciate all that privacy. It wasn’t just the wind that was howling outside. There was a storm brewing on my horizon, as well.

“Where are the guys?” I asked, when Neil was upstairs.

“They’re outside, prowling for wood. I hate to drop bad news so soon after you check in, but we’re having a little problem.”

I groaned. “How little?”

“The furnace went out this morning, so we may all freeze to death. And if this storm sticks around, we’ll be drawing straws to see who gets eaten first,” she said cheerfully.

“I say we start with Janet,” I growled.

“Yeah,” Sandy commiserated. “I got the feeling you guys had a bad trip.”

“Were we both blind when we thought this up?” I asked miserably. “Not to see how awful she really is?”

Sandy shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe Charlie will be dazzled by her new chest. Doris Walters says she paid a fortune for it. Do you think real boobs even come that big? What’s wrong with Neil? He looks like he wants to strangle someone. Janet?”

“I’ll be first, then Janet, actually. And you’re probably third in line. Watch your step. He always carries a nine-millimeter Beretta in the glove compartment. Cops aren’t allowed to go anywhere without it.”

I was explaining about Neil’s sidearm when the door flew open and Joe and Charlie stumbled in, shedding snow everywhere. “We’re going to need that gun,” Joe quipped. “When the frozen pizza runs out. Did Sandy give you the good news about the furnace?”

Neil came down the stairs, still scowling. “You can’t actually hunt with a pistol. Lousy accuracy at long range. Maybe your thermostat’s screwed up,” he said, looking directly at me. “Women don’t know how to deal with thermostats.”

“I never laid a finger on the damned thermostat,” I snapped.

“Nah,” Joe said quickly, obviously trying to smooth the troubled waters. “There’s something wrong with the oil line. Dominic’s out back now, working on it. He’s the furnace guy, from town.” Joe glanced out the window. “Looks like he could be staying with us, for tonight, anyway.”

“Oh, goody,” I said sweetly. “Maybe Dominic would like to bunk with me. I simply adore furnace guys. Just ask my husband.”

Neil opened his mouth to say something, but just then, Janet came down the hallway, wearing a pure white spandex ski outfit with white fur trim that fit like her own skin, only tighter. With her newly augmented chest preceding the rest of her by a good eight or nine inches, she reminded me of a huge, white ferry boat, bearing down on a cluster of helpless rowboats.

“Which way to the slopes?” she exclaimed. “Am I the cutest snow bunny you’ve ever seen, or what?”

I would have chosen the “or what,” but before anyone could come up with a snappy retort, Charlie emitted a little sound like a deflating air mattress. He’d been standing quietly through all the merriment, but when Janet arrived on the scene, his jaw dropped and his eyes kind of bulged out, like Elmo, one of our kids’ pop-eyed goldfish. When I looked over at Janet, I realized that she had stopped in her tracks, with her mouth wide open and her face turning sort of purplish.

A moment later, she began screeching. “Where the hell did you come from?” she screamed. “You goddamned, fucking pervert!”

It wasn’t the kind of question that required an answer, and in any case, she didn’t give Charlie a chance to reply, before she started snatching things and hurling them at him. Sandy and Joe had purchased the cabin fully furnished, and unfortunately for Charlie, there were a lot of breakable, colonial knickknacks within reach. The first early-American missile, a diminutive china bust of George Washington, struck Joe in the shoulder, and then crashed into the fireplace, but Janet got luckier with her second shot, and a hefty coffee table book about Switzerland found its intended mark. Charlie grabbed his forehead, groaned once, and went down like a half-ton of bricks. Always the cop, Neil leaped forward, got Janet around the waist, and wrestled her to the floor, while the rest of us just stood there and stared. Sandy dropped to her knees next to poor Charlie and checked for a pulse, the way she’d seen them do on Scrubs and E.R.

“He’s okay, I think,” she breathed. “But jeez, what a lump he’s going to have!”

Neil had Janet face-down on the braided rug now, with his knee on the small of her back, but she was still flailing her arms and snarling obscene insults, a lot of them having to do with the size of Charlie’s penis. When Neil finally threatened to handcuff her if she didn’t shut up and calm down, Janet’s tantrum began to wane,