Shame on You

At least someone is on my side.

“Kennedy, do you have your gun on you?” she asks as she pulls her purse off her shoulder and starts digging through it.

“Uh, yeah. Why?”

Paige finds her wallet and counts out thirty dollars, slapping it down on the kitchen table.

“Because, McFadden is outside flipping burgers three houses down.”

Griffin pushes away from the counter and his arms fall to his sides. We look at each other in silence for five seconds before we both take off at a dead run out of the kitchen, shoving Paige and my father out of the way.

“You could have led with that, you know!” I yell at Paige as I race to the front door.

“This was more fun!” she shouts back as Griffin and I fight over the door handle, pushing and shoving each other out of the way. Griffin slams his hip into mine and I stumble backward as he flings open the front door, sprinting outside into the sunshine. I take off after him while I curse Paige. She could have pulled me aside and told me about McFadden quietly.

GD lack of loyalty.





CHAPTER 12




I race down the front porch just in time to see Griffin standing in the middle of the yard looking left to right, trying to decide which direction to run. My dad’s house is right smack in the middle of the cul-de-sac. There are seven houses on either side of his house, each one filled with people getting ready to root on Notre Dame. I need to pick the right direction. WHICH ONE IS THE RIGHT DIRECTION?!

Looking to my left, I see that Lorelei just arrived. And she’s wearing a maroon-and-gold silk blouse with matching maroon dress pants: Arizona Sun Devils’ colors, the team that Notre Dame is playing today. She’s going to be killed!

I see her lift her arm and point in the opposite direction that Griffin is currently looking and send her a thumbs-up before sprinting away. She’s on her own; I can’t save her from crazy Notre Dame fans now.

Running at top speed and yelling for people to get out of my way, I make it to the Andersons’ house, three houses down, in record time.

“Where’s the grill?” I ask the first person I come to through gasps of air.

“The burgers aren’t done yet,” a guy with a giant navy-blue foam finger tells me as he uses the foam finger to scratch his nose.

“WHERE’S THE FUCKING GRILL?!” I scream at him, pulling my gun out of the holster under the back of my shirt.

He doesn’t even bat an eye when he sees the 9mm in my hand. Half of the people on this street carry guns. Football season is serious business. Plus, most of the people here know that my family all works in some sort of law enforcement.

“If you’re that hungry, I heard someone brought Buffalo Wing Dip a few houses down.” He points his foam finger back in the direction I came.

“There’s a criminal cooking burgers on your grill. Where is the grill?” I ask again as I check the safety on my gun.

“Bob Anderson is a criminal? Damn, it’s always the quiet ones,” foam-finger guy states with a sad shake of his head.

I’m going to take his foam finger and shove it up his ass in three seconds.

“No, not Bob Anderson. His name is Martin, he skipped bail, and rumor has it he’s manning the grill at this house,” I tell him through clenched teeth.

“You mean McFadden? I just met him. Nice guy. And he has a cute dog.”

Sweet mother of God…

“The grill’s around back,” he tells me with another point of his finger. “Don’t shoot the dog!”

Looking over my shoulder to make sure Griffin isn’t anywhere in sight, I take off running again, keeping myself pressed to the side of the house as I move quickly with my gun in front of me. Peeking around the back corner, I see the grill about ten yards away from the house. And I see McFadden with his back to me, all alone with Tinkerdoodle sitting by his feet staring up at him, hoping one of the burgers he’s flipping drops on the ground.

Edging out from around the side of the house, I hold my gun out in front of me and creep closer, careful not to make a sound. When I’m within three feet of him, I check my back pocket to make sure the zip ties I usually carry are still back there, ready to be used when I tackle him and secure his hands behind his back.

“Hey, McFadden! Are those burgers almost done?”

I jump when I hear the yell from foam-finger asshole behind me and McFadden turns around from the grill with a giant spatula in his hand and a smile on his face. The smile dies when he sees me standing here with my gun pointed right at his chest.

“You can have the first burger. Just don’t shoot me!” he says nervously.

“You are really pissing me off, Martin. Put the spatula down and let’s do this calmly, without making a scene.”

I can hear people talking behind me and roll my eyes when I realize the backyard is filling up with onlookers, wanting to see what’s going on.