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I was too old for that crap. I was also too old to spend my days hiding out in trees and hunting for food in back alleys and dumpsters, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. Harriet can be very forceful sometimes, and right now I had to admit it was for good reason. Our humans needed to be taught a lesson, and so we were going to teach it, even though it meant making a few sacrifices.

We sat quietly for a moment, watching the sun rise over the park. My stomach was rumbling and my mind drifted to the nice treats Gran would be putting out for us, probably calling our names right now and opening the backdoor to see where we were.

My heart bled for her—and for my poor empty stomach.

Chapter 13

Croquet was not a sport Odelia had ever played before. In fact she’d had no real awareness of the sport before now. All she knew was that it was played with a wooden hammer and that balls had to be put through hoops hammered into the ground. Clearly none of the other participants in this extravaganza had any idea what they were doing either, which didn’t diminish the fun.

Emerald and Pete were both team captains and got to pick their teams—not coincidentally Emerald picked all the women and Pete picked all the men. Soon they were slugging away at those colored balls and putting them through as many hoops as they could. It wasn’t exactly a contact sport, but it soon turned into one when Alina faced off against her husband and fora moment Odelia feared she would hit him instead of the ball.

And then she managed to get her revenge by hitting the ball right between Reinhart’s eyes. He went down for the count and the game was over before it really got started. A bucket of ice was brought out and Kimberlee’s hockey player, who’d seen this type of injury before, attended to the fallen rock star. Alina, impatiently tapping her foot, didn’t even pretend to be sorry.

“Nice shot,” said Chase as he and Odelia watched the proceedings from the sidelines.

“For a moment there I thought she was going to attack him with the mallet,” said Odelia.

“Yeah, that would have been bad.”

Kimberlee now also bent down next to Reinhart, like an administering angel holding the ice against the man’s damaged snout. When Alina saw this, she took a firmer grip on her mallet and stalked over to Kimberlee. She swung and would have hit the unsuspecting young actress in the back of the head if Pete hadn’t been there to stop her at the last moment.

“Let me have a whack at her!” screamed Alina. “Let me have a great big whack at that great big ugly head of hers!” she raged.

“What’s your problem, huh?” Kimberlee shouted, now aware she’d narrowly escaped a terrible fate.

“You tart!” Alina screeched. “You horrible little tart!”

“Oh, look who’s talking!” Kimberlee screamed right back. “Who tried to seduce my boyfriend, huh? You, you skinny skank!”

“What? Are you crazy?” Alina yelled, balling her fists and shaking them furiously. “I never even came near your stupid boyfriend.”

“That’s not what he says. He says you came on to him and he had a hard time removing your saggy old boobs from his shoulder!”

For a moment, Alina didn’t speak, then suddenly she screamed so loud, Odelia winced, and then she was launching herself at Kimberlee, hands out, claws extended, and tackled the young woman!

For a moment, all Odelia could see were the two ladies rolling on the floor, screaming so loud even Emerald’s distant neighbors must have been alerted by the sound, and then Pete—him again—and Chase and a few of the others managed to separate the two women. There was a rending sound as they were dragged apart, and then Kimberlee stalked off towards the house, minus her shoes, which she had lost inthe scuffle, and Alina did the same thing but in the other direction.

“Everyone!” Emerald said nervously. “Drink some more Coke Emerald. There’s plenty to go around!” And she held up a can for good measure.

“Who cares about your stupid Coke Emerald, Emerald?!” Abbey yelled. And then she stalked off in the direction of the house, too.

The croquet match was more or less over after that, and people started drifting off in different directions.

“Nice party,” said Chase as he joined Odelia.

“It’s a miracle these people managed to create two seasons ofBig Little Secrets without killing each other.”

The director of the show, who must have overheard them, drifted over.“Oh, it wasn’t like that,” he said, “I can assure you.”

“They weren’t trying to whack each other over the head with croquet mallets?” asked Chase.

The director, a rail-thin man with wavy blond hair and a lined face, smiled indulgently.“No, they weren’t. I run a pretty tight ship, and I would have none of this crap. But they wouldn’t have gone this far, either. They knew the stakes, and would never spoil the shoot.”

“And now that the shoot is over, they just let it all hang out, you mean?” said Odelia.

“Pretty much. A lot of tension is generated when you live cheek by jowl for months on end. It is not a natural state—and it leads to friction.”