MA06 Little Myth Marker Read Online Free PDF Page B

Bunny.
    “Hey, Boss! What’s with the kid?”
    “Guido, Nunzio, this is Markie ... our other house guest. Massha, Markie, this is Bunny. She’s going to be staying with us for a while ... in the pink bedroom.”
    “Now I get it!” Bunny exclaimed. “You want we should play it cool because of the kid! Well, you can count on me. Discretion is Bunny’s middle name. The pink bedroom it is!”
    I could cheerfully have throttled her. If her meaning was lost on Markie, it certainly hadn’t gotten past Massha, who was staring out at me from under raised eyebrows.
    “Whatever!” I said, rather than take more drastic action. “Now, Nunzio, you get Bunny set up in the pink bedroom. Massha, I want you to get Markie settled in the blue bedroom next to mine ... and knock it off with the eyebrows. I’ll explain everything in the morning.”
    ‘That I want to hear,” she snorted. “C’mon, kid.”
    “I’m not tired!” Markie protested.
    “Tough!” I countered. “I am.”
    “Oh,” she said meekly and followed Massha.
    Whatever kind of a crumb her father might be, somewhere along the line she had learned when adults could be argued with and when it was best to go with the flow.
    “What do you want me to do, Boss?” Guido asked eagerly.
    I favored him with my evilest grin.
    “Remember that special assignment I said I had for you?”
    “Yea, Boss?”
    “I’ll warn you, it’s dangerous.”
    That appealed to his professional pride, and he puffed out his chest. “The tougher the better. You know me!”
    “Fine,” I said. “All you have to do is go upstairs and explain Bunny to Aahz. It seems my partner isn’t talking to me just now.”
    * * *

LUANNA WAS WITH me. I couldn’t remember when she arrived or how long she had been here, but I didn’t care. I hadn’t seen her since we got back from the jailbreak on Limbo, and I had missed her terribly. She had left me to stay with her partner, Matt, and a little piece of me went with her. I won’t be so cornball as to say it was my heart, but it was in that general vicinity.
    There was so much I wanted to tell her ... wanted to ask her, but it didn’t really seem necessary. We just lay side by side on a grassy hill watching the clouds, enjoying each other’s company in silence. I could have stayed like that forever, but she raised herself on one elbow and spoke softly to me.
    “If you’ll just skootch over a little, Skeevie, we can both get comfy.”
    This was somehow jarring to my serenity. She didn’t sound like Luanna at all. Luanna’s voice was musical and exciting. She sounded like ...
    “BUNNY!”
    I was suddenly sitting bolt upright, not on a grassy knoll, but in my own bed.
    “Ssshh! You’ll wake up the kid!”
    She was perched on the edge of my bed wearing something filmy that was even more revealing than the skin-tight outfit she had had on last night.
    “What are you doing in my room!?”
    I had distinct memories of stacking several pieces of furniture in front of the door before I retired, and a quick glance confirmed that they were still in place.
    “Through the secret passageway,” she said with one of her winks. “Nunzio showed it to me last night.”
    “Oh, he did, did he?” I snarled. “Remind me to express my thanks to him for that little service.”
    “Save your thanks, sugar. You’re goin’ to need them when I get done with you.”
    With that she raised the covers and slid in next to me. I slid out the other side of the bed as if a spider had just joined me. Not that I’m afraid of spiders, mind you, but Bunny scares me stiff.
    “Now what’s wrong?” she whined.

    “Um ... ah ... look, Bunny. Can we talk for a minute?”
    “Sure,” she said, sitting up in bed and bending forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “Anything you say.”
    Unfortunately, her current position also gave me an unrestricted view of her cleavage. I promptly forgot what I was going to say.
    “Aaah ... I ... um...”
    There was a knock at the