A Tale of Two Trucks by Thea Nishimori Read Free Book Online Page A

had to be Brandon, the middle-aged officer (who had looked bored all through his “investigation”) simply shrugged.
    “I’m sorry, boys, but there’s nothing I can do without some hard evidence,” he said, putting away his notepad. “At least most of this will wash off, and as long as nothing’s been tampered with under the hood, the only damage is cosmetic.”
    “B-but, aren’t you going to question him, at least?” I demanded, noticing he hadn’t written down Brandon’s address when I gave it to him. He shook his head.
    “I have no reason to—no probable cause. Now, if you can find a fingerprint somewhere in all of this,” he said as he glanced doubtfully at the goo on the truck, “then you’re welcome to have us come out and lift it. But for something like this, even if you can get a conviction, all they’d get is a slap on the wrist. Frankly, I’ve seen worse pranks on Halloween.”
    I was about to retort that maybe he would feel differently if it were his own car, when Joe placed a heavy hand on my shoulder and distracted me (more than he could know).
    “Well, thank you for coming out, officer,” he said politely. He was much calmer than I was, even though this was an outrage committed against his property. “We’ll just wash it off now.”
    After the cop left, I was still seething and stomped into the garage to pull out the garden hose, but Joe followed me in there.
    “Look, Mike, there’s only so much the police can do,” he said in a patient, hushed voice. “And really, your ex has just taught us a valuable lesson!”
    “ What ?” I yelled, staring up at him as though he’d taken leave of his senses.
    He grinned, a wicked twinkle in his eyes.
    “He’s shown us that the important thing is to not get caught. ”
     
     
    W E spent the next hour washing off the besmirched truck, and then, at my insistence, we switched the trucks so that his was in the garage and mine was in the driveway. My hope in doing this was that Brandon would drive by the scene of the crime and be at least perplexed when he saw a perfectly clean and graffiti-free truck. And also, just in case he came back to do more, I wanted it to be on my truck (even though it was my baby), not Joe’s.
    As for Joe, he revealed to me his devious side, which I hadn’t suspected even existed. But then again, having your new vehicle violated tends to change a man.
    “My first impulse was to find the bastard and beat him to a pulp,” he admitted as I made lunch, “but then I could get in trouble with the law. No, we have to play it smart and not leave any incriminating evidence—just like he did.”
    “Well, between the two of us, we’ve certainly watched enough crime dramas to pull this off,” I agreed.
    We worked together to hash out our plan and, after lunch, continued to discuss it while I took my painting supplies to the garage. It would be extremely expensive to get the panels repainted professionally, but since I still felt that this was my responsibility, I’d asked Joe if I could cover up the graffiti with some hand-painted art.
    “I can try to get the paint off with benzene,” I explained, “but that would take the shine and probably the original paint off too, making it more susceptible to the elements. If you trust my painting skills, though, I can put some designs right on top of it so it’ll look like you had it detailed.”
    “I trust your painting skills implicitly,” he vowed, so I opened up the garage door a crack for ventilation and got started.
    I was a bit nervous having Joe watch my every move, but once I’d decided on the picture, it flowed easily off my brush. Since the background was that lovely midnight blue, I went with a night scene and put a full moon right where the dot of the i was, surrounding it with a pine forest. I added a shimmering lake under the moon and, in silhouette, the majestic horns of an elk stepping out to get a drink at the lake. Not only was it a night scene, but the elk