When my phone rang at seven in the morning my first thought was that someone had died. My second thought was that I was turning into my mother.
“Babe,” Ranger said. “I want you to take a look at the videos we have.”
“I’m on my way.”
I took a fast shower, got dressed, and went out of the house with wet hair. I rolled all the windows down on the Honda and by the time I got to Rangeman my hair was frizz and tangles, but at least it wasn’t wet. I ran a brush through it in the garage and put it into a ponytail.
I found Ranger in a small conference room next to his office on the fifth floor. He was at the conference table with his laptop. A large monitor was on the wall across from the table.
“Babe,” he said. “You look like you need coffee.”
“You got me out of bed. I didn’t take time for breakfast.”
He made a phone call and asked that coffee and breakfast be brought to the conference room. “We have a high-res monitor here. I thought it would be better than trying to look at images on my laptop. I’ll start at the beginning. I have two angles of the same thing. Two men walking into a building. The quality of one isn’t good. DOT inferior equipment.”
The first video was black and white and grainy and lasted about thirty seconds. Two men came into focus. They were wearing hooded sweatshirts. Dark pants. Running shoes. Hard to see their faces. One was carrying a case that presumably held the drone. The second video was in better focus and shot from a slightly different angle.
“Do you recognize either of the men?” Ranger asked.
“No. I couldn’t see their faces. If I had to make a guess, I’d say they were in their forties or early fifties based on their build and the way they walked. Caucasian. It looked like the one carrying the case might have had a tattoo on his hand.”
Ranger isolated a frame that showed the hand and the tattoo. “It’s an anchor,” Ranger said. “Not especially unique, but not everyone has an anchor tattooed on their hand.”
There was a knock on the door and Ella came in with a tray. A pot of coffee, breakfast pastries, fruit, a slice of bacon, and a cheese quiche.
“I knew this was for you,” Ella said to me. “So, I brought pastries.”
“It’s perfect,” I said. “Thank you.”
I drank coffee and ate quiche and pastries while Ranger played two more videos.
“We have them leaving the building,” he said. “They’re walking with their heads down, but you can catch a partial glimpse of one of their faces. It looks like he has a two-day beard. Maybe some gray in it when I enlarge the frame. That would fit your age assessment.” He played the videos a couple times and moved on to a street view. “Another DOT camera picked them up on the corner of the block. They took the cross street and got into a Camry. We were only able to get a partial plate number. Jersey plate JZ and the rest is obscured. The DOT needs to improve their equipment.”
“Did anyone here recognize them?” “No.”
I topped off my coffee and took an almond croissant. “Anything else?”
“That’s all we have right now. We’ve been able to determine the building from the façade and the front door. I have someone inside, checking occupants and roof access. Ramon is scanning interior cameras. Put your sign in the window. Tell them you need more time. We’ll see where that gets us. I have someone on Hamilton, watching for the Camry.”
I left Rangeman and drove to the bail bonds office. Lula was already at Connie’s desk, working on the day’s box of doughnuts. Vinnie was somewhere else.
“Hey, girl,” Lula said. “You didn’t call me so I’m guessing nothing good happened.”
“Ranger is making some progress. He has video of two men carrying a drone case. Their faces are hidden in hoodies, but it looks like they’re in their late forties and one has an anchor tattooed on his hand. They were driving a Camry with Jersey plates.”
“Ranger’s the shit. He’s Mr. Magic. He’s the Mailman. What are we going to do now? Are we going out to look for the tattooed guy?”
“I need to make a sign for the window and then I’m looking for Beedle.”
The sign said MAKING PROGRESS BUT NEED MORE TIME. I stuck it in the window and went back to Lula. She was scrolling through email and text messages.
“I’m heading out,” I said.
“I’m going with you. Nothing happening here. No new FTAs.” I made sure the office phone was forwarded to my cell, Lula took the box of doughnuts, and we went out the front door and locked the office. I took a moment to look up and down the street for Ranger’s man. I didn’t see anyone loitering in doorways or hiding behind shrubbery. There was a panel van parked in front of a house across the street. It was a possibility.
I drove to Beedle’s house and parked at the curb. No Sentra in the driveway. We went to the door and knocked, and Mrs. Beedle answered.
“Is Carpenter here?” I asked her.
