The Marriage at the Rue Morgue (A Rue and Lakeland Mystery) Read Online Free Page B

One smack. Boom. I’m gone. It pulled its punch, on purpose. It spooked,” he said. “If it hadn’t . . . Well, we’ll find him.”
    I didn’t cut in. Now wasn’t the time for lectures, but Art had one coming. I met Lance’s eyes, and I knew we were thinking the same thing. If anyone else on the staff had precipitated such rank stupidity, personal affection wouldn’t have stopped Lance and I from firing that person on the spot. Art was very lucky he outranked us both.
    Now that he was happy again, Art began zestfully hacking a number of fruits while giving us instructions. It didn’t seem to matter to him that the food had not yet been organized or that others would be arriving in the near future to address this project. His hands clearly wanted for action. Lance backed quietly away from the tables and into our office. I followed him as Art began to think out loud.
    “I’ll get a call in to Florida,” Art said. He meant he would call Richard Norris, our contact at the sanctuary we would be sending the orangutan to once we caught him. Art had more ideas. But I didn’t hear him because I shut the door.
    “Talk fast,” I told Lance, “because he’s going to want us back out there in a minute.”
    But Lance seemed disinclined toward conversation, instead pausing to breathe deeply, arms crossed over his chest. Art might have recovered fully from his encounter, but Lance was still frightened. Me, too. I walked around behind my fiancé and reached up to rub his shoulders. Slowly, his muscles relaxed, and he rolled his neck from one side to the other.
    We could see into the barn through an internal window. Art was using the butcher knife as a pointer to indicate people as he spoke. Since he only had two people to indicate, he waved it back and forth between Trudy and Darnell until he buried it in a watermelon. Lance shook his head. “This is extreme. Even for him.”
    Our office had a good view of the rest of the barn. We could also see pretty clearly out into the woods, thanks to the vehicle doors that we still hadn’t bothered to close. Through these, we watched the fruit truck lumber up the employee drive to the parking pad with our weekend delivery. “We need to warn Olivia to watch out,” I said.
    Lance nodded agreement, and I left him alone in the office.
    “Trudy and Darnell, get ready to come with me,” Art was proclaiming, as I went through the barn. He wanted to talk to me, too. “And you two, Noel, Lance,” he said. He had dislodged the knife from the melon and was using it as a pointer once more.
    “Not now,” I snapped. “Fruit truck’s here, and I want to be sure the driver doesn’t get any surprises.” Even as I spoke, Olivia swung the truck around to back it up to the open doors. The orangutan was riding on her tail, standing on the back lift holding onto the door’s handles like he was taking a ride on a trash truck.
    “Noel, you have to—” Art began again.
    “Art!” I snapped. “Dart gun.”
    “What?”
    I glanced his way, then pointed. When his eyes followed my gaze, they widened.
    “Look at that” he breathed. “So smart.”
    “So dangerous.” I cut quickly away from him and ran toward our medical clinic, hoping I could sedate the animal before Olivia even knew her danger. “Lance! Come out! I need help!”
    “He knows,” Art said, not referring to Lance, but delivering Trudy and Darnell a classroom lecture about an animal that was going to come charging through the doors in a few seconds. “He associates us with food, and he knows the food comes on a truck.”
    Lance didn’t emerge, and I couldn’t worry about why he wasn’t listening to me right then. “Trudy, Darnell, shut the door before it gets in.” Their feet thumped rapidly across the floor. If the orangutan associated the sight of the truck with food, I could only imagine what it would think of our prep tables.
    I ducked into the clinic and reached for one of the two dart guns stored on the wall.