‘Going Rogue’ Chapters 13-16

Chapter Fourteen

It was Monday morning, and I woke up in Morelli’s bed thinking life was good. It had been days since anyone tried to stun gun me. Connie was back home. And so far, none of Bella’s threats about boils and incontinence had come true. Morelli had left for work a couple hours ago, but his big goofy dog Bob had taken Morelli’s place next to me.

“This is going to be a perfect day,” I said to Bob. “It feels like all my stars are finally in alignment.”

I didn’t want to say it out loud to Bob, but I was having serious thoughts about Morelli. It had been a really good weekend. Comfortably intimate. Pleasantly relaxing. Especially nice not to have a lot of drama after the chaos of last week. I thought I would like to have more weekends like this. Maybe I wanted it full-time. Maybe I wanted to get married.

“That’s sort of a scary thought,” I said to Bob. “What do you think?”

Bob didn’t look like he thought much about marriage. Bob was chill this morning. If Bob thought about anything it would be breakfast.

+++

Connie was at her desk when I got to the office. The box of doughnuts was on the desk, and the office smelled like fresh brewed coffee. Never underestimate the joy of normal, I thought. And never take normal for granted.

A single Boston cream was still in the box, but I was in a magnanimous mood, so I left it for Lula. An hour later, Lula bustled in.

“I wanted to get here early but I overslept,” Lula said. “Did I miss anything? What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on,” I said.

“I didn’t see the Rangeman car out front,” Lula said.

“It was a quiet weekend, so Ranger switched to electronic surveillance.”

Morelli called. “I have a problem,” he said. “Bella is supposed to be confined to the house, but a neighbor called and said Bella just got picked up by an airport limo service. I called the service and Bella told them she was going to Italy.”

“Can she do that?”

“Maybe. She has a credit card. I don’t know about a passport.” “Didn’t your mom stop her?”

“My mom isn’t home. She’s at the hospital with my Aunt Bitsy.”

“What’s wrong with Bitsy?”

“I don’t know. There’s always something wrong with Bitsy. I can’t keep up with it. My sister-in-law was supposed to be keeping an eye on Bella, but I can’t reach her. She’s not picking up when I call her.”

“Which sister-in-law?”

“Marylou.”

I was getting a queasy feeling in my stomach. “Why are you calling me?”

“I was hoping you’d go to the airport and get Bella.”

“No. No, no, no, no.”

“I can’t go. I’m in the middle of a double murder.”

“What about Anthony?”

“I’ve called everybody I know. Every relative. No one will go,” Morelli said.

“Why don’t you just let her go to Italy?”

“Yeah, that would be tempting, but I don’t think we have any relatives left in Italy, and I’d be the one who would have to go find her and bring her back.”

“Why don’t you tell the car company to turn around and drive her home?”

“They’ve already dropped her off at Newark.”

“She’s going to make a scene. She’s not going to want to come home with me.”

“Yes, but you have a legitimate reason for wrangling her out of the airport. You have a bail bond agreement and she’s a flight risk.”

So much for the perfect day. “Text me the flight information. I assume you know where she is in the airport.”

“I don’t know exactly. I think she might be flying American.”

I hung up and grabbed my messenger bag. “Come on,” I said to Lula. “We’re going to Newark airport.”

“I was only hearing half of that conversation,” Lula said, “but it didn’t sound good.”

“Bella is at the airport, and we’re going to get her and bring her home.”

“There’s no we. I’m not doing that. She’ll put the eye on me, and my hair will all fall out. I don’t want that to happen. I like my hair.”

Her hair was currently pulled back into a massive puffball of pink frizz.

“There’s no such thing as the eye,” I told her.

“Are you sure?”

“Mostly,” I said. “Anyway, I’m going. You don’t have to go with me. I totally understand.”

“Well, I can’t let you go by yourself,” Lula said. “Especially after you left me the Boston cream. Not many people would do a thing like that.”

I took I-95 to the Jersey Turnpike and didn’t hit traffic until the exit to the airport. That was disappointing. If I’d hit traffic sooner Bella might already have boarded by the time I got to the gate.

I parked and Lula and I walked into Departures. There was a line of people in front of the American ticketing counter, and a clump of uniformed police and airline employees at the desk.

“The nightmare has begun,” I said to Lula.

“It don’t look good,” she said. “That’s a Bella cluster if I ever saw one.”

I waded into the uniforms and came in behind Bella.

“You know nothing,” Bella said to one of the cops. “If you don’t watch your step, I fix you good.”

“What’s the problem?” I asked the ticket agent.

Bella turned and narrowed her already narrow eyes at me. “Slut! What you doing here.”

“Your grandson sent me to bring you home.”

“I’m not going home. I’m going to Italy.”

“She doesn’t have a passport,” the ticket agent said to me.

“I don’t need passport,” Bella said. “I’m old lady. I’m American citizen. We go where we want. I have credit card and money. Money talks, eh?”

“Let’s go home and look for your passport,” I said to Bella. “You can come back tomorrow.”

“You big liar,” Bella said. “God will strike you down.”

“Hey,” Lula said. “You can’t talk to Stephanie like that.”

“That’s it for you,” Bella said to Lula. “I’m giving you the eye.”

“For Pete’s sake,” I said to Bella. “That’s enough with the eye.”

“I give you one too,” Bella said.

“Okay,” I said, “how about if I put you in handcuffs.”

Bella held her arms out. “Look at this. This is how sick old ladies are treated. Handcuffed. Somebody take a picture.”

“You can’t handcuff her,” one of the cops said.

I pulled Bella’s papers out of my messenger bag. “I can handcuff her and forcibly remove her. She has an active bail bond and she’s obviously a flight risk.”

“Thank goodness,” the desk clerk said.

One of the cops scanned the papers and looked over at me. “Are you Stephanie Plum?”

“Yes,” I said.

He looked at the two cops behind him. “It’s Stephanie Plum!” he said.

Everyone was smiling.

“You’re the one who burned the funeral home down,” he said. “And last year you jumped out of the window of that hooker hotel. I saw your picture in the paper.”

I put the cuffs on Bella. “The funeral home wasn’t my fault,” I said. “It was an accident. And only part of it burned down.”

“Can I get a selfie?” the cop asked.

“Sure,” I said.

Everyone crowded in, several pictures were taken, and Lula and I escorted Bella out of the building.

“I don’t want to go to Italy anyway,” Bella said when we got to the car. “Everybody is dead there. Italy isn’t what it used to be.”

I got Bella secured in the backseat and I texted Morelli that I was bringing her home.

“You!” Bella said. “The fat one. Why your hair is big bushy pink.”

“First off, I’m not fat,” Lula said. “I’ve got an abundance of voluptuousness.”

“You look fat to me,” Bella said. “What about the hair?”

“I regard hair as a fashion accessory. I think hair should be fun.”

“So, you make it pink? I think you don’t know how to have fun.” “How do you have fun?” Lula asked her.

“I drink and I smoke. I like weed,” Bella said.

“Fuckin’ A,” Lula said.

“You got dirty mouth,” Bella said. “I give you the eye.”

“I think giving people the eye is how you have fun,” Lula said.

“It my job,” Bella said.

+++

I parked in the Morelli driveway and got Bella out of the car. I took the cuffs off her and walked her to the door.

“This is good,” Bella said. “Go away.”

I tried the door. Not locked. A red RAV4 was parked at the curb. Probably the sister-in-law was here. I opened the door and followed Bella inside.

“Go away or I give you the eye,” Bella said.

Lula was behind me. “There’s something wrong in this house,” Lula said. “I hear something thumping.”

“Water heater,” Bella said. “No good.”

I stopped and listened. “I hear it too,” I said. “I get it fixed tomorrow,” Bella said.

I followed the thumping to the kitchen. “It’s louder here. It’s coming from the door next to the refrigerator. What’s behind the door?” I asked Bella.

“Nothing,” Bella said. “Closet with mop.”

“Help!” someone yelled behind the door. Thump, thump, thump. “Let me out!”

