Murder on the Mainline: another Mike Claymore Mystery Chapter 17

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
4TH FRIDAY

Mike is up and around early with the kids when they get up. He lets Marlene sleep while he gets the kids fed some breakfast. They go off to school and he is enjoying a fresh cup of coffee when she comes down in her robe.

She comes to him and kisses him then holds his head between her breasts as she says, “Thank you, my love. I see they are all fed and gone to school. Jan to play. Your the best husband a woman could ever ask for. Want to come back to bed?”

“I’d love to but I’m going over to the shop and see how badly my horse is wounded. You know with us lawmen the horse always comes first.” He looks serious.

“I think we better start horsing around and see who comes first.” She suggests this with a gleam in her eye.

“You could sit down here in my lap and take care of anything that might come up.” He opens his robe and crooks his finger at her.

“Let me get a cup of coffee, first.” She gets her coffee, brings it around to his elbow then lifts the back of her robe and sits down in his lap. She wiggles a bit and settles down. She sips on her coffee and says, “Mmmmm, I love my coffee like this in the morning. Don’t you?”

“Delicious, my lovely one.” He moves his hips slowly as he sips his coffee.

“What do you want to do today after you check on the car?” She rocks back and forth a bit.

“I thought I might just hang around here and work on the lawn and flower beds. I could start on one of those insurance cases, but I think I’ll leave that for tomorrow. It’ll be easier to catch people at home on the weekend.”

“You’ll be working both Saturday and Sunday?”

“Probably. Did you have something you wanted me to do?”

“Just stay here with me.”

“Right here?”

“Yeah, right in this spot like this.” She has started to move a little faster.

“If we are going to make it last all weekend, you better slow down.” He chuckles in her ear as he nibbles at it.

She stops and says, “Did you hear something. I think Jan is at the door. Am I covered?”

“Don’t worry. You just look like your sitting in my lap having a cup of coffee. I didn’t hear anything…”

“Hi guys, it just me. Mind if I join you for coffee?” Nina comes up the steps and passes by them to pour a cup of coffee. She brings it back to the table and sits down across from them. “Jeff went down to the office and I had to come over. What happened last night, Mike? You had an accident?”

“Uh, yeah. Some idiot in a van cut me off. Before I knew what was happening I drove into the ditch. Banged up the fender and bumper. I don’t know how much damage underneath yet. I was just going to check on it when Marlene sat down here in my lap and captured me for coffee.” He bounces Marlene up and down in his lap for emphasis. She grins and tries to drink her coffee. Mike takes a swallow of his.

“I was so worried when Marlene told me about that crazy phone call last night. I could just see you lying in an alley with ten slugs in you. It was horrible. I realize now that I was just acting hysterical.”

She comes around the table. “It is good to see you alive. Let me kiss you.” She brings her lips to his behind Marlene’s back and slips her tongue in his mouth as she kisses him. As she pulls away she winks and goes back around to drink her coffee. Mike pulls Marlene down hard into his lap then quickly reaches for his coffee.

Marlene wiggles her bottom slightly and says, “I took the call seriously, too. He sounded so forbidding. His accent made it all the more mysterious. I feel chills all over when I think of it.” She wiggles in mock chills in Mike’s lap.

“Dear! Don’t do that. You’ll give me ideas and then I’ll have to take you back to bed. I’ll never get out of here to check on the car.”

Nina giggles and says, “Let me sit on the other knee and you’ll really be stuck here. Between the two of us, you’d never get out of that chair again.” Her and Marlene laugh at that one as she comes around the table again. “Come on, Marlene, move over and give me a knee.”

“No way. He’s mine this morning.”

Nina glances down and slowly starts to turn red. “Oh my. Are you… Your not, are you? I mean, for a minute there I thought… Uh, never mind. I feel so foolish. I better go.”

Marlene laughs and says, “Did you think we were screwing right here in the kitchen at the table with coffee in hand? Nina, I’m ashamed to tell you, but it’s true. We are.” She bobs up and down and laughs again.

“Don’t make fun of me. I really thought for a moment that you were. That was so embarrassing. I turned scarlet and got hot all over. I’m sorry, guys.”

