Nerd Gone Wild by Vicki Lewis Thompson Read Free Book Online Page B

that had been Madeline Jarrett hiring him. It appeared that, instead, he was being punished for some unforgivable transgression.
    He should be working on whatever story he planned to tell Ally once they were alone, but his brain was frozen solid. Madeline had made it very clear that he was not to reveal that he’d been hired to guard Ally unless her life was in immediate danger. A woman like Ally, Madeline had said, would hate the idea of a bodyguard and would sabotage his efforts if she knew about them.
    This damn weather was enough sabotage to deal with. If he had to live in a place like this—which would never happen, but say he was forced at gunpoint by aliens with superhuman strength—then he’d construct a series of heated tunnels between buildings so that he never had to go outside in the winter.
    He trudged along behind Ally, who seemed to be using Betsy as a windbreak. Mitch didn’t blame her. As the tallest member of the three blind mice, he caught the gale full in the face, or what used to be his face. He couldn’t feel his lips anymore. When he finally got inside, they might crack and fall off.
    After what seemed like about a hundred years, Betsy opened the front door of the Loose Moose and they all funneled inside, stomping their boots on the mat in front of the door. Stomping was good, Mitch decided. If he stomped hard enough, he might get some circulation back in his toes.
    “Hang your coats on that rack by the door and stick your boots underneath the bench.” Betsy unzipped her coat and flipped back her hood. “With you two being the only ones in the lodge, you might as well use that spot for your stuff, instead of letting it drip all the way up the stairs. I’ll go on back to the kitchen and turn on the oven.”
    Ally’s teeth chattered as she took off her coat and draped it over a brass hook by the door. “I wonder if I c-could c-crawl in the oven with the moose-meat pie.”
    Mitch itched to tell her
I told you so
, but he didn’t. He needed her to like him a little bit so she wouldn’t dig in her heels at every suggestion he made. “Does Betsy have a dog?” He hung up his coat beside hers. God, it was orange. It hurt his eyes every time he looked at it.
    “I haven’t seen a dog since I’ve been here.” Ally sat down on the bench and tugged off her boots. The extreme cold seemed to have sobered her right up. “Why?”
    He lowered his voice. “We need a way to make the moose-meat pie disappear.”
    “I’m thinking the garbage disposal. But then what will we eat? I really am hungry.”
    “Yeah, me, too. Maybe we can find some bread and peanut butter in her cupboards.” He was a little sorry to watch tipsy Ally being replaced by in-control Ally. She might be more of a problem for him under the influence, but she sure was funny.
    She thought he’d been paralyzed by humiliation back at the Top Hat, when in fact he’d been clenching his jaw to keep from laughing. When she’d sent her loaded question sailing right into that moment of dead silence, he’d nearly lost it. Talk about hilarious.
    Now that he was thawing out, he could appreciate it all over again, except he had to be careful not to start smiling for no apparent reason. People tended to get nervous around that kind of behavior. He sat down next to Ally and began taking off his boots, too.
    “Whatever you do, don’t let on that you’re not looking forward to eating her special dish,” she said.
    He was offended that she’d even feel the need to warn him. “You think I’m that much of a social klutz?” Then he realized that she probably did think so. And he had made that remark about roadkill, which had popped out of his mouth before he could stop it.
    “I just want to make sure we don’t insult Betsy’s cooking,” Ally said.
    “Don’t worry. I won’t insult her cooking.” An aroma that wasn’t half bad drifted into the hotel lobby. “Who knows? Maybe we’ll like it.”
    Ally shuddered. “I’ve never eaten