An old-fashioned skeleton key was stuck in the lock. I unlocked the door and Marylou crashed the door open and lunged out into the kitchen. She was red-faced and sweating.

“Thank God you showed up,” she said to me. “This crazy old hag locked me in the cellar. She said there was something wrong with the water heater and when I went down to look, she locked me in. It’s just a crawl space down there with about a million spiders.”

“We heard you banging on the door,” Lula said.

Marylou shoved some hair off her face and turned to me wild-eyed. “Do not marry into this family. They’re all nuts.” She whirled around and jabbed her finger at Bella. “You are a horrible, evil person. You aren’t even a person. You’re a . . . fruitcake!” Marylou snatched her purse off the kitchen counter and stomped off to the front door. “I’m out of here. I’m done. I don’t care if she burns the house down.”

“Good riddance,” Bella said. “She knows nothing.”

I called Morelli. “I brought Bella home,” I said.

“Is Marylou there?”

“No. Bella locked her in the cellar. We heard her banging on the door, and when we let her out, she left.”

“If you could just stay with her until four o’clock, I can take over. And then my mom will be home.”

“Have you tried taking her to a doctor?”

“We did that. Bella gave him the eye and he got shingles. I have to go. I’m treading water here.”

Maybe Marylou was right. Marriage to Morelli might not be a good idea.

“I’m supposed to stay with you until Joe gets off work,” I said to Bella.”

“Good,” Bella said. “You can make me lunch and wash the floor.”

Connie called. “We just got an alert on Zane Walburg. He didn’t show for court this morning and Vinnie is freaked out. It’s a super-high bond.”

“The name sounds familiar.”

“He got a lot of publicity when he was arrested. He makes bombs on demand. His big seller is the retro pressure cooker bomb. Vinnie wants you to drop everything and find this guy before he seriously disappears. I have the paperwork ready for you to pick up.”

“I’m hung up until four o’clock.”

“That’s okay,” Connie said. “I’ll see you at four.”

I could hear Vinnie ranting in the background. “Four o’clock isn’t okay. What the hell is she doing? She’s supposed to be working. This guy is going to run.”

“I have to go to the office,” I said to Lula. “Can you stay with Bella?”

“Not now. Not ever,” Lula said.

“Then we’re all going to the office. Everybody out to the car.” “What about my lunch,” Bella said.

“I might be getting a migraine,” Lula said.

I locked the door to the house and went to the car. Lula and Bella were arguing about who should get the front seat.

“Your head is too big,” Bella said to Lula. “I can’t see anything from the backseat.”

“You’re supposed to look out the side window,” Lula said.

“You sat in front last time,” Bella said.

“That’s because you were a prisoner,” Lula said. “Handcuffed prisoners always sit in the backseat. Everybody knows that.”

“I’m not handcuffed now,” Bella said. “I’m senior citizen. I deserve front seat.”

“Let her have the front seat,” I said to Lula. “You can have the front seat next time.”

“It’s because of my pink hair, isn’t it?” Lula said to me. “You don’t want me in the front because of my pink hair.”

“That’s ridiculous. You sat in the front this morning, didn’t you? Was your hair pink?”

“Nobody cares your hair is pink,” Bella said, getting into the front passenger seat. “It’s your head is too big. Now you take your big head and sit in the back.”

I drove to the office and parked, being sure to take the key with me. I dashed inside, grabbed the papers, and went back to the car. I handed the papers to Lula.

“Where are we going?” I said to Lula.

“Hamilton Township. Curly Tree Gardens. Looks like an apartment complex.”

“I’ve been there,” I said. “It’s by the pet cemetery.”

“What is this?” Bella asked. “What we doing?”

“I’m doing my job,” I said. “A man failed to appear for his court appearance, and I need to find him and bring him back to the court to get rescheduled.”

“Why? What he do?”

“He builds and sells bombs.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Bella asked.

“It’s illegal,” I said.

“This country have too many rules,” Bella said.

“Remember when Salvatore Perroni’s Cadillac got bombed and Sal lost four fingers on his hand? That’s why bombs are illegal,” I said.

“I didn’t like that,” Bella said. “That was bad bomb. Sal couldn’t hold cards to play poker. Only had a thumb.”

+++

Curly Tree Gardens was a large complex of three-story cinder-block and stucco buildings that looked like they were built by the Russian army. Number 126 was a garden-level apartment without the benefit of a garden.

It had two parking spaces allotted to it. One space was occupied by a Hyundai. I took the remaining space.

“You stay here,” I said to Bella.

“Take the key and crack the window for her,” Lula said.

“Hunh,” Bella said. “Fat head.”

Lula and I walked to the door, and I rang the bell. In my peripheral vision I caught a dark shadow scuttling toward us. Bella.

The door opened and a guy who looked like a twenty-six-year-old, chubby Harry Potter peered out at us.

“Zane Walburg?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “What’s up?”

“I represent Vincent Plum. You missed your court date this morning.”

“No biggie,” he said. “I’ll go some other time.”

“Absolutely,” I said. “I came to take you downtown to reschedule.”

“Okay, but not now. I got a rush order last night.” He looked past me at Lula and Bella. “Did they miss a court date, too?”

“No,” I said. “They’re with me. It’s a long story. You don’t want to hear it.”

“Do you build bombs?” Bella asked him.

“Yep,” he said. “Bombs R Me. That’s my website.”

“I want to see one,” Bella said.

“Do you want to buy one?”

“Maybe,” Bella said.

“I don’t have a lot of inventory,” he said. “Mostly I build on demand, but I have a classic pressure cooker bomb that was never picked up. I could give you a good price on it.”

“We aren’t buying bombs today,” I said to him. “And I know you’re busy but you’re going to have to take a half hour out to go to the courthouse with me to reschedule.”

“No,” he said. “Not now. I have work to do.”

“You became a felon when you missed your court date,” I said, taking cuffs out of my back pocket. “I’m going to have to insist that you come with me.”

“I’ll cut a deal with you,” he said. “I’ll give you the pressure cooker bomb in exchange for you going away and never coming back.”

“I don’t need a pressure cooker bomb.”

“How about a firebomb? Everyone should have a firebomb. I could put one together for you in a couple minutes.”

“You aren’t paying attention,” Lula said to Walburg. “You need to get your chubby behind out to our car. It happens that I don’t have a lot of patience and I’m getting cranky.”

Walburg adjusted his round Harry Potter lenses. “It happens that you don’t know who you’re dealing with,” he said. “I’m the bomb maker. I could blow you to smithereens at the touch of a button.”

Bella shoved Lula aside. “Too much talk,” she said. “You do what the slut say, or I put the eye on you.”

“What’s the eye?” Walburg asked.

“It’s a curse,” Lula said. “She does this thing with her eye and bad things happen to you.”

Walburg looked at me. “Are you people serious?”

I shrugged.

“Go ahead,” Walburg said to Bella. “Put the eye on me. Give it your best shot.”

“I go easy on you first time,” Bella said. “I make you poop your pants.”

Walburg burst out laughing and then . . . BRRRUP. He stopped laughing.

“Holy crap,” Lula said, stepping farther away from Walburg.

Bella gave a soft chuckle. “Heh, heh, heh. Good one, eh?” She looked at Walburg. “You coming to car now?”

“That was coincidence,” he said. “I get irritable bowel sometimes.”

“Okay, here goes,” Bella said. “This time I make your pee-pee swell up like watermelon. Maybe I give it big boils. I have good luck with boils curse.”

“No!” he said. “No boils. Look, I’m going to the door. This won’t take long, right?”

“Right,” I said.

“Is this your car?” he said. “I’m getting in. You want me in the back, right? Let’s go.”

Bella started to get in the front and Lula stopped her. “My turn to sit up front,” Lula said. “We made a deal.”

“Deal is off,” Bella said.

“No way,” Lula said.

“I give you the eye,” Bella said.

“I’ll squash you like a bug,” Lula said.

“I don’t want to sit up front anyway,” Bella said.

We all got in and I backed out of the driveway.

“It don’t smell good back here,” Bella said.

