Murder Me for Nickels Read Online Free PDF Page A

got her down on the couch. And she couldn’t get her hands back in front because I was too close.
    “Don’t get mad,” I said. “Because if you wriggle too much—”
    She held still.
    “Gimme a kiss.”
    She moved her head to one side and I got her ear.
    “No!”
    I moved my hands away from her back so she would lie more comfortably. “—no.”
    With that “no” I felt much less uncertain and I leaned up on my elbows and smiled down at her.
    “Patty, if you’ll let me have that dress, like I said, I’ll be able to do….”
    “I know what you want to do.”
    “You sensed that, Patty. You just sensed that without my having to tell you a thing.”
    “Don’t! Don’t move away, I’m all bare in front!”
    “I sensed that.”
    I stayed close to her because why move and because she was holding me that way. Then we didn’t talk for a while, but when I gave her a chance she said:
    “I told you, Jack. You’re supposed to be there.”
    “I’ll be late.”
    “They’re going to wonder. And Walter, he’s going to wonder!”
    “I’ll explain to him. I’ll explain why.”
    “Don’t you dare!”
    “Hold still.”
    “Don’t you dare!”
    “You think I’m crazy?”
    “Yes!”
    “I wouldn’t spoil that for you. Walter Lippit’s all right.”
    “Don’t tell me about Walter!”
    “You don’t think he’s all right?”
    “Of course he’s all right!” she said. “I like Walter.”
    “Don’t yell in my ear.”
    “Better than you, I like him.”
    “That’s only because you have never given yourself, and, of course, me, the most elementary chance which both you and I….”
    “I don’t mean that, Jack St. Louis. Let me up. No!—I was talking about how he helps me.”
    “Your career. Ah yes. Your career.”
    “You know I’m a good singer.”
    “You’re much better, given half a chance, in more elemental….”
    “Stop using those words!”
    “You’re much better, I meant, in….”
    “I know what you mean.”
    “And all good singers are fat.”
    “That’s not true. I don’t have to be fat.”
    “Not at all. This was my point.”
    “Walter doesn’t talk that way about me.”
    “He helps your career.”
    “Seriously.”
    “So could I, Patty. Seriously.”
    She didn’t answer right away. I could tell by her face that I had made the mistake of getting her onto the one cold and serious subject of her life. She lay still.
    “You’re kidding me,” she said.
    “Ever hear of Blue Beat Records?”
    I could tell she had. It wasn’t a big label, but a nice, little thing for the aficionados.
    “You mean you could get me on that label?”
    “I could get you a trial, maybe.”
    Which had been the wrong answer. If I had said yes, she would have thought I was handing a line. When instead I had said the other, she pricked up her ears, because she had caught something serious. Which is what I mean when I say that I had made a mistake.
    “Listen, Jack. I want to talk to you.” She rewound her arms on my neck and looked up at my face.
    “I don’t want to talk to you, Patty, honest,” and I tried to get back to the lost subject.
    She didn’t say “no” this time. She didn’t say anything for a while, and I didn’t, and it felt as if we were done talking. My collar felt tight and out of place and she must have felt the same way when it came to that dress with the busted zipper because she stretched and twisted up closer and to hell with the front of that dress.
    Then it struck me what a mercenary minx she was.
    “Patty.”
    “Huh?”
    “I got nothing to do with the record business.”
    “Uh.”
    “I said, I got no ins with the record business.”
    “I don’t believe you.”
    “I mean it.”
    “Your stud button is digging into me.”
    “I, uh, I’m sorry.”
    “Take it off.”
    It was hard to take it off and it was harder to talk any more and I hardly cared any more what kind of a minx she was. I heard her kick off first one shoe, then the other.
    “Listen,