Chapter 30:Fun for Lester and Kitty
It had been several months since anyone had come into Ambrose, and the three Sinclair brothers, as well as Katrina, were starving for some excitement. Besides several rather rambunctious arguments between Katrina and Bo, nothing else had happened. Bo lounged about the house and the church, drinking beer and singing old country songs under his breath. Vincent spent hours sketching or painting Katrina as a mermaid, an angel, the Madonna, and countless other things. Katrina rearranged the living room and kitchen, dusted the House of Wax and began a flower garden that she soon abandoned any hope of growing anything out of. Finally, she began reading anything she could get her hands on.
Around noon one day, Bo and Katrina lay out on the porch, drinking lemonade-flavored Kool-Aid and soaking in the June warmth. Bo had just finished telling the girl about how he slammed a girl named Jennifer's head into her car windshield by holding on to her face while he was driving his truck. Katrina brought up the subject by asking who the previous Miss Ambrose was. Vincent came out of the house, rubbing wet hair as he had just gotten out of the shower.
"What's going on, my love?" Katrina greeted the deformed man, waving her hand in front of her face.
He smiled and leaned down to kiss her, his wet hair tickling her face as it stuck to her cheeks. "Are you hot, Kitty?"
She shook her head. "Not really. I just feel like a cat right now. All anxious and twitchy. If I had a tail, I'd be thrashin' it around this very minute. Instead, I have to settle for waving my hand."
Bo rolled his eyes at the girl's long, languid speech and let out a great belch.
"So gross, Bo-Bo!" Katrina objected.
"It's my lemonade. I can burp it up if I want."
"Don't burp like that when you're around others!" she said in an unusually snappish voice.
"I'll do what I want," he answered.
Vincent's eyebrows began to furrow at the easy way in which Katrina and Bo teased each other. The young woman read the warning signs of a jealous rage and was glad when she saw Lester's vehicle approaching.
"Any of y'all wanna come wit' me t' the bar t' pick up that licker Henry owes me?" Lester asked.
"Sure, I'll go," Katrina said, looking relieved. She hopped into Lester's truck with a smile, not even wincing at the smell.
Lester grinned back at his brothers' mirrored looks of incredulity and drove into Woodston, chatting to Katrina about stupid things like knives and bones the whole time. They picked up the cases of Crown Royal bottles and set them in the back of the truck, tying them down with twine. Lester pulled one of the bottles out and opened it once they drove out of the gravel driveway of Henry's Place.
"Here's t' you," he said, chugging some of the liquor down.
Katrina took it when it was offered to her and tossed her head back, taking a long drink. It wasn't long before the bottle was empty and the two were quite drunk. When they neared Ambrose, Katrina noticed a car on their side of the road, pulled over close to the ditch on the right. Someone was standing several yards behind the car, talking on a cell phone. Lips spreading into a wide, drunken smile, Katrina nudged Lester with her elbow.
"Speed up some and get closer to the bitch," she ordered.
Lester grinned down at her and did as she said. Katrina rolled down her window and leaned partway out of the truck, both her arms out. The girl on the cell phone saw what she was doing and stood staring in confused silence. Katrina grabbed the girl's head as Lester sped by and drug her backwards, slamming her face into the back window of the parked car.
"Shit," Lester said as he tried to catch his breath from laughing so hard.
"What?" Katrina giggled.
"There was someone else in that car."
"Wanna go back and off 'em?"
Lester shook his head slowly. "Nope. We should just go."
Katrina snickered, swaying drunkenly. "Such fun for Lester and Kitty."
Her companion began to snort with laughter before growing serious. "Bo's gonna be pissed," he informed her.
She laughed. "Oh well. I guess I'd better look innocent."
They pulled into Ambrose with sober expressions on their faces. Lester followed Katrina up to the house and into the front door. Bo was sitting on the couch watching T.V. and saw what he recognized immediately as Lester's guilty face.
"What happened?" he asked immediately.
Lester, unable to lie to his brother, told the story as Bo's face grew red. It wasn't long before Bo was shouting at Lester about how stupid they were, how they could have gotten caught, and other things before his words grew so strewn together they were incoherent.
"Oh no," Katrina mumbled as she stumbled into the living room. "We're in so much trouble." She sank into a chair, listening to Bo's tirade with her face in her hands.