The Miss Fortune Series: Undercover Bubba (Kindle Worlds Novella) (Miss Chance meets Miss Fortune Book 3) by Sam Cheever

pounded toward us. Cal ran into the room, the pocket of his pretty tux ripped almost all the way off and his bow tie riding the side of his throat. There was a suspicious shadow on his jaw that I didn’t think had been there when we got to the gallery. He caught my gaze, his expression grim. “They’re out for blood. I think somebody called the cops. We need to go.”
    Sighing, I started for the Exit sign on the back wall. It was going to be a long sprint down three blocks to Cal’s car. And me without my shoes.

 
     
     
    CHAPTER SEVEN
     
    “What about my buttocks?” I asked Cal on the ride back to Sinful.
    He waggled his brows. “What about them? They look mighty fine to me.”
    Snickering emerged from the backseat. I glared at my intrepid PI. “You know what I meant.”
    Cal shrugged. “No money changed hands. The case of the flying cocktail sauce interrupted our negotiations.”
    I sat back in my seat, sighing my relief. “Thank God for that, at least.”
    “Opportunity lost, if you ask me,” Ida Belle said.
    I turned around and found her working way too hard not to smile. “Ha, ha. I suppose you’d put that nightmare in your house?”
    She snorted. “Not a chance. But I know a spot in the Catholic church where it would look mighty fine.”
    We all snickered at that. But the sentiment reminded me of the smoldering turd we were returning to in Sinful. “Do you suppose Celia’s calmed down?”
    Fortune shook her head. “I’m more worried about Carter. He knows that was us in the nun costumes.”
    “And if he didn’t already know,” Ida Belle agreed, “he’d figure it out soon enough when he talked to Maxwell.”
    “You think Max will rat us out?” Gertie looked shocked.
    “With two hundred pounds of Carter bearing down on him, he’d rat out his own mother.”
    We all fell silent for a moment, while I sat chewing my fingernail. Finally I had to ask. “Do you think Carter will arrest us?”
    Fortune frowned. “I doubt it, but you never know with Carter.”
    “He’s covered for us a few times,” Ida Belle told her.
    “Yeah. On some pretty big stuff,” Gertie added.
    I was dying to ask what big stuff. Unfortunately, Cal spoke before I could ask.
    “Carter won’t arrest you. I already told him we’d pay for the statue.”
    Three sets of gazes swung his way, filled with varying degrees of shock.
    “When did you do that,” I asked.
    “While you three were shopping for art show clothes.” He shrugged. “I had time to kill.”
    Fortune sat forward. “You admitted it was us in the church?” She was clearly irritated. I didn’t blame her. Cal had seriously shtepped on their shtick. I knew something about the dance Swamp Team 3 engaged in with Carter and Celia. They did the crime. The law knew they did the crime. Celia knew they did the crime. But they simply denied everything until they found a way to fix it all. Carter turned a blind eye as long as he could and Celia screamed bloody murder…quivering like a jelly fish with righteous anger…but unable to prove a thing.
    “You shouldn’t have done that,” I told Cal.
    “I didn’t admit you did it. I just told him you have an inheritance you might consider using to replace the sculpture. But only if he didn’t arrest your friends.”
    “But Cal’s not stupid,” Fortune argued. “He’ll know Felly wouldn’t pay for something she didn’t do.”
    “Hey! I wasn’t the only woman in a breakaway nun’s costume in that church.”
    Fortune flipped a hand in my direction. “You know what I mean.”
    “We need to go into hiding,” Gertie said. She plunged her hand into her suitcase-sized purse and started rummaging around. “I have enough food for two days in here if you don’t mind hairy shrimp. A blanket, two flashlights, matches, a bottle of water, and of course a full arsenal.”
    “I get the blanket,” Ida Belle said.
    Gertie frowned. “It’s my blanket, why should I give it to you?”
    “Because I’m the oldest.”