Free The Secret Society of Demolition Writers by Marc Parent Page A

wearing a dress that looked like it might be a little warm for the summer weather. Something about her was familiar to him—the eyes maybe. He couldn’t place it. He knew there was no reason he would have ever seen her before.
    “What’s your name, sweetheart?”
    “Lucy.”
    Brian’s eyes lit in surprise.
    “Really? That’s my favorite name for a girl. My wife and I are about to have a baby and if it’s a girl we’re going to call her Lucy, just like you. Do you believe that? How old are you, sweetheart?”
    She smiled, revealing she was missing a front tooth.
    “Six.”
    “Wow, I would have guessed at least seven. You’re a big girl.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Well, listen, I have to do some cleaning up in here and it might get dusty. You should run along now, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    “See you, Lucy.”
    “Bye, bye, Box Man.”
    He watched her leave the room, wondering how she knew to call him that. Had her father used the term? He couldn’t remember but assumed Robinette had told her who he was and what he was doing in the house. He listened to her footsteps padding away and then he went back to work, vacuuming out the safe and then taking photos of the safe’s door, front and back.
    After loading his equipment back into the truck he sat in the driver’s seat while writing out a billing statement on his clipboard. He didn’t charge Robinette anything other than the two-fifty already agreed to. He took the bill back inside with him and called up the stairs to Robinette.
    Robinette studied the bill as they walked back to the study.
    “I ought to retire and learn how to legally break into safes. What’s this come out to, like eighty bucks an hour for using a drill?”
    “Hardly. I’m lucky if I get one job a day. There aren’t that many safes that need opening all the time. Most of my work is just plain old locksmithing.”
    “Well, I’d say you did pretty damn good today.”
    Robinette dropped the bill onto the desk in the study as if he were dismissing it.
    Brian said, “I usually get paid upon completion of the job.”
    Robinette said, “Well, you didn’t say that before.”
    “It is custom in the service industry. I didn’t think I had to say it.”
    Brian could tell that Robinette didn’t like that service thing thrown back at him.
    “All right,” he said curtly. “I’ll go up and get you a check.”
    “Thank you.”
    Just before Robinette left the study Brian spoke up again.
    “What do you want me to do with the door? It’s heavy. I could take it and get rid of it, if you want.”
    “No, no,” Robinette answered quickly. “If you don’t mind, could you carry it out to the curb and sort of prop it up so it can be seen?”
    Brian was confused.
    “If you want me to, but why?”
    “Three words:
In Cold Blood
. Trash pickup doesn’t come until Thursday. That means it will be out there a couple days and maybe the word will get out that there is no longer a safe in here.”
    Brian nodded though he didn’t really follow the logic.
    “What’s that old song say?
Paranoia will destroy ya
.”
    Robinette turned fully around to confront him.
    “Look, I don’t expect you to understand me or my life. Do you have children?”
    “Got one on the way. I’m not trying to—”
    “I don’t care what you are trying or not trying to say. Just do your job and don’t worry about my paranoia. My paranoia got me this place and this life. I think in some ways it’s like drilling through steel plates for a living, but I like it better. It’s not as noisy. Now if you don’t mind, I will go up and get you a check while you take that damn thing out to the curb. Okay?”
    “You got it.”
    AT DINNER BRIAN told Laura all about his encounter with the arrogant writer and she told him that Robinette hadn’t had a book out in at least three years. She suggested that maybe that had something to do with his paranoia and arrogance.
    “I was reading in one of the baby books about how when they get