The Housewife Assassin's Killer Christmas Tips by Josie Brown Read Free Book Online Page B

darkness.
    “That’s the money shot,” Arnie mutters. He clicks back to it and isolates it onto his computer screen.
    Bingo. She’s grainy, but he’s got her.
    I hold my breath as he zooms onto her face, enlarging the tiny square pixels into the peaks and valleys of skin and emotion.
    Because her head is covered with a headscarf, you’d have to guess if she’s blond, brunette or a redhead.
    Ah, but if the eyebrows are any indication, she’s honey blond.
    If you’re a man who had ever loved her, you’d still remember those almond-shaped eyes, those full petulant lips, and those sky high cheekbones.
    I’m guessing that’s why all the color has left Jack’s face.
    She’s Valentina, the wife who left him. The wife who ran away with Carl.
    She is also my nun on the run.
    The pain in Jack’s eyes now mirror my own, but for all the wrong reasons.
    “Okay, folks, you’ll get your marching orders as soon as we figure out our reconnaissance hot spots. Jack, if you’ve got a moment, I’d like to see you in my office.” 
    As always, Ryan’s matter-of-fact tone doesn’t give a hint as to why he and Jack need to go behind closed doors this very second, when we should be tightening the noose around Valentina’s pretty little neck.
    Emma slaps Arnie upside his head.
    “Ouch! What did you do that for?” he yelps. Her kohl-eyed stare is making him sweat. 
    “What, do you think I’m stupid? You’re using your new ex-ray software to check out her boobs under her habit, aren’t you?”
    “Well… okay, yeah. But you’ve got to agree, it’s the perfect application—”
    Emma isn’t buying it. She stomps off to her own cubicle.
    Arnie’s cockeyed wooing of Emma is a lot like a game of Chutes and Ladders. His desk jockey derring-do may earn him a few inches within proximity of Emma’s hardboiled heart, but in so many ways he’s still a nerd and a Neanderthal. No amount of manscaping can change that.
    Valentina’s mesmerizing eyes draw me back to Arnie’s computer screen. Speaking of DNA, I have to admit. She’s drop dead gorgeous.
    The drop dead part happens later, if she runs into me again.
     
    The drive home with Jack has been conducted in complete silence. I can’t stand it anymore. Now that we’ve pulled into the garage, I’ll be damned if the rest of our afternoon is going to be haunted by Valentina’s resurgence in Jack’s life.
    Or I should say, in our lives.
    So I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. “Who did you draw for Secret Santa?”
    For the first time since we left Acme, Jack lips raise into a smile. “You tell me first.”
    I adjust the mirror so that I can apply some lipstick. “I pulled Emma’s name.”
    Not really. I pulled Jack’s. I wonder what’s considered an appropriate gift to a man whose wife you’ve just tried to kill. He’ll have to settle for a pair of cufflinks.
    “How about you?” I ask innocently. “Who’s stocking are you stuffing?”
    He shrugs. “I got Arnie. I think I’ll get him a shoe phone. You know, as a gag. He eats up all that retro spy stuff. The only television channel he watches is TV Land. He’s memorized reruns of The Avengers, I Spy and The Man from Uncle .”
    That gets a snort out of me. “If you do, he’ll have it rigged into a satellite phone before the party’s over.”
    Jack chuckles, too. It’s great to hear his laugh again.
    “You know, Jack, you haven’t mentioned Valentina since she was ID’d as Father Casari’s shooter.”
    The smile disappears from his face. “What’s to say? The hit just earned her a few notches closer to Number One on the FBI and the International Watch lists.”
    “Was that Ryan’s consensus on the matter, too?”
    He shrugs. “If you’re wondering what our little powwow was about, it’s exactly what you’d imagine. He wants to make sure I won’t have a problem exterminating her, if and when the opportunity presents itself.”
    Ryan’s question proves he and I are of like minds,