“It don’t smell all that good up front either,” Lula said. “It’s coming from Walburg. We should have put him in the shower before putting him in the car. Maybe we should go back to his apartment.”

“Ignore it,” I said. “I’m not turning around.”

“Stop the car,” Bella said. “I’m getting out.”

I hit the child lock button and opened all the windows. “No one’s getting out until we’re at the municipal building.”

“It’s all your fault anyway,” Lula said to Bella. “You made him poop his pants.”

“Seemed like good idea,” Bella said. “I was tired of standing there. I wanted lunch. I didn’t think ahead to sitting in backseat.”

Twenty minutes later, I pulled into the parking lot for the municipal building, and everyone jumped out of the car. I cuffed Walburg, walked him across the street to the police station, and apologized to the desk cop.

“Sorry about the smell,” I said. “Not my bad.”

Lula and Bella were standing at a distance from my car when I got back to the parking lot.

“Anyone still want lunch?” I asked.

“We should go to Cluck-in-a-Bucket and get takeout,” Lula said. “That way we can replace the Walburg smell with fried- chicken-and-onion-rings smell.”

I cut through town to Hamilton Avenue and got buckets of fried chicken, onion rings, fries, and coleslaw. We took it to the office and set it all on Connie’s desk.

Vinnie popped out of his office, spied Bella, and instantly retreated, slamming his door shut and locking it.

“Va fancul,” Bella said to the closed door, hand gesture included.

“Amen to that,” Lula said.

We pulled chairs up to Connie’s desk and dug into the food.

“I got good stuff,” Bella said, taking a flask out of her pocketbook. “Who want some?”

“I’ll take a hit,” Lula said, pouring out a shot glass of hooch. She threw it back and gasped. “Fire,” she said. “I’m on fire. That’s one hundred percent grain alcohol.”

“Amateur,” Bella said to Lula, chugging some down.

Connie and I passed.

“Why was Walburg considered a flight risk?” I asked Connie.

“He has clients who value his expertise and would prefer not to see him come to trial,” Connie said. “They have the ability to relocate him.”

“Or terminate him?” Lula said.

“It’s possible but not likely. I hear he’s very clever. A bomb savant,” Connie said.

Bella ate two pieces of chicken and drained her flask. “I’m done,” Bella said. “What now? You got any more job to do?”

“Not today,” I said.

“Okay. Take me home.”

I was half a block away from the Morelli house when I saw Joe’s mom pull into her driveway. Hooray! I turned Bella over to Joe’s mom and drove the short distance to my parents’ house. I’d promised to take Grandma shopping for a new pocketbook.

“This is just in time,” Grandma said, getting into my car. “I’m going to bingo tonight and I want to look nice. Mort Blankowski is calling numbers. He’s a cutie and his wife just died so he’s up for grabs.”

I cruised out of the Burg and headed for Route 1.

“This car smells bad,” Grandma said. “It smells like fried chicken and doody.”

I opened the windows. “It’s been a hard day.”

“You should take some probiotic pills,” Grandma said. “They say yogurt is good too.”

“I’m not the one who had a problem. I brought an FTA in today and he had an accident.”

“Must have been a beauty.”

“I don’t know the details. I have air freshener in the glove compartment.”

Grandma sprayed the air freshener around and stuck her head out the window. When we rolled into the mall parking lot and she pulled her head back in, her hair looked like it had been spray varnished in a wind tunnel. She looked at herself in the visor mirror.

“I could be in one of those punk rock bands,” she said. “I might leave it like this for bingo. Morty is ten years younger than me. He might appreciate this look. There’s going to be a lot of competition for him. I’m going to have to up my game.”

An hour later we returned to the car with Grandma’s new pocketbook and the car smelled worse than ever.

“Now it smells like fried chicken, doody, and lavender air freshener,” Grandma said. “I’m grateful for the ride, but when I get home, I’m going to have to throw my clothes away and take a shower.”

I didn’t throw my clothes away when I got home but I took a shower and washed my hair twice. I had a meatball sandwich on white bread for dinner and washed it down with a bottle of beer.

I shut the television off at ten o’clock and I went into the kitchen to say good night to Rex.

“It wasn’t such a bad day,” I said. “It ended pretty good except for the smell in my car.”

I gave him a peanut, turned to go, and my apartment was rattled by an explosion in the parking lot. I ran to a living room window and looked down at smoke and mangled car parts where my Honda used to be parked. It didn’t take a lot of thought to come up with an explanation. Somebody put up the bail bond for Walburg. I returned to the kitchen and ate a celebratory Tastykake Butterscotch Krimpet. The odor issue was solved.

I lowered the lights and watched the action outside. Police, fire trucks, gawkers. The Rangeman SUV arrived seconds after the first fire truck. Ranger called minutes later.

“I’m okay,” I said. “I captured an FTA bomber today and obviously someone immediately bailed him out.”

“And he bombed your car.”

“I’m guessing.”

“Zane Walburg?”

“Yep.”

“He makes a decent bomb, but he has some delusions-of-grandeur issues,” Ranger said. “Do you need a car?”

“No, but thanks for the offer.”

“Babe,” he said. And he was gone.

I strolled downstairs to the parking lot. I got there just as Morelli rolled in. He parked behind a fire truck and walked over to me. We were standing near a shredded tire.

“Your car?” he asked.

“Of course,” I said.

“Good thing you weren’t in it.”

“He was making a point. He didn’t want to kill me.”

“He?” Morelli asked.

“Zane Walburg was FTA and I brought him in for rescheduling today. I’m guessing someone bonded him out.”

“He’s good,” Morelli said. “For instance, notice the way your car is completely destroyed, but very little damage has occurred to the cars surrounding it. That takes talent.”

“It sounds like you’ve had previous dealings with him.”

“Not personally,” Morelli said. “Walburg is a local celebrity

in the law-enforcement community. He’s been building bombs for several years and has always been able to avoid prosecution.”

“Until now,” I said.

“Last month he shipped a bomb using his own name and got caught.”

“Ranger said Walburg has delusions of grandeur.”

“From what I hear, he’s on the spectrum.”

The crowd dispersed. The fire trucks left. I answered all necessary questions. A flatbed tow truck arrived and started to scoop up what remained of my Honda.

Morelli wrapped an arm around me and steered me toward my building’s back door. “I have to be on the road early tomorrow,” he said.

“Does that imply that you’re staying over?”

“I thought you would need comforting after this traumatic experience.”

It was a win-win. I got rid of the smelly car and now I was going to get comforted. Lucky me.

 

Chapter Fifteen

At nine o’clock in the morning life wasn’t such a win-win. I didn’t have a car. Lula was supposed to pick me up, but she was a half hour late. I was about to give up and call my dad for a ride when the red Firebird rumbled into my parking lot and stopped in front of me.

“Sorry I’m late,” Lula said. “I had a fashion dilemma. Tuesday is always boho day, but my ankle boots didn’t look right with my boho fringe bag. Both of them go with my paisley dress, so you see the problem.” She looked around the lot. “Where’s your car? Why do you need a ride?”

“My car no longer exists.”

“Say what?”

“It got blown up last night. Bombed.”

“Get the heck out.”

“I’m thinking it was Zane Walburg, but I don’t know for sure.”

Lula left the lot and connected with Hamilton Avenue. “Do you want to visit him?”

“No. I want to go to the office and get a doughnut. Then I want to get the kid who drove the fire truck into the Garden of Life. I need the capture money to get a new car.”

“Doesn’t sound like you’re worried about the kidnappers.”

“I haven’t heard from them. I think they wrote it off.”

“I don’t know about that,” Lula said. “I’m still creeped out. If it was me, I’d have a hard time walking away from eleven million. I think Connie’s creeped out too. I noticed yesterday she was parked in front of the office and when I went by today, she was parked there again. She always used to park in the alley spaces and use the storeroom door. She could have PTSD.”

