Charmed and Dangerous by Toni McGee Causey Read Free Book Online

problems all while weaving something or other into her dreads the way other people doodle. Today it was colorful beads. She could barely wedge her barrel-shaped body between the desk and the wall and Bobbie Faye chuckled when she saw Ce Ce using her large breasts as a shelf for the bags of beads. She hadn’t known how much she needed to see Ce Ce’s warm smile until it spread across the woman’s face to her eyes.
    “That’s right, sugar,” she was saying. “Better sex. How many crystals should I put you down for?” Ce Ce listened as Bobbie Faye looked askance at her, then said, “A whole gross? Honey, are you sure? You want your man to live through it, don’t you?” Then she laughed, marked down a gross next to a client’s name, and hung up.
    “Tell me you’re not actually selling those crystals as an aphrodisiac for better sex,” Bobbie Faye said, weaving around stacks of oddball items and mountains of office clutter. She dropped into a chair opposite Ce Ce.
    “Of course I am, honey. Confidence breeds confidence, don’t you know that?”
    Bobbie Faye just shook her head and laughed.
    “Now what you want, honey?” Ce Ce asked, her chubby cheek propped on a fist. “ ’Cuz you got that look.”
    Bobbie Faye had barely had the words “I need an advance” out of her mouth when Ce Ce was already writing out a check.
    “I don’t get it,” Ce Ce said. “Why’re you paying forelectricity when it’s dead on its side? Seems to me you should just shoot it, bury it, and get yourself a man.”
    “Only if they let me shoot and bury him when he’s useless, too.”
    “No wonder you’re still single.” Ce Ce handed the check to Bobbie Faye. “It ain’t like you to throw good money after a bad cause, unless it’s your . . . dammit. It’s Roy, ain’t it?” Ce Ce asked, her all-too-knowing gaze making Bobbie Faye uncomfortable. “What’re you up against?”
    “I told you. Gotta get the electricity turned on to wet-vac out the place.” Bobbie Faye swallowed, wondering if Ce Ce had heard that wobble in her voice. “You know, once I get it standing back upright.”
    The only way she had been able to think to be subtle when going to the bank was to have something normal to do, like cashing a paycheck. Ce Ce didn’t owe her one for another week, but Bobbie Faye could rationalize asking for an advance instead of telling Ce Ce the truth. Thing was, Ce Ce was the smartest person Bobbie Faye knew, and one of the kindest, and if there was anybody who might be able to figure out a way to help Roy, it might be her. Then Bobbie Faye remembered the picture of their dismembered cousin and shuddered, knowing she could never put Ce Ce at risk.
    “It’s nothing, Ceece. I gotta run.”
    Ce Ce gave Bobbie Faye a big hug, and said, “You call me if you need anything,
chère
. You got that?”
    Bobbie Faye nodded and hurried out of Ce Ce’s office, grabbing a biscuit from Alicia (or maybe Allison) before going back out to her car. She checked the time on her cell phone; a quarter ’til nine and the bank was just one block over. She would get the tiara, she’d give it to the creeps who had Roy, and he’d be safe.
    The car hiccupped. And wouldn’t start. After the starter throbbed a bit to no effect, Bobbie Faye put her head on the steering wheel and tried not to scream. She then calmly opened up her glove box, got out a small ball-peen hammer, went around to the front, lifted the hood, and smacked a few engine parts indiscriminately.
    “You,” she said, seething through gritted teeth as the ball-peen hammer made contact, “stupid,” smack, “car.” smack. “You’re going to be,” smack, “tin cans,” smack, “if you don’t freaking
start
.”
Wham
. She got back behind the steering wheel, turned the key. The car chugged a bit, but the starter wasn’t quite catching.
    “I swear. You’ll be a freaking toaster!”
    She stomped her foot and the engine roared to life.
    Bobbie Faye backed out of the lot,