Grimm Tales Read Online Free Page A

the road to my horizon
    But I’m gonna be where the lights are shinin’ on me
    The keener of the temptatious twins from Miami, Pammy, seemed to be following everywhere his eyes were eyeballing. He noticed she’d noticed his notice of the ship’s layout, but had she seen the way that gawdy red chandelier’s pendants dangled? Something about the sheen was akilter, he’d bet his bottom GW. His eighty-watt smile shot out, the better to distract her roaming eyes. Focusing his hocusing, he came to realize her earbuds were attuned to iTunes instead of
his
tunes, thus blocking his penchant to mesmerize.
    The no account debauched crowd went down for the count to an eight-count of the Sweet Harmony Harmonica’s drowsy bluesy rendition of “Goodnight, Irene.” Last goodtimes gal standing was Pammy from Miami, ironically not sorry to see the party she’d been part of now over and out.
“If you snooze, you lose,”
she whispered, as Big Daddy and his preponderance of pretty playmates drifted down a lazy river.
    Piper arched his left brow.
    Pammy motioned her exquisitely tapered right index finger. Fetchingly so.
    â€œYou just going to stand there looking gorgeous and beckon, or is there destination to your reckon?”
    â€œYou going to follow me or just whistle Dixie with that dinky mouth harp?”
    Lady had a point. Size mattered. He was behind her sashay all the way. All the way to the captain’s quarters, where the swanky skirt showed she had predilection to her direction and was still several steps ahead. Pammy tiptoed with no teetering to her teal Jimmy Choos, pulling from an upper teak cabinet a creased sheaf of bundled papers, with a paper-clipped news clipping along for the ride.
    Waving provocatively both the papers and her stance, “This what you came aboard looking for?”
    â€œCould be. Why do you wonder?”
    â€œWas wondering what’s in it for me.”
    â€œYou anglin’?”
    â€œY’know, wise guy, I used to be Snow White, but I drifted, and drifting along, running this show how Big Daddy wanted it to go, got irksome in its day. So let’s just say I’m bored and I’m the kind of gal who likes action. Matter o’ fact, I’d like a bigger piece of some bigger action. Do
you
hold that attraction…Big Boy?
And—
fifty/fifty, that’ll do nice to even the score I cipher you’re in for.”
    Piper couldn’t hold back his amused grin. “Nice Mae West to your zest, and—sixty/forty,
if
, and that’s a big IF, your presentation yields something good,
then
, kid—
then
you’re in.”
    â€œIF’s a pretty big word for two little letters. Nevertheless, I indeed have what you need to succeed so no negotiations necessary, Mr. Piper. Y’all Jake with that?”
    â€œAs Jake as the day my mother named me. All right, Ms. perplexing Pammy from Miami, you’ve got style, you’ve got wit, now let’s see you make the split worth both our whiles.”
    Pammy smiled, the kind of smile that stokes kindling in the gut to flame a slow burn. She was sure selling the sizzle for her stake. She got right down to business, though, spreading the papers flat on the marble charts table. “Just twain us, says here, this ship belongs lock, stock and barrels to one Samuel Marx, signed over by his grandparents Clem and Clementine Marx. Ship’s then duly registered and notarized in the great state of Texas as the
Samuel Clems
, and was charted for a coastal cruise. Big Daddy was the crook to hook up this ship with a river casino cartel in Baton Rouge.”
    Piper followed her line-by-line finger pointings steadily. Her delivery was no nonsense, not so her perfume. That fair Windsong was wafting his mind to following
sees
.
    She noticed his notice.
She continued, a little softer this time, “Now this recent newspaper clipping caught the eye of Big Daddy the day we refueled our