I thought back to all of the scary things that had happened to me since I started working for Vinnie. The fear and horror didn’t immediately go away. There were night sweats and sick stomachs and a reluctance to go out in the dark. And there was always the temptation to quit and stay home and hide. So far, I haven’t quit. The interesting question is, why not?

Ranger and Morelli stick with it because they believe in the job. I used to think I stuck with it because I was too lazy and uninspired to find something else. I’m coming to realize that’s no longer true. Maybe it was never true. If I’m honest with myself, I have to admit that I like the chase. And I like when I succeed. Truth is, I might be a bit of an adrenaline junkie. And while I’ll never have the skills of Ranger or Morelli, I’m actually halfway decent at retrieving felons. Go figure.

“When you have a bad experience like Connie had, you become more careful,” I said to Lula. “At least for a while.”

“I always park in the front,” Lula said. “I don’t want my car getting dinged by people throwing things in the dry cleaner dumpster that’s next to us.”

I checked the street when we got close to the office. I was looking for two stocky guys in hoodies. They could be walking on the sidewalk or slowly cruising past the office in a Camry with JZ on the license plate. I was telling myself that they’d given up, but I was still looking.

Connie stood at her desk when we walked in. “I need someone to babysit the office for an hour,” she said. “One of my burns doesn’t look good. I’m going to the walk-in clinic.”

“No problem,” Lula said. “I’m good at being the temporary office manager. I got a talent for it.”

“Vinnie won’t be in until later, and I’ve done the mail. There was a notice for a delivery this morning. No details. Just keep an eye out for it. It’s coming by truck. Probably something weird that Vinnie got in Atlantic City.”

“Remember I brought Walburg in yesterday?” I said to Connie. “Do you know if he’s already gotten bonded out?”

“Not my bad,” Connie said. “I wouldn’t have bonded him, but Vinnie likes him.”

I took a doughnut and sat in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs. Lula took her position behind the desk. Ten minutes later a large truck pulled up in front of the office. A guy got out and came to the door.

“I got a delivery for the office manager,” he said. “The only name I got is Lula.”

“That’s me,” Lula said.

“Where do you want it? You want me to bring it all in here?”

“What have you got?” Lula asked.

“Furniture. It’s from Mel’s One Stop Shopping.”

Lula jumped up. “It’s the stuff I ordered online. I forgot all about it. Bring it in!”

“Did you tell Vinnie about this?” I asked Lula.

“Hell no. Even if I remembered about it, I wouldn’t have told him.”

The men were unpacking on the street. A couch, a couple armchairs, a desk chair, a rug, a coffee table, end tables. An hour later, the old office furniture was in a heap next to the dumpster and the new furniture was in place.

“What do you think?” Lula asked.

I was speechless. It was nice. Shockingly nice. A big comfortable dark brown couch that was genuine leather. Two cream, brown, and pumpkin striped armchairs in front of the desk. A couple side tables with lamps. A coffee table that matched the side tables. A new ergonomic desk chair for Connie. And a low-pile tweed rug.

“Wow!” I said. “It’s fantastic. I love it.”

“That’s ’cause I got taste,” Lula said. “I got vision for this stuff. Mel’s One Stop Shopping got rooms already arranged for you, and soon as I saw this room, I knew it was the one. It’s casual but sophisticated for a comfortable business or home environment.”

Lula arranged some past copies of Star magazine on the coffee table.

“Now it’s perfect,” she said.

Connie walked in and stopped in the middle of the room. “Am I in the wrong place?” she asked. “That looks like my desk.”

“I made some purchases while I was temporary office manager,” Lula said. “And then I forgot about them until the truck got here, what with all the drama going on.”

“Does Vinnie know about this?”

“Hell no,” Lula said. “How’s your burn?”

“It’s okay,” she said. “They gave me some antibiotic salve to put on it. They said it looked like I work the fry basket at Cluck-in-a-Bucket.”

Vinnie’s Cadillac screeched to a stop in front of the office and Vinnie rushed in. “I need forms,” he said. “I got a guy locked up downtown. Harry’s cousin. Not someone I want to keep waiting.”

Connie pulled a packet out of her desk drawer and handed it to Vinnie.

Vinnie took the packet and the last remaining doughnut and he left.

“He didn’t notice,” I said.

“Sort of disappointing,” Lula said. “I was looking forward to him going on a rant. I like when his eyes bulge out and his face gets purple.”

Connie answered the office phone and immediately put it on speaker.

“Time is running out,” a man said. “We’re taking another hostage if we don’t get our money immediately.”

He instantly disconnected.

“These people are losers,” Lula said. “They’ve got no imagination. All they can think of is taking a hostage.”

“It’s not going to be me,” Connie said. “I’m paying attention and I’m carrying.”

“Ditto on that,” Lula said. “Not gonna be me either.”

I was lacking confidence that it wouldn’t be me.

“Business as usual,” I said. “Let’s collect the guy who drove the fire truck into the flower shop.”

“You haven’t got a car,” Lula said. “And my car isn’t suitable for transporting felons.”

“What’s wrong with your car?” I asked her.

“It’s too nice. Why don’t we just go get you a car.”

“I haven’t got enough money. I need the money from the fire truck guy.”

“I know a guy who practically gives cars away,” Lula said. “We could talk to him.”

“Are they legal?”

“Mostly it’s that they’re refurbished.”

“Refurbished would be okay.”

+++

Lula drove us down Stark to the end and pulled into the junkyard. “Hold on,” I said, “this is the junkyard.”

“Yeah, they have a side business going,” Lula said. “Some of the cars get a second chance at life. It’s like when you go to the animal shelter, and you adopt one of the dogs or cats and give them their forever home. Only these cars are more like getting a last-gasp home. I know about this because I sort of date one of the guys here. Andy. I called and told him to expect us.”

Andy was waiting at the gate. He looked okay. Jeans and T-shirt. Some muscle. Shaved head. Large gold tooth front and center. He motioned for us to park in a cleared area that was next to a line of sad cars.

“So here are the cars,” he said to me. “They all run, and the tires have some miles left on them. Just pick one out.”

This is what my life has come to, I thought. Last-gasp cars.

“What do you think?” I asked Lula. “Do you see anything you like?”

“If it was for me, no. But your cars never last more than a couple weeks before they get blown up or smashed by a garbage truck. How about the pink one?”

“I don’t think I can do pink,” I said.

“Truly, the best one here is the little gray Whatever,” Andy said. “I think most of it is Toyota. You can’t go wrong with Toyota.”

“Does it smell inside?” Lula asked.

Andy walked over and sniffed at it. “It smells like a used car.” “How much is it?” I asked.

“How much do you have?” Andy asked.

“Four hundred and fifty dollars,” I said.

“That’s a little shy,” Andy said. “Lula’s gonna have to make up for it in lovin’.”

“You wish,” Lula said.

Andy grinned at her. “That’s the truth.”

“What about papers and plates?” I asked.

“They come with the car,” Andy said.

+++

Steven Plover lived in a two-story white colonial with blue shutters. The lawn was excellent. There was a new Mercedes in the driveway. The neighborhood was extremely respectable. I did some background and found that his father was a doctor, and his mother was a Realtor.

I parked my gray Whatever in front of the neighbor’s house so I wouldn’t tarnish the Plover image, and Lula and I went to the front door.

Steven answered the doorbell. I knew him from his photo. Brown hair, cut by someone who knew what they were doing. Five feet ten inches. Medium build. Pleasant looking. Jeans and T-shirt. New and expensive.

I introduced myself and explained that he had to reschedule. “Sure,” he said. “I haven’t got anything to do anyway. I guess I forgot about court.”

“I’m curious,” Lula said. “Why did you take the fire truck and crash it into the flower shop?”

“There’s this girl I really like, Jessica. She was in my art appreciation class at Rutgers, and she lives here in the neighborhood. She was home for the weekend, and I wanted to ask her out, but she doesn’t know I exist. So, I got this crazy idea that I’d show up at her house in the fire truck and ask her if she’d like to go for a ride. I mean, who could resist a ride in a fire truck.”

“You were high, right?” Lula asked.

