“Good morning to you, too, Emily,” he said, sipping his coffee.
“Yeah, good morning. Why did you arrest my entire construction crew last night? I got to the work site this morning, and the only one there was Georgie, and she said that the rest of them were in jail.”
Harlan chuckled. “Technically, yes, they are in jail, but no one was arrested, and they’re free to go.”
Emily visibly relaxed and slid into the booth next to me. “I don’t understand. What happened?”
“The details are a little sketchy,” Harlan said, “but from what my deputy could make of it last night, the boys were celebrating Tiny’s impending fatherhood by plying him with shots of Fireball. Lots of shots of Fireball. He finally passed out at the Mustang Saloon, but since all the horse taxis were in for the night and he was too damn heavy to carry home, they dragged him by his feet across the street to the jail so he could sleep it off there. I guess the rest of them were either too lazy or too drunk to go home, too.”
“So, no one is in trouble? They can all come to work today?”
Harlan laughed again. “Sure, they can all come to work, but I wouldn’t expect much from them. They were a mess last night. And Tiny probably has a powerful headache from the Fireball. And the curb. And the steps into the station. No power tools or saws today, okay? I don’t want somebody losing a limb.”
Emily shook her head in dismay. “Great. That’s just great. I need to start building days into the construction schedule to account for their shenanigans and hangovers. Geez. Give me those pancakes.”
She reached for my plate, and I handed her my fork before someone got hurt.
Chapter 9
“She wants to launch her dead husbands into outer space? What is wrong with that woman?”
The pub’s window glass behind June Mahoney may have just cracked a little at the shrill tone of her voice. It was city council meeting time again, and so far, this one wasn’t going any better than the first one. My well-constructed agenda was once again being used as cocktail napkins by these bickering geriatrics, and since my father had been called away to help catch a runaway horse, I didn’t have him to back me up.
“She doesn’t want to launch them into space, June,” I corrected for the fifteenth time. “She wants to send them up in a firework. Well, three, actually, one for each.” I cringed internally, knowing that my version didn’t sound that much better. “She’d like to do this at midnight on New Year’s Eve.”
June had been pacing the floor, the swish of her corduroy pants loud and irritating. She whirled back toward me. “Brooke, your grandmother has been a nutjob since the day she was born, but this just takes the cake.”
Her aggressive stance sent my frustration level over the edge. “She is not a nutjob, June, and if your brother wasn’t being so demanding, she wouldn’t have to be doing this at all!”
June slammed her hand down on the table. “Don’t you bring my brother into this. He is a sweet, guileless man, and your grandmother is just using him for . . . for her own sexual gratification.”
Sudsy and Dmitri exchanged intrigued glances. “Gigi is in need of sexual gratification? If that’s the case,” Sudsy said, “I’m available Tuesday evenings, when Marilyn goes to bingo. Your grandmother is still a hottie.”
I didn’t for one second want to know if Sudsy was serious or not. “Could everyone please stop talking about my grandmother’s sex life?” I glanced out the open door of the meeting room to see Leo chuckling behind the bar and might have felt embarrassed if I hadn’t been so annoyed by the whole thing.
Gertie raised her hand. “Ladies, gentlemen, I feel we are veering off topic. May I suggest a nonbinding vote to see where everyone stands on the issue of launching dead bodies into the sky? It’s possible we’re closer to agreeing on this than we realize.”
“Gertie, I think that’s a great idea,” Dmitri said. “Let’s vote. All in favor of letting Gigi blow up her dead husbands, raise your hand.” His hand popped up, and slowly, one by one, the other members voted in favor. The other members not including June Mahoney. Even Olivia Bostwick gave a tiny little wave of agreement.