“No,” she said. “But I did hear from him. He said he was thinking he needed a change in scenery, and he would let me know when he settled somewhere.”
“When did you talk to him?” I asked.
“This morning. He called about an hour ago and said he didn’t want me to worry. And that he was fine. He’s very resourceful.”
I drove to the Trenton Transit Center and parked in a no- parking zone. Lula jumped out and looked around the bus stop area. She returned to the car and said there was no sign of Beedle. I drove into the downtown area and came up empty after an hour of cruising.
“This is disturbing,” Lula said. “I bonded that man out and this is the thanks. Vinnie’s surety company isn’t going to be happy about this.”
No kidding. Vinnie could be out of business, and we could all be unemployed. Comic Book Benji was next on my list. He was the middleman. I didn’t think he would have much to contribute but I was going to talk to him anyway.
I took Maymount to Chambers and cut across town to Benji’s store. Lights were off and a sign in the window said it was closed.
“It should be open,” Lula said. “This is regular business hours.”
I hadn’t been paying attention when Ranger drove to Benji’s apartment, so I typed “Benji Crup” into an app on my phone and got his address. His apartment was on the second floor of a neglected three-floor row house. One of his roommates answered my knock.
“Yuh,” he said.
I looked past him into the room. There were boxes of comic books stacked against the wall, a mattress on the floor, a sad couch that had a tan slipcover on it, a large flat-screen TV on the wall in front of the couch. That was as far as I could see.
“I’m looking for Benji,” I said.
“Dude’s not here.”
“I went to the store and there’s a Closed sign in the window.”
“Dude’s off on a wander.”
“What’s a wander?” Lula asked.
“It’s when you wander,” the roommate said.
“Like a drugged-out trip?”
“No, like a vacation.”
“Do you know where he went?” I asked.
“Not exactly. He said something about buying a car, or maybe he was going to Hawaii. And he was gonna hang out with Aquaman. He’s like total Justice League.”
“When did he leave?”
“About an hour ago. What are you, preggers or something?”
“Looking to buy a comic,” I said.
“Or an action figure,” Lula said.
“We got comics here if you want to look through,” he said. “Discount price.”
“Some other time,” I told him.
We went back to my Honda, and I pulled into traffic.
“He must do okay selling comics if he’s going to Hawaii,” Lula said.
I was getting a bad vibe. I thought it was a strange coincidence that Beedle and Benji both gave notice an hour ago that they were setting off on a wander.
“Where are we heading now?” Lula asked.
“We’re visiting Melvin Sparks.”
“Do you think he’ll let you in?”
My fear wasn’t that I wouldn’t get in. My fear was that he wouldn’t be home.
I parked in front of the Ivy, and we went to the fifth floor. No one answered at Sparks’s apartment.
“Maybe he’s sleeping,” Lula said. “He works nights.”
“Maybe he’s off on a wander,” I said.
“I got my equipment with me today,” Lula said. “You want me to get us in?”
“Sure.”
Lula took a screwdriver and a small hammer out of her massive purse and bumped the lock. We slipped into the apartment and closed the door behind us.
“Hello,” I yelled. “Melvin Sparks?”
Nothing.
“Looks like he had company,” Lula said from the kitchen. “There’s three coffee mugs in the sink and three dishes with crumbs. And there’s an empty Sara Lee coffee cake box on the counter.”
I went to the wall of collection cabinets where Ranger had found the coins. The coins were still there. Nothing seemed out of place. I went to the area Sparks used as an office. There was a monitor but no computer. No laptop.
My phone rang. It was the office number. No caller ID.
“Now what?” he said.
“This isn’t easy,” I told him. “I’m running down leads. I need more time.”
“I had an unpleasant experience this morning. Someone shot at my drone when it flew past your office. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
“This is Jersey. We shoot at everything.”
“I’m losing patience,” he said.
And he hung up.
“So, how’d that go?” Lula asked.
“Someone shot at his drone.”
“Was it us?”
I shrugged. It could have been Ranger’s man. Or it could have been Mr. Ruffles in the house across the street. He has anger issues.
“Here’s what I think,” I said to Lula. “I think Beedle, Benji, and Sparks have the coin.”
“And they ran away with it, right? On account of it’s valuable, and we’re not talking sentimental valuable. Personally, I always thought that was a lot of bull pucky.”