“Yeah, maybe a little,” Steven said. “I’m almost always high. Anyway, it was easy to borrow the truck. They wash it in the morning and then they leave it out all day. They even leave the key in it.

“I took the truck and then I thought I should bring Jessica some flowers, so I drove to the flower shop. Only the truck wouldn’t stop fast enough, and I accidentally drove through the big window in the front of the store and took out the case with the orchids. It was pretty funny but sort of embarrassing.”

“Did Jessica ever go out with you?” Lula asked.

“No,” Steven said. “She thinks I’m an idiot.”

“Not much of a surprise there,” Lula said.

“Are your parents home?” I asked him.

“Negative. They’re never home. It’s just me.”

“Lock up the house, and I’ll drive you to the courthouse so you can reschedule.”

“Okay, I’ll get the back door,” Steven said.

He disappeared into the house and Lula and I exchanged glances.

“He’s gonna run,” Lula said.

“That would be my guess,” I said.

Seconds later we heard the garage door open on the side of the house. Lula and I took off and reached the garage just as Steven rocketed out in a red Tesla.

“That car’s got excellent acceleration,” Lula said. “And you can’t go wrong with red.”

“True and true,” I said, heading for my gray Whatever. “And red is going to make it easier to spot Steven.”

“He turned right when he went out of his driveway,” Lula said.

I went straight for three blocks until I got to Mulberry. Mulberry was the first road that wasn’t part of Steven’s neighborhood. There was a gas station on one corner and a convenience store next to it. The red Tesla was parked at the convenience store.

“This is too easy,” Lula said. “Kinda takes the fun out of it.”

Not for me. I liked easy.

I parked behind the Tesla, preventing Steven from backing up. I could see Steven at the cash register, talking to the clerk. I had my cuffs in my back pocket and an illegal stun gun in my sweatshirt pocket. Lula and I walked in and stood on either side of Steven.

“I don’t suppose I could borrow some money from you,” he said. “I ran out of the house without my wallet, and I have a rad craving for gummy bears.”

I paid for the gummy bears and cuffed Steven with his hands in front so he could eat. We got him into the backseat of the Whatever and drove him to the police station on North Clinton. I called Connie after we dropped him off.

“Is Vinnie still in the municipal building?” I asked Connie.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t been able to reach him.”

“I brought Steven Plover in just now. He’s going to want to be bailed out before court closes shop for the day.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Connie said. “I’ll call his mother.”

“Tell her the Tesla is parked at the convenience store on Mulberry. Have you heard any more from the kidnappers?”

“No,” Connie said. “There was just that one call.”

“Who do you think they’re going to take?” Lula asked when I hung up.

“Me,” I said. “They tried to get me after the viewing and Grandma scared them away. I’m sure they think I have the money.”

I turned onto Hamilton Avenue and saw that I’d picked up a tail. Black SUV. Rangeman. Ranger had no doubt tapped into the call from the kidnappers and reached the same conclusion I’d reached. That I had a big target on my back. Plus, I had a new Whatever that wasn’t yet tagged with a tracker.

Lula got out at the office, and I continued on to my parents’ house. I parked on the street, got out of the Whatever, and waved at the Rangeman guy.

My mom was knitting, and Grandma was on her iPad when I walked in.

“I’m going to mooch lunch,” I said.

“Help yourself,” my mom said. “There’s leftover pot roast for sandwiches with gravy, or there’s deli meat and cheese.”

I went with the pot roast, no gravy.

“What’s new on Facebook?” I asked Grandma.

“I wasn’t on Facebook,” she said. “I was on Twitter. I like to watch the rocket launches. What’s new with you?”

“I have a new car. Actually it’s not new. It’s just different.”

“What does it smell like?”

“It smells like used car.”

“That’s a step in the right direction,” Grandma said. “How’s Connie looking? That was all they were talking about at the bakery. Her disappearance is a big mystery. Even her mother doesn’t know where she was. I just about got a rupture trying to keep the secret.”

I made myself a pot roast sandwich with mustard, horseradish, and slices of dill pickle. I can’t cook but I can make a sandwich.

“Connie’s good,” I said. “She’s back at work.”

“Have you heard any more from the kidnappers?” Grandma asked.

“Only that they want their money.” “Can’t blame them,” Grandma said.

“Are you going to give them their money?” my mother asked me.

“No,” I said. “I can’t. I don’t have it.”

“Suppose you did have it,” Grandma said. “Would you give it to them?”

“Yes. Would you?”

“Heck no,” Grandma said.

“How about you?” I asked my mom. “Would you give the money back?”

“How much was it?” she asked.

“Eleven million.”

“That’s a lot of money,” she said. “A person could do wonderful things with that much money.”

“Like what?” I asked. “What would you do with eleven million dollars?”

“I’d go to Paris,” my mother said.

“I’d buy a horse,” Grandma said. “I always wanted a horse. I’d name him Brownie. What would you do with the money?” Grandma asked me.

“I’d get new towels for my bathroom,” I said. “And I’d get a new bathroom.” It seemed boring compared to a horse and Paris, but I had a really ugly bathroom.

I finished my sandwich and pushed away from the table. “I have to get back to work,” I said. “Stay safe. Be careful.”

I went to my Whatever and noted that the Rangeman car was still in place. I suppose it should make me feel safe to have them following me around, but it did the opposite. It increased my anxiety. It was a reminder of the danger. It was like the TSA people at the airport who were there to keep flyers safe, but their presence screamed out that it was perfectly possible for your plane to get exploded at forty thousand feet in the air.

I drove the short distance to the office and sat in my car for a moment, thinking about the eleven million. Suppose it dropped in my lap. What would I really do with it? First thing, I’d buy a condo. Nothing elaborate and not too big, but I’d want it to be new. New paint. New appliances. It should have its own washer and dryer. What else? New furniture. Maybe a fish tank for the living room. And I’d get a pedicure. And a new car. I didn’t want to spend time in Paris or get a horse. Probably I should quit my job, but what would I do all day? I could learn to play the piano. No, scratch that. I couldn’t see myself playing the piano. I could join a gym and get a trainer and get in really good shape. Ugh. That was a horrible thought. Or I could go to culinary school like Julia Child. She got a husband because she could cook. I have two amazing men in my life but neither of them wants to get married, and I don’t think acquiring cooking skills would change that. Maybe if I went to culinary school, I’d meet someone new who appreciated that I could make a soufflé. Something to consider.

A black Mercedes drove past me for the third time. Carpenter Beedle was behind the wheel. I called him and he picked up.

“Why are you driving past the bail bonds office?” I asked him. “We’ve been checking to make sure things are okay. I see Connie is back at work. That’s a relief. We’re sorry we caused so much trouble, but it looks like everything’s good now, right?”

“Wrong. The kidnappers want the money.”

“Most of it’s spent,” he said.

“How could you go through eleven million dollars that fast?”

“It got divided up three ways so we each got a little over three and a half million. Half of that I invested in bonds for everyone. They’ll have a good yield, but we can’t touch them for five years. The rest of the money went to clothes, cars, boats, and entertainment. GoComic wasn’t cheap. Benji got his own apartment. Sparks married the hooker who gave him the lap dance.”

“What about you?”

“I paid the mortgage off on my mom’s house and I bought this car. I got an expensive haircut and some clothes, and I have some money put aside for a defense lawyer. This was found money to us. We didn’t know someone was kidnapped over it. We ran out and spent it. Even if we sold off some of the stuff we bought, we couldn’t come near to the eleven million.”

“Are you going back to panhandling?”

“I don’t know. I enjoyed panhandling, but I really liked moving money around and investing it. I might look for a job in finance if I can avoid going to jail.”

“Not accounting,” I said.

“Not accounting. That ship sailed and sank.”

“Good luck,” I said. “Don’t forget your court date.”

“I never forget a date,” Beedle said.

I looked across the street at the Rangeman car. Now I had Rangeman, Sir Lancelot, Benji, and Beedle working as security. Why didn’t I feel safe?

+++

It was five o’clock when Connie got back to the office.

