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“I have a confession to make,” Charlotte says.
I grip the steering wheel with white knuckles to brace myself. “There’smore?”
Charlotte takes a deep breath, like she’s mustering the courage to jump off a cliff. “I saw your puppet show yesterday, Auggie. I saw the whole thing.”
Fuck. This is worst-case scenario. My biggest fear, realized.
“Now, don’t freak out, okay?” Charlotte adds quickly. “I thought it was brilliant—sexy, funny, hot.Amazing.”
“I had a feeling you lied to me. It was written all over your face.”
“Yeah, I’m a terrible liar. Sorry. I didn’t want to embarrass you. I told a little white lie to spare your feelings.”
“Bullshit. You lied to buy yourself some time to decide what to do with the juicy information. Are you going to blackmail me? Is that your plan for paying off Carlo in time? Because if that’s it, you should know, I don’t have—”
“Of course, not.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“If I were going to blackmail you, I’d have done it already. Also, I can’t very well blackmail you, when you know something much, much worse about me, now can I? Don’t you think me dating a hitman and stealing sixty grand from a mob boss is far worse than you doing some funny, silly, harmless online penis puppetry in order to put yourself through veterinary school? Areyougoing to blackmailme? Was your accusation against me what the shrinks callprojection,Mr. Vaughn?”
I scoff. “Why would I blackmail you, when you don’t even have fucking gas money?”
Charlotte chuckles. “Yeah, that’d be kind of dumb of you.”
“I’m dumb, but I’m notthatdumb. Besides, even if you had money, blackmail isn’t something I’d do to anyone, not evenyou—the most annoying human in the entire universe—a woman who thought stealing money from the fucking mob was a brilliant idea.”
“I didn’tthink! That’s my whole point! I saw the bag and the cash inside and went into some sort of trance. It was a moment of pure insanity, plain and simple. I had a psychotic break!”
I stop the car at a red light and run my hand down my face. “Do you swear on your love for Tessa you didn’t take any videos or photos of my puppet show or anything else through the peephole?”
“I swear on Tessa. It didn’t even occur to me to do that. I swear it on Tessa and her children and my mother and brothers. Also, on my father, may he rest in peace.”
“Thank you. I believe you.” I pause. “Sorry about your father.”
“Thank you. Now it’s your turn to tell me the truth and swear to it. Did you, or did you not, call that tow truck on me, Augustus Vaughn?”
I can’t help chuckling. “Yes, I did.”
“I knew it!”
The light turns green, and we’re off again. “So what? It doesn’t seem like such a crime, now that I know all the crazy shit you’ve done, McDougal. Stealing money from the mob? Babe, that makes calling a tow truck seem like child’s play.”
To my surprise, Charlotte laughs with me. “Yeah, I’ve definitely surprised myself lately. I can’t believe I did that.What was I thinking?”
“You weren’t.”
“I’m totally out of control, if you want to know the truth. I don’t blame you for calling that tow truck. I deserved that and more.” She flashes me a look of genuine remorse. “I’m so sorry I’ve gotten you involved in my mess. I promise, I’m not going to let anything happen to you, Auggie.”
I flap my lips together. “You didn’t do it maliciously. And you got some major help from me. The thing is, I’ve got my own money crunch—a big, fat tuition invoice that’s already past due.As it is, I’m only gonna be able to make enough with my puppet shows to pay half of it in time, so I can negotiate a payment plan for the rest.”
“How much is full tuition, and how much do you make per show?”
I tell Charlotte the numbers, and she looks decidedly underwhelmed by my average earnings.
“Shoot,” she says. “I thought you had to be making bank. At least four times that amount per show.”
“That’s actually really good for me. I used to make a fraction of that when all I did was jack off in a superhero mask.” I explain what I used to do as Superhero Salami Slinger and that the puppet show is actually a new tactic for me—the big idea I had after my father abruptly retracted his promise to pay for all four years of my schooling.
