Karen MacInerney - Margie Peterson 01 - Mother's Day Out Read Online Free Page A

early cardiac arrest, but with the hours he’d been putting in lately and the attendant stress, it wouldn’t be a shock if he keeled over into his cornflakes one morning.  Besides, it was good for me too. I made sure the kids ate a relatively balanced diet, but either the clothing manufacturers were making things smaller or my chocolate habit was edging me into muu-muu territory.
    As I stirred lemon juice into the yogurt, I thought about Mrs. Pence.  Did she cook low-fat meals for her husband? From what I’d seen this morning, I was guessing not.  How would she feel when she saw the photo of her shrink-wrapped husband? She must have known something was up—otherwise she wouldn’t have hired a private investigator—but seeing the proof would still be a shock.  Particularly a photo like the one in my camera. 
    I covered the chicken with Saran Wrap and winced at the spices dotting the pale slabs of flesh.  They looked kind of like Pence’s buttocks. Just a whole lot smaller.  Would it be appropriate to send Mrs. Pence a sympathy card, I wondered? Probably not.  Odds were good that Hallmark didn’t have a Sorry your husband was sharing his Saran Wrap fetish with a hooker card anyway.
    I had just slid the chicken into the refrigerator when the phone rang.  I rinsed my hands and picked it up before it went to the answering machine.
    “Hello?”
    “Margie?”
    I recognized my husband’s voice.  “Blake! How are you? You’re not going to believe what happened this morning…”
    “I’m sorry, Honey, I don’t have time to talk.  I just wanted to tell you that I’ve got a meeting with a client tonight, so I won’t be home for dinner.”
    So much for the chicken.  “Again? You’ve been working way too hard lately.”
    “I know, I know.  It’s just this case I’m putting together.”
    I sighed.  Maybe we’d do hot dogs and macaroni and cheese, and save the chicken for tomorrow.  “Well, we’ll miss you.  Want me to save you some dinner?”
    “Oh, don’t worry about that.  I’ll pick something up.  Gotta run… give the kids a kiss.”
    And then he was gone. 
    I hung up the phone and scowled, wishing I could expense all of the uneaten dinners I’d prepared lately to Jones McEwan, the law firm that was holding my husband in indentured servitude.  “It’s just till I make partner,” he always said.  “Then I can relax a little, and we can work on the house a bit.”  Yeah, right.  It had been four years now, and despite the fact that he worked sixty-hour weeks on a regular basis, he was still an associate. 
    I had just pulled a package of hot dogs out of the freezer when Elsie appeared in the doorway, blue eyes wide.  “Can I have my fry phone?”
    I swallowed.  How was I going to tell her an obese plastic-clad adulterer had swiped her love object? I adopted a casual tone.  “You know, honey, I don’t know where it is right now.  I’m sure it will turn up, though.”  I guided her through the Lego-strewn living room to the TV.  “Why don’t I put Lady and the Tramp on?”
    Tears welled in her eyes.  “But I want my fry phone!”
    “Honey, I don’t know where it is right now.”
    “You mean it’s gone? Forever?”
    “No, sweetie, not forever.  I’m sure it’ll turn up.”  I stroked her curls and sat through fifteen minutes of Lady and her perfect household until the snuffling had receded to an occasional sniff.  Then retreated to computer desk, where I pulled up eBay and typed in Fry phone.  Nothing.  Ditto for McDonald’s fry phone , French fry phone , Happy Meal phone , and Freedom fry phone .  Damn.
    Why had I taken this job?
    I shut off the computer and picked up the phone.   Peaches answered on the third ring.
    “It’s Margie,” I said.  “I got a photo of Pence.”
    “You’re shitting me.”  I could hear the surprise in her pack-a-day voice.  “When can you bring it in?”
    “I’ll e-mail it to you,” I said.  I paused to clear my