MA06 Little Myth Marker Read Online Free PDF

should keep this one.”
    My headache had now spread to my stomach.
    “Swell. Just swell. Well, at least...”
    “The one thing I couldn’t find out, though,” Guido continued with a frown, “is why he wants her with you. I figure that it’s either that he thinks that you’ll treat her right, or that he expects you to scare her out of bein’ a moll. I’m just not sure which way you should play it.”
    This was not turning out to be a good night for me. In fact, it had gone steadily downhill since I won that last hand of dragon poker.
    “Guido,” I said. “Please don’t say anything more. Okay? Please? Every time I think that things might not be so bad, you drag out something else that makes them worse.”
    “Just tryin’ to do my job,” he shrugged, obviously hurt, “but if that’s what you want ... well, you’re the Boss.”
    “And if you say that one more time, I’m liable to forget you’re bigger than me and pop you one in the nose. Understand? Being the ‘Boss’ implies a certain degree of control, and if there’s one thing I don’t have right now, it’s control.”
    “Right, B ... Skeeve,” my bodyguard grinned. “You know, for a minute there you sounded just like my old B ... employer. He used to beat up on Nunzio and me when he got mad. Of course, we had to stand there and take it...”
    “Don’t give me any ideas,” I snarled. “For now, let’s just concentrate on Bunny.”
    I turned my attention once more to the problem at hand, which was to say Bunny. She was still staring vacantly around the room, jaws working methodically on whatever it was she was chewing, and apparently oblivious to whatever it was Nunzio was trying to tell her.
    “Well, uh ... Bunny,” I said, “it looks like you’re going to be staying with us for a while.”
    She reacted to my words as if I had hit her “on” switch.
    “Eeoooh!” she squealed, as if I had just told her that she had won a beauty pageant. “Oh, I know I’m just goin’ to love workin’ under you, Skeevie.”
    My stomach did a slow roll to the left.
    “Shall I get her things, Boss?” Nunzio said. “She’s got about a mountain and a half of luggage outside.”
    “Oh, you can leave all that,” Bunny cooed. “I just know my Skeevie is going to want to buy me a whole new wardrobe.”
    “Hold it! Time out!” I ordered. “House rules time. Bunny, some things are going to disappear from your vocabulary right now. First, forget ‘Skeevie.’ It’s Skeeve ... just Skeeve, or if you must, the Great Skeeve in front of company. Not Skeevie.”
    “Gotcha,” she winked.
    “Next, you do not work under me. You’re ... you’re my personal secretary. Got it?”
    “Why sure, sugar. That’s what I’m always called.” Again with the wink.
    “Now then, Nunzio. I want you to get her luggage and move it into ... I don’t know, the pink bedroom.”
    “You want I should give him a hand, Boss?” Guido asked.
    “You stay put.” I smiled, baring all my teeth. “I’ve got a special job for you.”
    “Now just a darn minute!” Bunny interrupted, her cutie-pie accent noticeably lacking. “What’s this with the ‘pink bedroom’? Somehow you don’t strike me as the kind that sleeps in a pink bedroom. Aren’t I moving into your bedroom?”
    “I’m sleeping in my bedroom,” I said. “Now isn’t it easier for you to move into one of our spares than for me to relocate just so you can move into mine?”
    As I said, it had been a long night, and I was more than a little slow. Lucky for me, Bunny was fast enough for both of us.
    “I thought we was goin’ to be sharin’ a room, Mr. Skeeve. That’s the whole idea of my bein’ here, ya know? What’s wrong? Ya think I got bad breath or sumpin’?”
    “Aahh ... ummm...” I said intelligently.
    “Hi, Guido ... Nunzio. Who’s ... oh wow!”
    That last witty line didn’t come from me. Massha had just entered the room with Markie in tow and lurched to a halt at the sight of