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I scoffed. “Do you see how short I am?”
“She’s right, prof,” a guy said who was at least a foot taller than me. “And even if she could jump that high, she doesn’t have the muscle tone to haul herself up.”
“Um, thanks?”
Dingle moved to the window and checked the lock. I watched, tense. If he got close to the glass and looked down, he’d see the bucket.
But Dingle apparently decided the intruder would have a hard time locking the window behind him, and the bushes outside were deterrent enough. He stepped away from the window, subdued. Dejected, even. If he wasn’t such a flaming turdblossom, I wouldn’t have been forced to ruin his day.
“Very well,” he said, all trace of arrogance gone. “We shall return to the lab and,” he sighed, “do a virtual dissection online.”
As we filed toward the lab, Curly-headed Guy leaned close. “I don’t know how the hell you did it, but I owe you a beer.”
I masked a grin, but an instant later my breath caught. I’d forgotten all about the frog on the front table. I needed to find a way to save him, too. Knowing Dingle, he’d take his frustration out on the poor thing. Unfortunately, the only rescue plan I could think of involved liquid nitrogen and a tub of peanut butter. Not terribly feasible.
We shuffled into the room, and I cast a forlorn glance at the container on the front workbench.
The empty container. Still covered. Hot diggety damn, someone else in the class had risen to the challenge.
Dingle entered last then stopped dead as he registered the frog’s absence. His shoulders sagged.
“You have five minutes to go over your notes,” he muttered. “I . . . need a moment.”
He turned and slumped out of the room. I bit my lip against a laugh and sent silent thanks to the unknown hero who’d rescued the last little froggy.
Chapter 12
After the class finally let out, I dawdled outside the building, pretending to be on my phone as I made sure Dingle was indeed headed to his office in the next building over. I carefully checked my surroundings for possible witnesses, pausing as I caught sight of Isabella striding briskly toward the parking lot. When she reached the sidewalk, she stopped and set her bag down, then crouched and peeked into her lunch box. Apparently satisfied with what she saw, she closed it, stuffed it into her bag, and hurried off.
“Oh, Isabella, you sneaky little minx,” I murmured with a mixture of delight and admiration. If that wasn’t a frog in her lunch box, I’d eat my backpack.
With that particular mystery solved, I slipped behind the bushes and retrieved the bucket of frogs with—crossing fingers—no one the wiser. Getting them to my car was a bit more challenging, especially since the only available parking had been somewhere near the rings of Saturn. Halfway there I had to stop and secure the lid after nearly sloshing a frog out. But the gods must have been smiling upon me, because no one seemed to notice or care that I was lugging a heavy bucket across the parking lot. Arms aching, I eventually reached my car and jammed the bucket behind the passenger seat—securely enough, I hoped, that it wouldn’t tip over and turn my car into a traveling pond. Of course then I worried about them suffocating with the lid closed. After all, there were a lot of frogs in there.
I solved the problem by digging a pocket knife out of my console and cutting a fist-sized hole in the lid. There. Frogs could breathe, and sloshing water and frogs would still be contained.
Whistling “Rainbow Connection,” I got the hell out of there.
Though I’d never performed a heroic frog rescue before, I knew the very best place to give them their freedom. A few months ago, I’d picked up a body in Belle Maison Estates, about ten miles north of Tucker Point. On my way out of the subdivision, I got lost and ended up driving around the prettiest pond I’d ever seen. The frogs would love it. And with nearly an hour before I had to be at work, I might even have a bit of chillout me-time after I liberated the captives.
Belle Maison Estates was a gated community, but like darn near every other gated community I’d been to, the gates stood open during the day. Made me wonder what the point was. Did they think Bad People only came out at night? Plus, did they realize how laughingly easy it was to get in, even with the gates closed? All you had to do was follow another car in. I snickered as I sailed through the impressive, open, and pointless gates. Security theater. Make things look safer and more secure, without actually being so.
Other than the silliness with the gates, there was a lot to like about the place. I made my way down peaceful, winding roads, past lovely, large houses on lovely, large lots. Walking trails wound throughout the neighborhood, and there were trees everywhere. It was obvious you had to have a lot of money to live here, but it wasn’t obnoxious and in-your-face about it. Classy. Like a genteel Southern lady.
After several turns, I took a road that circled the pond and rejoined itself, like the eye of a needle. About a third of the way around, I parked in a space nestled in a grove of flowering trees, then unloaded the bucket, relieved to see that only a little water had splashed out.
I followed a path through the grove and to the water’s edge. The pond was sort of a squished oval shape, measuring about a hundred yards at its longest point. Wildflowers bloomed along the banks amidst reeds and cattails, turtles sunned themselves on a partially s
ubmerged log, and butterflies flitted everywhere. A shaded walking trail offered exercise with a lovely view, and every thirty or forty yards a wrought iron bench rested beneath mature oaks.
It was gorgeous. I seriously needed to get rich so I could live here.
A woman with sleek, salt-and-pepper hair caught up in a tidy bun strolled down the trail toward me. A shaggy, mixed-breed dog padded by her side, tongue lolling.
She waved. “Hello there!”
Crap. Suddenly the bucket felt very conspicuous. I hadn’t planned what to say if asked why I was dumping frogs in the pond. “Hiya!” I replied with a bright smile. “Nice day, huh?”
She approached and peered into my bucket. The big dog sat without command, ears perked.