I called Ranger. “I heard from the kidnapper,” I said. “He wasn’t happy. Someone shot at his drone.”
“I had Sanchez parked in a van across from your office. He said the drone was hovering in the middle of the street and an old bald guy ran out of his house and took a potshot at it.”
“Did he down it?”
“No, but he put a round through the bonds office’s front window. Vinnie should replace it with impact glass.”
“That’s Mr. Ruffles,” I said. “Last month he shot at a bird and took out the satellite dish. Was Sanchez able to follow the drone?”
“No. And he didn’t spot any foot or vehicle traffic that looked suspicious.”
“Beedle, Comic Book Benji, and Sparks have disappeared. Beedle’s mother said he needed a change in scenery. Benji’s roommate said Benji’s gone wandering. And I’m in Sparks’s apartment right now. Lula bumped the lock. There’s no Sparks. It looks like he had company this morning. Everything seems to be in place but there’s no computer or laptop. Just the monitor.”
“And?” Ranger asked.
“And I think they have the coin.”
“Do you need help?”
“No. I’ve got it.”
“Babe,” Ranger said.
Lula and I did the best we could to secure Sparks’s apartment. I drove to the office and parked at the curb behind a Trenton PD car. Vinnie was on the sidewalk talking to a uniform.
“Look at this,” Vinnie said when he saw me. “Some asshole shot up my window.”
“Good thing no one was in the office,” I said.
“Who would do this?” Vinnie asked.
I shrugged. Lula shrugged.
“Last month someone took out the satellite dish,” Vinnie said.
I shrugged. Lula shrugged.
“Someone’s out to get me,” Vinnie said.
“That would be everyone,” Lula said.
Lula and I went into the office. Lula took the couch and checked her mail, and I went to Connie’s desk and ran Beedle, Benji Crup, and Sparks through a bunch of search engines.
Beedle didn’t show any surprises. He was a smart guy. Got a BA from Rutgers and a master’s from Wharton. Worked as a CPA for a respectable firm until his divorce. His credit rating sucked. Lots of expenses while he was married. After the divorce there were crickets. Nothing. It was like he no longer existed. He had an apartment for a while but just recently moved in with his mother. He drives a rusted Nissan Sentra.
Benji Crup lasted through two years at the University of Pennsylvania and dropped out. Worked at GameStop for a year and transitioned to the comic book store. He was the only employee. He made minimum wage. He roomed with a bunch of guys and drove a 2009 Kawasaki Ninja 250.
Melvin Sparks had a high school education. He was in the drama club and the Dungeons & Dragons club. After high school he worked at a Camelot-themed restaurant as a waiter. He spent a year at Disney World as Goofy. After Disney he moved to LA and worked as a waiter at Olive Garden. The next year he landed in Trenton and got a job stacking shelves at a discount box store on the night shift. He didn’t have a car.
I got phone numbers for all of them. No one answered at any of the numbers.
“You look like you got nothing,” Lula said.
“It’s interesting. They’re all three very different people, but in a strange way they have a similar history. It’s like they had early aspirations that didn’t turn out and eventually they settled into a comfortable undemanding existence.”
“That’s not me,” Lula said. “I always shoot for big stuff. Like I said before, I’m an overachiever who isn’t discouraged by underachieving.”
“One of your best qualities,” I said.
“Fuckin’ A. Where we taking this?”
“I don’t know. I thought I’d check in with Grandma.”
“I like that idea,” Lula said. “There’s an added advantage of getting lunch.”
Chapter Eleven
Illustration by Ryan Johnson
“Just the person I want to see,” Grandma said when I walked into the kitchen. “Are you going to the Mori viewing tonight? I could use a ride.”
“Is it really necessary to go to a viewing tonight?” my mother said. “Can’t you let things calm down a little after last night’s scandal?”
“What scandal?” I asked.
My mother laid down two more place settings at the little table. “Everyone’s talking about how you took Bella out in handcuffs.”
“She insisted,” I said. “And the funeral director begged me to remove her from the building.”
“It’s true,” Grandma said. “I was there. I saw it all. Bella needs to have her head examined.” She looked at Lula. “What about you? Are you going to the viewing tonight?”
“No way,” Lula said. “Dead people give me the creeps.”
