In Over Her Head by Elsie Russell - Parnasse.com

contraband, the labels are in Russian." She looked up at the gun
sticking out of Max's waist.
"Hey, you know, we should be using gloves for this, but you've
had your paws all over this stuff, haven't you?"
Alessandro raised his hands, and shook his head, pure Harpo
Marx pantomime.
Max was so pumped he was stupid. He scratched his jaw and
threw his messenger bag on the leopard futon next to Alessandro, who
literally jumped a few inches up from his seat, he was so edgy.
Still in her red bra, Maia stomped around the room, tearing at
her curls. Suddenly she pushed Max into the kitchen, where she ran the
water to muffle her voice, not that it did anything.
All Penny caught was prison and c'est vraiment con. Max
mumbled something back and one of them banged stuff around in the
kitchen.
In the living room, Penny poured Alessandro some cold tea. He
drank, breathing a long sigh of relief. Plunging his fingers into his eyes,
he mushed them around as if to erase what he had seen.
Maia came back with a collection of red vinyl colorist's gloves
and tossed them on the table.
"We can use these. Max, get your laptop. I find the video
player. And I make some more tea, a big pot. Va bene, Sandro?" She
mussed his hair, kneeling in front of the cabinet to pull out her cheap
video cassette deck, grimy with use.
Max argued with her. "Non! I have better equipment."
"Your place smells like feet and this equipment is okay. Here
we have tea, it smells good and it is warm."
Max ducked back out to get his gear. Penny decided not to pull
out her laptop yet. No telling what was crawling around in those disks,
and she didn't want any trouble aiding and abetting.
Max came back with his laptop, equipped with the best DVD
player money could buy. He still had the gun tucked into the waistband
of his spandex cycling suit. Maybe he expected company. He slammed
in the top DVD, that playing, of all things, the very video that had
brought Penny all this way. The under the virtual water footage with
Penny's music filtering through the speakers.
Maia stood in the kitchen doorway, wiping her hands on a
checkered dishrag. Alessandro gazed enigmatically at Penny. Max
looked up from his screen, "This creep is transforming Ula into a
cartoon! This is nothing like what I was doing with her, remember?
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