Mike says, “Don’t worry, little one, if we were I’d have you join us. I’ll bet you’d get over that hot flush in a hurry while I bounced you on my knee.” He bounces Marlene a bit. “Sounds like fun, doesn’t it?” He bounces Marlene again.

“I’m going to take you back to bed if you keep bouncing me.” She wriggles and laughs as Mike feels pressure mounting.

“You better take her back to bed, Mike. I’m going now anyway.” Nina puts her cup in the sink and goes down the steps as Mike grips Marlene’s hips hard and pulls her down to him.

Gasping he says, “I didn’t think she was going to go before I did. Wow! That was close.”

“Well, don’t stop now. I got a ways to go yet, lover.”

Coffee out of the way and desert as well, they go up for a shower. Then he goes over to the shop.

“Morning, Murray. Had a chance to look her over, yet?”

“Yes. I pulled that fender clear of the tire and put in a headlight. You can drive her. I’ve got a fender on order for you. We’ll put it on when it comes in. Luckily, you seem to have missed everything vital underneath. Keep an eye out for oil leaks and such but I think your okay for now.”

“Do you know where I can rent a strap on ball hitch for that back bumper. I have a small U-Haul trailer to pull Sunday.”

“You can try Lordco Auto Parts, but I think your going to have to go to a U-Haul dealer. There’s one in Clearbrook out near the freeway access on South Fraser Way. Just a minute. Maybe I can get you the loan of one.” Murray goes to the phone and talks for a few minutes.

He comes back and says, “Your in luck. Friend of mine says you can borrow his pickup. He has all three sizes of balls for his hitch. Will that work? But he needs it back Monday morning to take to work.”

“That sounds terrific, but what if he wants to go somewhere? I guess I could leave him the Mustang. Thanks, Murray, I owe you one.” He gets the name and address of his friend.

He drives around to see the pickup when he leaves the shop. It’s an old 82 Chevrolet, but he likes the sound of it when it’s started. He arranges to leave his car and take the pick up early Sunday morning. The keys will be under the mat and Mike will leave his the same place. They go in the house and have a beer. This is a fellow trucker who drives cement mixer for the local outfit, Rempel Bros. They talk trucking for a while and then Mike goes home.

He putters in the rest of the day around the house.

Sunday morning he’s up and gone by six, being careful not to wake Marlene. He leaves a note on the table saying he will be busy all day so don’t hold supper for him.

At seven twenty he pulls around by Trudy’s place and sees the U-Haul sitting in front of her door. He backs the pickup up to the hitch on the trailer and parks a few inches short of it. He goes to rap on the door but she opens it as he’s reaching to knock. “Get in here!” She hauls him through the door and throws her arms around him. She squeezes and squeezes him as she says over and over, “I love you! I love you! They better damn well not hurt you. I love you.”

He holds her close and she settles down. “I have been fuming every time I think of them trying to kill you. We’ll put them away behind bars before we’re through, won’t we?”

“We’ll sure try to, but life doesn’t always work like that. They may get away with it and never get caught. Are you ready to start moving?”

“Yep. I was going to load some stuff up last night but I remembered you said you wanted to load it so it’s all here, mainly in boxes. The nice man from the U-Haul in Hope brought the trailer out for me and backed it right up to the door. He said we could drop the trailer at U-Haul in Chilliwack. Wasn’t that good of him?”

“How much leg did you show him for that?”

“I didn’t show him any, so there.” She sticks her tongue out at Mike.

“Mommy is sticking her tongue out!”

Crystal comes out of a bedroom rubbing her eyes. She’s still in pajamas so Mike catches her up and asks her to forgive her Mother’s bad manners. “You know better than to do such a thing, don’t you?” He grins and tickles her. She laughs and hugs him around the neck.

“Don’t Mike, that tickles.” She laughs and laughs. Mike sits her in an armchair and says, “You going to help us move, today?”

“You bet! I have to move my furniture too. My table and chairs and all my dolls and my dishes… everything! Will you charge us extra?”

“Hmmmm, well, just for you I’ll make an exception.