Page 4 of Blow Down (The Plumber's Mate)
Flippin’ marvellous. “Uh, it’s easier if I’m on my own. Might take a bit longer with you here.” Well, she had said she had an appointment.
She smiled wide enough to show a bit of fang. “Then you’d probably better get started, hadn’t you?”
Great. “Well, could you go over by the door, at least?” I did not want her literally looking over my shoulder the whole bloody time.
She sent me a cool stare, then glided over to where I’d asked her to, somehow managing to make the sway of her hips look sarcastic.
Or, you know, maybe I was just a bit on the oversensitive side right then.
Once she had her back against the wall, I gave myself a brief shake, then listened.
I mean, not with my ears. For the, you know. Vibes.
Then I blinked. Whoa. Little Poppet-darling was one seriously secretive young lady. The room was buzzing with bright vibes, all tangled up like a plate of spaghetti. Forking any one particular meatball out of that lot wasn’t exactly going to be a picnic. There was a bitter taste to it all too, while we’re on the food metaphors. Or similes, maybe. Whatever. Whether it was all directed at the evil stepmother, I wasn’t sure, but there was definitely something—
Then the door swung open to hit the wall with a crash, I jumped halfway to the ceiling, and a loud female voice shouted in my shell-like, “What the hell are you doing in my room?”
I turned and gave Little Poppet-darling a weak smile while my heartbeat calmed down to nonlethal levels. At least I hadn’t been standing where Mrs. F-M. was. Another six inches closer to the door and she’d just have been a nasty stain on the wall by now.
“Plumber?” I said, my voice cracking just a little bit. “Thought you might have a leak in your pipes.”
She was a big lass—like her stepmum, she was about my height, but unlike Mrs. F-M., she had a healthy amount of padding on her bones. Same taste for tight, tailored clothes, but what came across as cool and professional on Mrs. F-M. looked downright racy on Poppet-darling, maybe because like the frocks on the bed, her blouse and skirt were definitely on the vivid side of the colour palette. Subtle clearly wasn’t a word she had any truck with if she could help it, and pastels were for pushovers. She looked like the sort of girl who liked a drink and a laugh, and would be up for a kebab or a bag of chips at the end of the night.
We’d probably have got on all right if we’d met under different circs, but right now her mouth was still narked at me and one of her eyebrows was telling me plainly it thought I was mental. “What pipes?”
“Well, you know these old places. Never find the plumbing where you expect to, do you?” God knows why I was covering up for Mrs. F-M., ’specially since she’d yet to say word one in our collective defence. Guilty conscience, probably, for going down the path of least resistance and not telling her to do her own sneaking around. “Tom Paretski, by the way. You must be, uh . . .”
“Vi. Vi Majors.” I noticed she didn’t bother with the double-barrelled bit. “And this is my room.”
She swung her gaze around the room, probably to check for what I might’ve nicked, and noticed her stepmum for the first time. “You.”
Mrs. F-M. peeled herself off the wall and stepped forward fearlessly. “Tom was just giving me a hand here.”
“Oh, I’m sure he was, and you can keep it out of my bloody bedroom. Your latest bit of rough, is he? Does Daddy know he’s here?”
“Oi, I’m not—” I spluttered, just as Mrs. F-M. snapped out an outraged, “Don’t be absurd,” in a tone that was less than flattering to yours truly. “Tom’s here to help me find something. You know how so many of my things have been going missing lately, don’t you?” There was a definite implication that Vi also knew why and where to.
“You know what?” I said, edging around Vi’s ample figure. “I’m just gonna let myself out. Let you and your stepmum catch up and all that.”
Mrs. F-M.’s lip curled. “Oh, dear Violet and I have said all we have to say to one another, I think.” She turned and stepped delicately out of the room, leaving me on my tod with an irate Vi.
Cheers, love.
“I can’t believe that cow. I could bloody kill her.” Vi turned to me. “Tell her I haven’t got her bloody earring or whatever it is she’s lost this time, and when she finds it, she can take it and shove it right up her—”
I made it out of the room, thank God, and shut the door behind me quick. Yep, definitely not much love lost in this happy little family. Course, these two were only related by marriage, so the whole blood-is-thicker-than-water thing didn’t really apply.
Then again, blood’s not the only thing that makes people family. And I’m speaking from a position of personal experience here.
Mrs. F-M. was waiting for me at the far end of the landing, head on one side and an eager look in her eyes. She didn’t seem fazed in the slightest by the hatred coming at her from Vi’s direction. Maybe that was why her skin was so pale and clear: she had antifreeze instead of blood running through her veins. “Well? Did you find it?”
“Didn’t exactly have a right lot of time in there, did I?”
“But did you get anything? Any sense of it at all?” She click-clacked closer.
“Weeellllll . . .” Shit. I really wasn’t comfortable with this. ’Specially after Vi had made her feelings on the matter so bloody clear. “Sorry. It was all a bit vague.”
“But there was something?”
