Page 94 of Hot & Heavy

Ian exhaled with a loud whoosh. "I give in. What is my wife doing now?"

"Well, it's not so much what she's doing. It's the visitor who came to see her."

" What?" Ian shouted into the phone.

"Really, cher, you've gotta work on your phone personality. My eardrums are developing a ring."

"Tell… me…" he gritted out.

"Your father came to visit Maddie."

This was the absolute last thing Ian expected to hear. He was angry with Maddie, but, God, his father would make mincemeat of her. "Why did he come?"

"Not sure. Guess he wanted to look over your better half."

Ian snorted his opinion.

"Man, you woulda been proud of her. She laid into your dad like some kinda warrior princess. She was a pit bull for you."

For me? Why would she defend me? Interfering witch! "And what did my father do?"

"He hugged her."

Hugged her? I think I will go slit my wrists. "Where is he… she… now?"

"They're sharing a mead in the kitchen and exchanging family secrets. I didn't know you peed the bed till you were three. Ha, ha, ha. What's that noise I hear?"

"My head banging on the desk."

Wacky or woo-woo?…

Ian was ambushed three days later as he left the mess hall. Geek, Omar and Pretty Boy stood in his path.

"We need to talk to you about Maddie. She—" Geek started to say.

"The last thing we need to talk about is Maddie," Ian interrupted. He put up both hands to halt them.

"Unless she has flown the coop again, unless her life is in danger, unless your lives are in danger from her, I don't want to hear it."

"You should hear this," Omar said.

"No. My nerves are strung so tight, they could slinky me down the steps of the Washington Monument."

"Frustration will do that to you every time," Pretty Boy opined.

"Bite me!" Ian said succinctly. "Get back to work. All of you."

The three of them just looked at him, said "Okay" as one, and turned to walk away into the mess hall.

"Shit!" They were actually going to leave without telling him the latest on Maddie. Forget about the fact he'd told them he didn't want to know. They should have told him anyway. With a sigh of resignation, he called, "Wait!"

The three stooges turned and smiled at him, as if they'd known he would be curious. Soon they were sitting down to coffee.

Geek started first. "There is something really strange about Maddie."

Ian raised his eyebrows. "Tell me something I don't know."

"Seriously, Mac, it's not just the way she talks," Omar said. "And believe me, some of the random words in her speech are more like the tenth or eleventh century than today. In fact, I've heard Icelanders speak the way she does."