“Dead people are okay,” Grandma said. “They always look their best at a viewing. It’s a good way to remember them . . . all dressed up with their hair done. It’s like they’re big dolls that are still in their box. It’s the live people that give me the creeps. What’s new in your world?” Grandma asked me.
“The three men involved with Paul Mori’s Knights Templar coin, Beedle, Benji Crup, and Melvin Sparks, have disappeared.”
“Like snatched?”
“I don’t think they’ve been snatched,” I said. “I think they’re hiding out somewhere. I ran them through some search engines but didn’t turn up anything useful.”
“I don’t know any of them,” Grandma said. “Do they have family in the area?”
“Beedle lives with his mom on Maymount,” I said. “She hasn’t been helpful. The other two have family scattered around the country. None of them are married.”
“Maybe they’ll show up at the viewing tonight,” Grandma said.
I didn’t think Beedle, Benji, or Sparks would show up at the viewing. I thought it was possible the kidnappers might be there. They really wanted the coin, and my efforts weren’t getting results. They might be reaching the point of going proactive on their own. And Paul Mori was the last person they knew who had the coin before Vinnie lost it.
We had egg salad sandwiches for lunch, and Grandma brought out a plate of pignoli cookies for dessert. I cut my eyes to her, and she smiled at me. They were the cookies she’d swiped from the viewing. Bella’s cookies.
“I met Shirley Weingarten at the bakery this morning,” Grandma said. “She lives next door to Manny Tortolli, and she was in the backyard when the Tortolli garage caught fire. She said it wasn’t kerosene in the can Bella was holding. It used to be a kerosene can, but Bella used it to get hooch from Tortolli. He had a still in his garage. Shirley said they had a big argument because Tortolli raised his price and Bella wasn’t having any of it. Shirley said there was a lot of arm waving and yelling and there was a crash and that something got knocked over and next thing the garage was on fire.”
“So, it wasn’t arson?” I asked.
“Not exactly,” Grandma said. “Nobody wants to say anything because they all get hooch from Tortolli. They figure nothing’s going to happen to Bella on account of everyone knows she’s a crazy old lady.”
“She gets a lot of mileage out of being crazy,” my mother said.
“Yeah,” Grandma said. “I gotta admit, it works for her.”
I pushed back in my chair and grabbed my messenger bag. “Things to do,” I said.
“What kind of things?” Lula asked.
I took my plate and put it in the dishwasher. “Things!”
We got into my Honda and Lula buckled herself in. “What things are you talking about?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “There has to be something. I can’t just sit around in my mom’s kitchen while Connie is held hostage somewhere.”
“Well, I haven’t got any ideas. Do you have ideas?”
“No.”
“Maybe if I went home and took a nap,” Lula said. “To tell you the truth, I could hardly get that egg salad sandwich down, and that’s saying something, because your mom makes kick-ass egg salad.”
“I’m checking on Beedle, Benji, and Sparks again. I don’t know what else to do.”
“I hear you. I’ll ride along. Maybe we could stop at the bakery and get some cannoli to settle my stomach. Those cookies Grandma put out didn’t do it for me.”
I drove to Hamilton and stopped at Tasty Pastry Bakery. Lula ran in and got a dozen cannoli and hopped back in the car.
“There were two women in there, and they were talking about the Mori viewing tonight. They were all excited to see if Bella was going to be there. I guess there’s a rumor that she’s on house arrest.”
I hoped that was true because I really didn’t want to have to handcuff her again. I swung by the Beedle house first. Still no Sentra in the driveway. I left Lula in the car with the cannoli, and I went to the door and knocked. Mrs. Beedle answered.
“Stephanie,” she said, “I have good news! Carpenter stopped in about an hour ago. He looked wonderful. He was shaved and he was wearing nice clothes and he had a new car. He said things have really turned around for him.”
“What kind of car?”
“A Mercedes,” she said. “It was black, and it looked brand-new.”
New clothes and an expensive car. That required a fast infusion of cash. Like selling something very valuable. Something like a Knights Templar coin. And not just any Knights Templar coin. One in particular. What the heck was so special about that one coin?
“Wow, he must have won the lottery,” I said to Mrs. Beedle, fishing for information.
“I didn’t think about that,” she said. “It sounded more like he was back in finance somehow. It was a short visit. He stopped in to pick up a few of his things.”