“Sorry I’m so late. I almost didn’t get him out today,” she said. “He was last up. The judge wanted to go home, but Steven’s mother started crying. Bawling her eyes out. When the judge reconsidered and set bail, Steven’s mother turned and winked at me. I bet she’s a hell of a Realtor.”

“We didn’t mind staying,” Lula said. “It’s real comfy in here now. It’s nicer than my apartment except it doesn’t have a bed and TV.”

“Anything new?” Connie asked, sitting at her desk, pulling up the email.

“Nope,” Lula said. “I checked about an hour ago. There was a threatening email from Vinnie’s bookie, but I deleted it.”

“I don’t see anything that can’t wait,” Connie said. “I’m closing up. Mom’s making an early dinner tonight.”

“She going to bingo or a viewing?” Lula asked.

“Viewing,” Connie said. “Marion Foscatelli. Pancreatic cancer.”

“That’s a nasty one,” Lula said.

We closed the office and I drove home with Rangeman close behind. I parked in my lot and took a moment to look around. I didn’t see anyone hiding behind a car, waiting to jump me. I walked to the building and thought this was the tricky part. The Rangeman guy was in the parking lot. No telling who was in the building. I took Ranger’s gun out of my messenger bag and decided the stairs were the safest way to go. I reached the second floor and found Sir Lancelot in full costume standing watch at my door with his new sword at his side.

“Carpenter wanted to make sure you got into your apartment without getting kidnapped,” he said.

“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll be okay now.”

“If you want to go out you can call us.”

“Good to know. I hear you got married.”

He smiled. “Yeah. Who would have thought? And she likes going to Renaissance fairs.”

“That’s great. Congratulations.” I unlocked my door and stepped inside. “Have a nice night and thanks for looking after me.”

“No problem. Make sure you lock your door.”

When you’re in a situation like this a safe haven can feel a little like a prison. Still, it was better than the alternative, which could have been a dark room with a chemical toilet and getting burned with a fire starter.

I was eating cereal out of the box when Morelli called.

“I saw a car parked in front of the bail bonds office today. I’m afraid to ask if it’s yours,” he said.

“What kind of car was it?”

“I don’t know. The front looked like a Toyota, but the back looked like spare parts held together with Bondo.”

“Yep. That’s mine.”

“Aside from the bargain car purchase, how did your day go?”

“It could have been worse. I brought Steven Plover in. That was my highlight.”

“He stole the fire truck, right?”

“Borrowed it. He wanted to take a girl for a ride. He said he might have been a little high.”

“That’s one of the better reasons to borrow a fire truck. Are you locked in for the night?”

“Yes. And I’ve got a Rangeman car in my parking lot. It follows me everywhere. I need to reinvent my life. I can’t keep living like this. Do you think it would help if I got a different job?”

“It would depend on the job. Even then I’m not sure. You’re like a magnet for disaster. How many of your cars have gotten blown up?”

“I don’t know. I lost count.”

“How many of my cars have gotten blown up?”

“Zero?”

“Wrong,” Morelli said. “Two. Both of them because of you. Car number one you ‘commandeered’ and it got blown up in your parking lot. Car number two you parked in my garage, left the garage door open, and Mama Macaroni blew the car and the garage halfway to hell.”

“Maybe I need an exorcist.”

“Let’s assume it’s your job and not the Devil. If you quit your job, what would you do?”

“That’s the hitch,” I said. “I don’t know.”

“There must be something that’s always in the back of your mind that you would like to try. A fantasy job.”

“Nope. I’ve got nothing.”

“Do you like kids? Old people? Sick people? Animals? Clothes? Cars?”

“I like all those things, but I don’t want a job associated with them. I guess I don’t love them on a group level.”

“What do you love?”

“Peanut butter.”

“That’s a little limiting, cupcake.”

I could tell he was smiling when he said that.

“It just popped out. I also love olives and wine with screw caps. What do you love?” I asked him.

“I love my job and I love Bob and I love you.” That made me feel warm inside.

“I love you too,” I said. “Do you want to give me a job?”

“Maybe. What can you do?”

“You know what I can do.”

“I definitely want to give you a job. Are you available tonight?” “No, I’m in my bunker. I’m under surveillance. I’m going to bed and hide under the covers.”

+++

I was in the kitchen eating Ritz crackers and finishing up a bottle of Chianti that I found in the back of my cupboard when Ranger let himself into my apartment. He eased me close into him and kissed me with a touch of tongue.


“Ritz crackers and red wine,” he said. “Makes me hungry.”

“For Ritz crackers?”

“No.”

“For red wine?”

“Wrong again. Unfortunately, I’m going to have to stay hungry because I’m working. I’m taking a shift with a new man. I’ve got him sitting in the lot with Hal.”

“Hal is my night watchman?”

“Until twelve.”

“It’s really not necessary to have someone out there all night. I’m sure I’m safe here in my apartment.”

“The alternative is to have me in your apartment or for you to move in with me.”

“I’ll consider it,” I said.

“Is there anything new that I should know?”

“You heard the phone call.”

“I did.”

“I haven’t had any contact since.”

“This is getting tedious,” Ranger said. “I’d like to go more proactive but all we’ve got so far are dead ends.”

He took a silver medallion necklace out of his pocket. The medallion was engraved with a cross.

“Don’t take this off,” he said. “Ever. Wear it in the shower.” “GPS?” I asked.

“Next generation.”

He fixed it around my neck, and he gave me a quick kiss. He thought about it for a beat and kissed me with a lot more passion.

“Think about the alternatives,” he said.

He left and I did a lot of thinking about the alternatives.

 

Chapter Sixteen

There are laundry facilities in the basement of my building, but I’ve always suspected that a troll lives behind the dryer. A better solution to the laundry problem is to cart my laundry to my parents’ house once a week and turn it over to my mom. Since my underwear drawer was empty and I had no clean jeans, this was the day.

I skipped breakfast, hung my messenger bag on my shoulder, and hauled my laundry basket out to the parking lot. The Rangeman SUV was one row away with a clear view of my Whatever. I was certain the occupants were awake and on the job, ever vigilant. No doubt hoping for a hooded guy to jump out from behind a car and try to stun gun me. Then they could pounce on him and this whole nightmare would be over. I was hoping for this too.

I slowly walked to my car, giving the bad guys plenty of time to rush me. The bad guys didn’t appear, so I drove to my parents’ house with Rangeman following at a discreet distance. I handed my laundry over to my mom, and I sat down to bacon and eggs and crumb coffee cake.

“Anything new from the gossip line?” I asked Grandma.

“Nothing worth repeating from bingo,” Grandma said. “And I didn’t go to the bakery this morning, so I’m not up on the latest. We had a beauty of a thunderstorm last night, though. Woke me up. And I think I heard fire trucks, but nobody called so far about anything burning down.”

“Do you need help with the laundry?” I asked my mom.

“No,” she said. “I’ve already got the darks in the washer.”

“Are you going after anybody interesting today?” Grandma asked. “Murderers or rapists? Animal abusers?”

“None of the above,” I said. “Business has been slow.”

“We’re having pork chops tonight,” my mother said. “If you want to come to dinner and pick up your laundry.”

“I’ll see how my day goes,” I said. “Thanks. I’ll let you know.” Grandma looked at me and rolled her eyes. No one ever wanted to eat my mom’s pork chops. She was a good cook, with the exception of pork chops. You couldn’t cut her pork chops with a steak knife. You couldn’t cut them with a hatchet.

I left the house and drove to the office. I was a block away when I saw the lone fire truck and some random cars. I inched closer and saw that there was no office. There was just rubble where the office used to stand. Connie and Lula were in front of the office remains. I parked and joined them.

“What?” I asked.

“Boom!” Lula said.

I turned to Connie. “Was it hit by lightning?”

“Hard to say for sure at this point,” she said. “My best guess is it was hit by Zane Walburg. It didn’t catch fire. It just imploded. At least that’s what they told me.”

I looked around. “Where’s Vinnie? Does he know?”

“I talked to Lucille,” Connie said. “She said he didn’t come home last night. Not that this is unusual for Vinnie.”

