Full Scoop by Janet Evanovich and Charlotte Hughes Read Free Book Online

and yanked the door open with the other.
    “What do you think you’re doing!” Maggie demanded in her most menacing tone, at the same time wondering if the man was one of Carl Lee’s thug friends. “Get out of here or I’ll blow you to kingdom come with my, um, Magnum!” She wasn’t even sure what a Magnum looked like, but it sounded pretty scary. She reached beneath her seat, pretending to go for her gun, but all she could find was her compact umbrella. This annoyed the heck out of her since she could never find the damn thing when it rained.
    “Amateurs,” Zack muttered. “Rule number one, lady,” he said. “Don’t threaten to shoot somebody unless you have a gun to back it up. Rule number two, keep your windows raised at all times. I can’t help you if you’re going to do stupid stuff.”
    Maggie wasn’t listening. She put her car in reverse and hit the gas. The tires grabbed the concrete, and the car shot back like a bullet.
    The car slammed right into the front of Queenie’s car. “Holy hell!” Maggie yanked her head around; she hadn’t seen the woman pull in. She cut her engine, grabbed her umbrella, and bolted from the car. She heard a loud yowl and turned, only seconds before Mel jumped the man from behind, wrapped both arms around his neck, and began choking him.
    “Run, Mom!” the girl yelled. “He’s got a gun tucked in the back of his pants!”
    “Mel, no!” Maggie cried. She swung her umbrella, and hit Zack, as hard as she could, in the gut. He grunted. “Let go of my daughter, you scumbag!” she shouted, hitting him again. “Or I’ll beat you so hard your mother won’t recognize you.”
    “Hey, wait!” Zack said. “I’m FBI.” He reached for his wallet, just as Queenie hurled her cell phone at him. It bounced off the side of his head. Zack blinked several times. “What the hell?”
    “Hang on!” Everest said, trying to squeeze through the window on the passenger’s side of Queenie’s car and getting stuck as a result. He finally pulled free and hit the pavement in a dead run. “I’ll save ya’ll!”
    Zack looked up. “Holy shit!” he said, a split second before impact.

Chapter Three
    “I can’t tell you how sorry we are, Mr. Madden,” Maggie said for the third or fourth time as she and Everest pulled Zack from the ground and insisted on helping him inside the house. Even in her concern she couldn’t help notice how solid he was; the muscles in his back and upper arms were hard and defined.
    “Look, I’m okay,” Zack said. “Really,” he added when the tension in her face didn’t lessen. She was pretty, despite her distress. “But if you ask me to do jumping jacks I’m going to have to decline.” He looked up at Everest. “Have you ever thought of becoming a bulldozer?”
    “I feel bad about this,” Everest said. “I thought you were Carl Lee Stanton.”
    “I’m much better looking.”
    Maggie paid scant attention to the two as she took in the damage. “You’re all skinned up and bleeding,” she said. “Mel, please hand me my medical bag.”
    “No big deal,” Zack said. “I’ve hurt myself worse than this going out for my newspaper.”
    Mel looked awed. “Man, Everest just mowed him down!” she said, grabbing the bag from the top of the refrigerator.
    Queenie stared at the badge that Zack had asked Everest to pull from his wallet, even as the big man had held him in a body lock, Zack’s face pressed against the concrete driveway. She glanced from the badge to Zack and back to the badge.
    “Problem?” Zack asked.
    “How do we know this badge is for real?” she asked. “And if it is real, how do we know this is you? This man doesn’t have a beard. And how come you’re driving a hippie van? FBI agents drive black cars with tinted windows.”
    “Yeah, and they wear black suits and sunglasses,” Mel said. “Didn’t you see Men in Black ?”
    “And how come somebody from the FBI didn’t alert Dr. Davenport to the fact they would