Death at the Summit by Nikki Haverstock Read Free Book Online Page B

watched.
    “Here’s our suspects. Are you ready to investigate?”
    Startled, I looked at her. “What? Weren’t you listening? Brian doesn’t want us to investigate.”
    Mary rolled her eyes at me. “How can someone so smart be so dense? He didn’t said say not to investigate. He said he didn’t want to see us investigating.”
    “Is that why he kept saying see , see , see ? I guess finding another body has really thrown me for a loop.”
    Mary put her feet on my desk. “It’s a good thing you have me around to keep you in line.”
    I leaned over and waggled one of her feet. “You know what? You’re right.” I was lucky to have her in my life. She was determined and organized but still fun. She kept me in line and had been the roommate I never knew I’d needed in my life. “Did you write down everyone from the video? Is the dynamic duo ready to ride again?” Last time we investigated, we’d had a running joke about being Batman and Robin.
    Minx knocked on the open doorway, with Tiger at her side, a plate of cookies in her hand.
    “This time, we get to help investigate,” Minx said.
    They came in and pulled up chairs. Moo trotted over to accept ear scratches from each.
    Minx knocked Mary’s feet off the desk and placed the cookies on the corner of my desk. Mary reached out and grabbed a tree-shaped cookie before replying, “Tiger can investigate; he’s the only one of us that never showed up in the footage at all.”
    He ruffled the side of Moo’s neck with his knuckles. “I was busy. Orion’s speech about women in the industry motivated me to talk to some people about an idea that I’ve had for a long time. If I get chosen to train here, I want to start a program where local women can come and learn all about firearms and archery in a female-only environment. I was talking to some companies to see if I could get their backing for the idea.”
    Minx snorted. “Whatever, you just wanted to flirt with women.”
    Tiger snapped back, “Treating women like intelligent peers and wanting to date them are not mutually exclusive ideas. I was raised by a single mother and have three younger sisters. Women are every bit as capable of doing things that I do, but when I was a kid and we went places, we were treated differently. We all shot guns and bows growing up. When I asked people how things worked, they would explain in detail, but when my sisters asked, they would be told not to worry about that stuff. I don’t know why people think it is such a radical idea that women are people, too.”
    We all sat in silence for a moment. He had given his little speech with more than a bit of frustration. I admitted to thinking of him as only a flirt, but I realized that he had actually never been demeaning or dismissive of me.
    Mary was looking at him with a huge smile. “That’s a great idea. You want to teach?”
    “Nah, that would kinda defeat the purpose. I want to have women teach the course, but I could do all the boring administrative stuff behind the scenes. Maybe if I’m lucky, though, they’ll let me join the ladies for a meal or two. Show them what a gentleman I am.” He waggled his eyebrows at her.
    I laughed. “You’re a complicated man, Tiger.”
    “All the best are.” He reached over and broke a corner off a cookie. Flinging it into the air, he caught it in his mouth then ate it with a smug smile.
    “Now that Tiger has enlightened us on his social ideology, can we gather up the gang and focus on clearing my name?” Notes of anxiety and weariness edged Minx’s comment.
    Mary grabbed two more cookies from the plate with a smile. “The Scooby gang to the rescue.”
    Minx fluffed her head. “That’s perfect. We already have a Great Dane and one pretty redhead.”
    “You’re not a real redhead,” I said.
    “You think Daphne was? And we both have a good-looking but kinda dumb guy.”
    Tiger laughed. “My specialty.”
    “We have an annoying know-it-all,” Minx continued.
    Minx and Tiger