“Where was he?”

“He bailed out one of his father-in-law’s relatives and that was the last anyone heard from him. He’s probably passed out in a strip club.”

“I can’t believe this happened after I did all that decorating,” Lula said.

“What about your records?” I asked Connie.

“Everything is in the cloud,” she said. “I can get it all back. The only thing we can’t get back is what we had in the storeroom. Items we had in the file cabinets might be intact. I haven’t combed through the debris yet. They won’t let us any closer than this.”

“I suppose we should talk to Walburg,” I said to Lula.

“The mad bomber? I don’t think so,” Lula said. “Let the police piss him off this time.”

“I don’t want him blowing up any more things. Like my apartment.”

“You’ve got a point,” Lula said, “but I’m not going without Bella.”

Bella was in the front passenger seat of my Whatever. She was clutching her purse, staring straight ahead with her eagle eyes bright under her fierce eyebrows.

“I want to see what he did,” she said. “Before I give him the eye, I want to see damage.”

I drove her to the office and idled on the opposite side of the street.

“This is good,” she said. “This boy, he do good work.”

“He blew up the office,” Lula said from the backseat. “I just decorated that office, and I had all my Star magazines there.”

“I like Star magazine,” Bella said. “That’s a mark against him. Vincent Plum I don’t like.”

“He put up your bail bond money,” I said to Bella. “You would be in jail if it wasn’t for Vinnie.”

“I want lunch when we’re done,” she said. “More chicken.” “Absolutely,” I said. “Chicken for lunch.”

Traffic was light at this time of the morning. People were commuting toward the city, and we were traveling away from it to Hamilton Township. I took the driveway into Curly Tree Gardens and parked in a slot reserved for Walburg’s neighbor.

“Now that we’re here, what are we going to do?” Lula asked.

“We’re going to bring him in for bond violation.”

“We going to sneak up on him?”

“There’s no good way to sneak up on someone in a garden apartment,” I said. “Go around back and make sure he doesn’t escape. We’ll go in the front door.”

Bella and I waited in the car until Lula texted that she was in place.

“This like in the movies,” Bella said. “I like this. Maybe instead of the eye, I shoot him, like James Bond.”

“No! No shooting. Not ever. James Bond didn’t use real bullets.”

“I think he did,” Bella said.

“Well, we don’t shoot people. Stay behind me when we get to the door.”

I knocked on the door and Walburg answered. “You again,” he said. “Now what?”

“You’re in violation of your bond.”

“Says who?”

“Says me,” I said.

“Me too,” Lula said, coming in from the back door.

“And me,” Bella said. “Make my day, scumbag.”

“Are you kidding me?” Walburg said. “You got the creepy old hag with you again? Big deal. I’m prepared. I googled ‘creepy old hags.’ ”

“What Google say?” Bella asked him.

“Follow me,” Walburg said. “I’ve got it in the kitchen.”

We went to the kitchen and Walburg took a bowl off the counter and tossed everything in the bowl at Bella.

“What this is?” Bella said.

“Salt,” Walburg said. “It’s death to demons.”

“I’m not demon,” Bella said. “Salt only good for soup and radishes.”

“Okay, that didn’t work,” Walburg said. “How about this?”

He took a pot of water that he had sitting on the counter next to the bowl of salt and he threw the water at Bella. It hit her square in the face and soaked her hair and her black dress.

Bella had her face scrunched up and her hands balled into fists.

“Do not shoot him,” I said to Bella.

“I don’t get it,” Walburg said. “It worked in The Wizard of Oz.”

“I’m not witch,” Bella managed to say through clenched teeth.

“What are you?” Walburg asked.

“I’m Sicilian,” Bella said. “I give you the eye.”

“No poop!” Lula and I said.

“I make his teeth fall out,” she said, putting her finger to her eye.

We all stood perfectly still, staring at Walburg.

“This one takes longer than poop,” Bella finally said.

I cuffed Walburg and we walked him out to my car and stuffed him into the backseat. The Rangeman guys were parked next to me. They looked bored.

Cluck-in-a-Bucket was my first stop on my way to the police station. It was early for lunch, but I got lunch for everyone anyway, including the Rangemen.

“I’ll take the Rangemen their chicken and biscuits,” Lula said. “And I’ll hitch a ride with them being that they got a better car than you, and their car don’t have the bomber in the backseat.” She climbed out of the Whatever and looked back at Walburg. “No offense meant,” she said to him.

“No offense taken,” he said.

The next stop was the Morelli house.

“Thanks for the help,” I said to Bella, handing her buckets of chicken, biscuits, and coleslaw.

“You still slut,” she said.

I watched her scuttle away and disappear inside her house. “Do you think I have to worry about my teeth?” Walburg asked.

“Eventually,” I said.

“I don’t suppose you’d consider not taking me back to jail?”

“You bombed my car and the bail bonds office.”

“Yes, but I didn’t bomb your apartment.”

“Not yet,” I said. “Why are you doing this?”

“It’s what I do.”

“Yes, but you’re going to jail for a long time for it. Doesn’t that bother you?”

“I won’t go to jail,” he said. “The government wants me. I’m a genius. They’ll get me off, just like always. At the very worst they’ll put an ankle bracelet on me and set me up in a lab in the desert. I have friends in high places. I’ve done favors for them. They won’t want those favors to come to an end. And the military needs my expertise.”

“Do you like the desert?”

“I like to make bombs. I don’t care where I make them. If I don’t want to stay in the desert after a while, I’ll cut a deal.”

I cut across town, parked in the municipal building lot, and got Walburg out of the Whatever.

The Rangeman SUV parked alongside me.

“Do you need help getting him in?” the driver asked.

“No, but thanks. This shouldn’t take long.”

Almost an hour later I returned to my car.

“Sorry,” I said to the Rangemen, “I had to give a statement about the two bombings.” I looked in the SUV. “Where’s Lula?”

“She got tired of waiting and called someone to pick her up.”

+++

I drove past what used to be the office on my way home. The collapsed building was ringed with crime scene tape, and a CSI truck was parked at the curb. Three men were poking around in the rubble and Connie was standing on the sidewalk, watching the men. I parked across the street and walked over to Connie.

“What’s happening?”

“Two of the CSI guys are looking for evidence, and someone from the fire marshal is trying to determine if it’s safe for me to access the file cabinets.”

“The CSI guys don’t need to find a lot of evidence,” I said. “I brought Walburg in, and he confessed to both explosions. I hope Vinnie isn’t going to bond him out again. My apartment is probably next on Walburg’s fun list.”

“I haven’t heard from Vinnie,” Connie said. Her eyes shifted to the street. “Holy mother!”

It was Lula behind the wheel of an ancient, rusted-out yellow school bus. She beeped the horn at us and parked behind the CSI truck. She opened the door and stepped out.

“I got us a mobile office,” she said. “It’s got a bathroom and everything. What do you think?”

I had no words.

“Um,” Connie said.

“I was sitting in the parking lot with the Rangeman guys, waiting for Stephanie, and I remembered seeing this when we went to get Stephanie a car. So, I called Andy and he came and picked me up and made me a real deal. Actually, he gave it to me because no one wanted it. It’s perfectly okay as long as you don’t drive it too far on account of it gets three miles to a gallon.”

“Ingenious,” I said to Lula.

“No shit,” Lula said. “You gotta go in and see it. Somebody decked it all out to make it a mobile home. They took the seats out and put in a couch and a TV and a teeny kitchen. And the refrigerator has a freezer. It’s got a bedroom in the back, only there’s no bed so we could put a desk there.”

Connie and I went in and looked around. It was sort of horrible but not entirely.

“It needs some cleaning up,” Lula said. “It’s been sitting in the junkyard.”

I opened a cupboard over the kitchen counter and found a dead mouse.

“At least it’s dead,” I said.

Connie picked it up in a tissue and threw it out the door. “If we park this in the back lot, we can hook it up to electric,” she said.

