Getting Dumped by Tawna Fenske Page A

stared down Petty. “The officer last night who came to assist our friend, Pete Wilco, suggested we come here and—”
    “Who?” Petty asked.
    “P-Pete Wilco?” stuttered Frank, dropping his donut on the floor. He bent down and retrieved it, straightening up with a dumbstruck expression and the donut in his fist.
    “Pete Wilco,” I repeated, looking from one to the other.
    “Never heard of him,” Petty said, scowling.
    Frank just stared.
    I shrugged. “He starred in some straight-to-video action flick that sold a few dozen copies a few years ago.”
    “ Bionic Cyber Cops in Monster Trucks ,” Frank said, nodding as he clutched the donut in one hand. “If you ladies would like to come with me, I think I can help you out.”
    Lori gave Petty her most smug smirk before grabbing the box of donuts and tucking them under her arm. I scooped up the fabric swatches and trotted after Frank as he lumbered down the hall, around a corner, and into a small, gray office.
    He dropped into a lopsided yellow chair behind the desk and set his donut down on a piece of paper. Lori put the donut box on the edge of the desk and opened it up enticingly before settling into another chair. I eyed the remaining chairs – all covered with giant stacks of paper – and opted to stand.
    Frank reached into the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a pair of rubber gloves and some tweezers.
    “So what seems to be the problem?” he asked, pulling on the gloves and picking up the tweezers.
    Lori and I stared for a few beats, neither of us speaking. I was the first to break the silence.
    “Well, I just started this new job at the landfill,” I began.
    “Sure, sure,” Frank said, studying the donut with his tweezers poised above it. “You being sexually harassed or something?”
    “Um, no. That’s not it.”
    Frank grunted and began picking at the donut with the tweezers. “Unsafe work environment?”
    He extracted something from the jelly filling before dipping the tip of the tweezers in a tiny dish of liquid on the edge of his desk.
    “No, of course not. See—”
    “Do you need a different donut?” Lori interrupted. She’d been quiet until this point, but had apparently reached a breaking point.
    He looked up, seemingly startled to see us sitting there. “Donut? No, I can’t stand donuts. They give me gas.”
    “But—”
    “This here is Drosophila pachea,” he said, holding up his tweezers. “A very rare fruit fly that only breeds on the stems of senita cactus. I don’t know how the little devil ended up here, but I’ve been wanting a specimen like this for years.”
    I stared. “You collect fruit flies.”
    “Of course.”
    Lori nodded, apparently satisfied with that explanation. “I collect handbags,” she announced, reaching into hers to extract a business card. “I’m really proud of my collection, and I’ve invested a lot of time and money in it. As I’m sure you have with your collection?”
    “Um—” Frank said, studying Lori’s card with apparent confusion.
    “And I care very much about making sure every item in my collection is authentic, don’t you?”
    “Well—”
    “So how would you feel if someone started forging fruit flies?”
    Frank stared at Lori.
    “What my sister is trying to say,” I continued, “is that we found some materials at the Albright County Landfill that suggest someone is creating counterfeit designer handbags locally.”
    “Say what?”
    “Look,” Lori said, snatching the fabric swatches from me and dumping them out beside the donuts. “This here is supposed to look like Coach’s signature material, only you notice how the little Cs don’t line up right? Or this one, this is supposed to look like the lining from a special edition Christian Dior bag that was just released in the spring, only if you look really closely you’ll see that—”
    “What does this have to do with you being sexually harassed?” Frank said, staring at me, then Lori, then back at me. When