“So, he’s in the area. Did he say where he was staying?”
“No, not exactly, just that he had to get back on the road.”
“That’s great,” I said. “I’m glad he’s doing well. Next time you talk to him, remind him that he has a court date coming up. Even better, you could put me in touch with him and I’ll make sure he gets to court.”
“That would be wonderful,” she said. “I’ll give him the message.”
“So, how’d that go?” Lula asked.
“I don’t know. I can’t tell if Carpenter’s mom is naïve or devious. She said Carpenter stopped by to pick up a few things and he was driving a new Mercedes.”
“He must have picked a good pocket,” Lula said.
“You can’t buy a new Mercedes with someone else’s credit card. And it’s difficult to believe someone was carrying that much cash.”
“Drugs?” Lula said. “Maybe he’s dealing.”
“I don’t see him dealing drugs. This has something to do with the coin.”
“You got a feeling, right?” Lula said. “It’s like when I get nipple radar if there’s rabid rats or man-eating spiders coming at me. How are your nipples doing? Are they feeling all shriveled up and tingly?”
I looked down at myself. I didn’t see any evidence of shrivel, so I continued driving to the comic book store. It was still closed. No new Mercedes in sight. I cut across town and parked in front of the Ivy. Lula had worked her way through half of the cannoli and felt like she could take a break, so she came up to the fifth floor with me. I knocked and there was no answer. The door wasn’t locked since Lula had damaged the lock when she bumped it with her screwdriver on the earlier visit. I stepped inside and yelled for Sparks. No answer. We walked through the apartment, looking for signs that Sparks had returned. We didn’t see any signs. I checked his closet and pawed through his costumes.
“Sir Lancelot is missing,” I said to Lula.
“Say what?”
“It’s his favorite costume. And it’s missing.”
“Maybe he wore it when he rode out of town on his big white horse,” Lula said. “Those guys always had big white horses.”
“So far as I know, Sparks didn’t even have a bicycle.”
“Just as well,” Lula said. “Sir Lancelot would look like an idiot on a bicycle.”
+++
I dropped Lula off at the bail bonds office, and I drove to my apartment. I said hello to Rex, gave him a cracker, and took a Diet Pepsi out of the fridge for myself. I went to my dining room table and opened my laptop. I wanted to know more about Gowa Knights Templar coins.
After a couple hours of searching, I knew that the game was created by a man named Randy Gowa. He’d owned a factory that produced a bunch of board games, but his big-ticket item was the Treasure of Gowa. He had two sons and a daughter. None of them wanted anything to do with running a factory. When Randy turned eighty, he sold the factory but kept the rights to the Treasure of Gowa game. He died a year later. None of my research showed that there was one special coin, and I couldn’t find any evidence that a coin could bring more than $30 on today’s market.
I had a peanut butter and banana sandwich for dinner, changed into my viewing clothes, and headed for my parents’ house.
Morelli called. “Are you going to the viewing tonight?” he asked.
“Yes. I’m on my way to get Grandma. Are you going?”
“No. It’s poker night at Mooch’s house. Schmidt is going to the viewing. He’s the primary on the Mori case. Bella is supposed to be confined to the house but that doesn’t mean much with Bella. Give me a call if she shows up and I’ll come get her.”
“Are you having any luck finding Connie?”
“Nothing worth mentioning, but I wouldn’t mind knowing about the signs in the bonds office window.”
I’d known this was coming and I’d decided to partially confide in Morelli.
“Connie’s been kidnapped and the kidnapper has been in touch with the office,” I said. “We’re working with him.”
“Without police involvement?”
“I decided to go with Ranger.”
Silence for a beat. “Good decision,” Morelli said. “That would have been my choice. He has all the technology, and he can operate outside the law. Let me know if you change your mind and you need my help.”
“I assume we never had this conversation.”
“What conversation?” Morelli said. “I don’t remember a conversation.”
“Good luck with the poker game.”
“Luck has nothing to do with it. By the end of the night, I’ll be the only one who’s halfway sober and I’ll cash in. Works every time.”
“And the other guys haven’t figured this out?”
“I’m playing with Mooch, Anthony, Little Dick, Big Dick, and Bugsy. They’re good guys, but collectively they couldn’t figure out how to unscrew a lightbulb.”