“I can do my decorating magic,” Lula said. “I might take it up professionally. I could specialize in old-school buses and crap-ass offices. I could have business cards made up.”

Connie’s phone rang and she looked at the number. “It’s the office number,” she said. “Unknown caller.” She put it on speakerphone.

“I guess you aren’t leaving messages in the window anymore,” the caller said.

Connie handed the phone to me.

“Lightning strike,” I said.

“Where’s our money?”

“No clue,” I said.

“Yeah, I almost believe you. Guess who I’ve got?”

“Who?”

There was some fumbling noise on the phone and the sound of someone growling.

“Vinnie?” I asked.

“Twenty-four hours and we start peeling his skin off.” The phone went dead.

“Omigod,” I said. “They snatched Vinnie.”

“We should get a bottle of wine and some chips to celebrate our new office,” Lula said.

“But they have Vinnie,” I said.

“And?” Lula asked.

“He said they were going to torture him.”

“Vinnie loves that shit,” Lula said. “He pays Madam Zaretsky good money to whip him and do God knows what else.”

“That’s true,” Connie said. “If they pull off his fingernails, he’ll get an erection.”

“Anyway, what can we do?” Lula asked. “These idiots want money we don’t have.”

The office number rang again, and Connie put it on speakerphone.

“I forgot to tell you the best part,” he said. “After twenty-four hours, when we roast this weasel on a spit like a hot dog, we’re coming after you, sweetie pie.”

“Which sweetie pie would that be?” I asked him.

“You know which sweetie pie,” he said. And he hung up.

“Okay, that’s disturbing,” I said.

“Yeah, it would give us more incentive to do something if we knew what to do,” Lula said.

Morelli appeared in the doorway. “Knock, knock,” he said. “Is this the new office?”

“Yep,” I said.

“It’s leaking something.”

“It’s motor oil,” Lula said. “It’s okay, I got a case of it. It came with the bus.”

Morelli crooked his finger at me. “Can I see you outside?”

We walked a short distance from the bus and away from the CSI people.

“We found Vinnie’s car,” he said. “They just pulled it out of the river. Vinnie wasn’t in it.”

“That’s because the kidnappers have Vinnie,” I said. “We got the phone call a couple minutes ago.”

“Why did they take Vinnie?”

“I guess they thought we cared if he lived or died or got tortured.”

“That’s a tough one.”

“Yeah, on the surface it doesn’t seem like he’s worth saving.”

“But below the surface?”

“Ditto.”

“It’s a dilemma,” Morelli said.

“On the plus side, I delivered the bomber today.”

“I heard. Nice.” He looked over at the bus. “That has to be at least twenty years old. It’s a dumpster fire on wheels.”

“It has a refrigerator with a freezer, and it had a dead mouse, but Connie got rid of it.”

“Good to know. Where do you go from here?”

“Do you mean about the office?”

“I mean about the kidnapping and the death and torture threats.”

“I don’t know. I guess I have to wait for them to make a move. We’re at a stalemate. I can’t give them what they want, and they refuse to believe that I don’t have it.”

“Is Ranger making any progress?”

“Nothing significant. Anything on your end?”

“We aren’t officially involved,” Morelli said.

The CSI guys went to their truck, and the fire marshal walked over to us.

“The site seems to be stable,” he said. “The explosion didn’t scatter the structure, and it was single-story frame construction so there isn’t a lot of the debris that you would see in higher-rise buildings. This basically just collapsed in on itself. There was no fire and all utilities have been disconnected. I see no reason why you can’t sort through this. Just be careful where you walk.”

“We need to salvage what we can from the storeroom,” I said to Morelli. “Connie said all the records are in the cloud, so things could be worse.”

“At least Vinnie isn’t available to bond out Walburg again.”

For a moment I’d forgotten about Vinnie. No matter what was said in the bus, the thought of Vinnie being held hostage wasn’t a good one. He was pimple pus, but he was our pimple pus.

“I need to get back to work,” Morelli said. “There’s preseason hockey tonight if you want to come over and share a pizza.”

“Sounds good. I’ll bring the pizza.”

“Game is at eight o’clock.”

I watched Morelli drive away, and I went into the bus to tell Connie and Lula that we had permission to sort through the office remains.

“I can’t go climbing over all that junk in my Louboutins,” Lula said. “I’m going to the hardware store to get boots.”

“I’m okay in my sneakers,” I said.

“I’ve got running shoes in my tote,” Connie said, “so I’m okay too, but as long as you’re going out you can get some big plastic bins.”

“And air freshener,” I said. “Something to get rid of the dead- mouse smell.”

Connie changed her shoes and we stood on the sidewalk and looked at the mess in front of us.

“Vinnie had a safe in his office,” Connie said. “We want to make sure it’s secure. I don’t know what he had in his desk drawers, and I don’t want to know. I want the gun from my desk. Beyond that everything would be easier to reach from the alley.”

“I’ll walk around to the back and start looking for the file cabinets. You can start looking for your gun,” I said.

The Rangeman SUV was parked behind my Whatever. The two men got out of the SUV and walked over to us. I recognized one of them. Raul. The other man was new. His name tag said he was Bek.

“Are you looking for something?” Raul asked.

“We need to salvage what we can from this wreck,” I said.

“We can help.”

“That would be amazing,” I said. “Bek can go with Connie. She’s working in the front of the office, and you can come with me. I’m going to walk around to the back so it’s easier to get to the items we took in as security.”

By five o’clock we had everything from the file cabinets in bins, plus we had assorted larger items that we found in the rubble. The gun safe was located and cleaned out. The guns were all packed off to Rangeman for storage. Connie had her desk gun, and we were waiting for the safe company to finish hauling Vinnie’s safe through the debris to their truck. This would also go to Rangeman.

I was standing by the bus with Connie and Lula, watching the Rangeman guys stuff the bins in our cars.

“It’s a good thing we had Raul and Bek helping us,” Lula said. “We couldn’t have done this without them.”

“We would have been done a half hour ago if your skirt wasn’t so short,” Connie said. “Every time you bent over Raul’s eyes almost fell out of his head.”

“I didn’t know you could see something,” Lula said.

“Everybody could see everything,” Connie said.

“Not everything,” Lula said. “I’m wearing undies. I’m covered up as much as when I’m on the beach.”

I’d seen Lula on the beach, and it was something not easily forgotten.

An hour later, the safe was trucked away, and we put the crime scene tape back in place. The bus was parked at the curb for the night, and we felt comfortable that there wasn’t a lot left to steal. We formed a caravan with our cars, drove to Connie’s house, and unloaded everything into her garage.

We thanked Raul and Bek and they went back to their SUV.

“Good thing we’re done,” Lula said. “I couldn’t pick up one more thing or carry any more bins anywhere. I feel like my back is broken. We should have let Bella make that stupid bomber poop himself again.”

“Opportunities missed,” I said.

“Fuckin’ A,” Lula said.

Connie’s mother was standing watch at the edge of the garage. “I heard that,” she said. “We don’t allow that kind of language in this house.”

“Sorry,” Lula said. “I wasn’t thinking it might be offensive. It seemed like an appropriate comment for what we were saying about the poop spell.”

“We don’t say that P-word either,” Mrs. Rosolli said.

“You mean ‘poop’?” Lula asked. “What do you call it?”

“We call it plops,” she said.

Lula and I looked at Connie.

Connie rolled her eyes and gave up a sigh. “Plops and pleeps,” she said.

“That’s just wrong,” Lula said. “I can see where it’s coming from, but I don’t want to admit to making a plop. Maybe men make plops. My experience is they don’t care what they do.”

I had my hand clapped over my mouth. I was trying not to laugh out loud, but squeaking sounds were escaping from between my fingers.

“For God’s sake, just go ahead and laugh before you pleep yourself,” Connie said.

Mrs. Rosolli made the sign of the cross and asked forgiveness for her daughter. “We don’t take God’s name in vain,” she said.

 

From GOING ROGUE by Janet Evanovich. Copyright © 2022 by Evanovich, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Atria Books, an Imprint of Simon & Schuster, LLC.