Page 14 of Slumming It

I saw no reason to lie. "I'm playing the odds."

She shook her head. "The odds?"

"It's either your phone or your wallet." I gave her a hard look. "Regardless, your ass is mine."

She drew back. "What doesthatmean?"

"It means, your story isn't gonna cut it."

"But you haven't even heard my story, which isn't a story at all. It's the God's honest truth."

Again with the h-word.This made what? Three times in ten minutes? In my experience, the louder someone proclaimed their honesty, the more shit they were shoveling my way.

Already, I’d heard enough.

But her cellphone would tell me plenty.

I strode toward the bed, bypassing her as I went. I'd just reached it when the fucking phone started ringing yet again. Without thinking, I picked up the receiver and ground out, "What?"

After a beat of silence, a female voice said, "Um, hi…This is the front desk?"

Her accomplice. Through gritted teeth, I asked, "Is that a question?"

"No. I mean, I was just wondering…are you still coming up here? You know…to sign that form?"

I scoffed into the receiver. "No point in that."

"Pardon?''

I turned to study the girl in my room. Her eyes were wide, and she looked on the verge of bolting. With my gaze locked on hers, I told the caller, "It didn't work."

A few feet away, Emily the Housekeeper winced. She could protest all she wanted, butsheknew she was busted, too.

The caller asked, "What didn't work?"

"Your paperwork story." It was time to cut to the chase. "Nice try, but I found your friend."

The caller was silent for several beats before saying, "Oh."

"Yeah." I didn’t hold back on the sarcasm. "Oh."

"So you mean Emily? The uh, housekeeper? I know she was in there doing some maintenance or something, but I, um…figured she would have been gone by now. So, um…" The caller hesitated. "Is she still there?"

I studied the girl in question. Maybe her namewasEmily. And maybe shewasthe housekeeper. But the rest of the story?

It was pure bullshit.

Whatever the tale, Emily the Housekeeper looked moments away from tossing her cookies onto the old-ass carpet. I gave the floor an obligatory glance. The carpet was purple with green and brown swirls. It was so ugly, the toss might be an improvement.

On the phone, the clerk was saying, "Is she okay? Because I’m warning you…"

Oh, for fuck's sake."She's fine."

"I need to talk to her."

My fingers flexed around the phone. "Yeah. Me, too."

"I mean it," the caller said.