This was a real dilemma for me. I was withholding information on a murder. Schmidt was the primary on the Mori case and as far as I knew, he had no clue that the murder was attached to a mysterious coin and a kidnapping. It was one thing for Morelli to close his eyes to the kidnapping. It would be impossible for him to walk away from information on the Mori murder. So, I was hanging out alone because I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize Connie’s rescue.
+++
Grandma was standing at the curb waiting for me. That meant she’d slipped out of the house early, before my mom had a chance to confiscate her .45.
“This is going to be a good viewing,” Grandma said, getting into the car. “I hear they filled in all the bullet holes and Mori looks real lifelike, considering he’s dead. It’s even an open casket. He didn’t have a lot of relatives but supposedly a sister is here from Detroit.”
This was way too much information for me. I was already counting the minutes to the end of the viewing. I dropped Grandma off and went in search of parking. All the on-street parking was already taken and there was one spot left in the lot. It was at the back and almost swallowed up by bushes, but I was happy to have it. This was going to be a monster viewing.
By the time I parked and made my way to the funeral home the doors were open, and the mourners had already rushed in. I assumed Grandma was in line to pass in front of the deceased. I had no desire to do this. I stayed in the lobby and scanned the crowd.
I saw Schmidt at parade rest on the other side of the room. Ranger and Tank were also there. They were all in casual black. Black jeans, black blazers, black collared shirts, black track shoes. Ranger looked like a badass movie star. Tank looked like the Hulk in a blazer, minus the green.
We knew the drill. We’d all attended viewings and funerals before with the hope that the murderer would be drawn to the drama of the event. This was different because this time we didn’t know what the murderer looked like beyond a shadowy figure in a hoodie.
I wandered around the room, looking for a stocky, middle-aged man who might have killed Mori. I found a lot of men who fit that description. Some were probably sorry they hadn’t gotten to Mori first.
I went to Ranger and stood beside him for a moment. He was the only person in the room who smelled wonderful. Ella, his housekeeper, stocked his shower with Bulgari Green shower gel and the scent stayed with him like magic.
“You look bored,” I said. “Would you like me to bring you a cookie?”
“Babe,” Ranger said with enough of a sexual threat to have me moving along.
An hour into the viewing I caught sight of a black-frocked woman scuttling toward the cookie table. Bella. I instantly called Morelli.
“Are you kidding me?” he said. “She’s really there?”
“Yep. She’s making her way to the cookie table and she’s going to be really pissed off again because Grandma already scarfed up all the pignoli.”
“Your grandma is almost as evil as my grandma.”
“True, but my grandma knows enough to get to the cookie table early.”
“I’m on my way.”
I hung back, not wanting to get involved. Mooch lived in the Burg so Morelli was about seven minutes away. Three minutes if he put the Kojak light on. Grandma had returned to the viewing room, so she wasn’t in Bella’s sights. Thank you, God.
After a couple minutes I saw Ranger cut his eyes to the front door and I knew Morelli was here. He walked straight to the cookie table and seconds later he was escorting Bella out of the funeral home. We all have our crosses to bear, and Morelli had a bunch of them. It was impressive that he’d been able to deal with it all and achieve a level of maturity that I hadn’t been able to find for myself.
At nine o’clock there were the usual chimes and the announcement that visitation hours were over. The viewing had been sedate. No drunken brawls. No grieving hysteria. Mori’s sister had been stoic. Most people left early with a sense of mild disappointment. Ranger and Tank disappeared just before the chimes. Schmidt stayed to the end. Grandma and I were among the last stragglers to leave the building. I saw that Ranger and Tank had positioned themselves across the street and were watching the cars that were exiting the lot.
The night air was cool, and the sky was dark and moonless. I used my cell phone flashlight to guide us to my Honda.
We were approaching my car when a stocky man stepped out of the shadows and blocked my way. He was wearing a hoodie and a surgical mask. There was a second man behind him, also in a hoodie and surgical mask. My heart gave a couple hard thumps in my chest, and I went breathless for a beat. The second man lunged at me with a stun gun, and I instinctively jumped away.
Grandma was quicker on the draw. “Son of a peach basket,” Grandma said, and she fired off a shot at the man with the stun gun. She missed the man and took out my driver’s-side window. She got off another round that whistled past my ear, and I hit the ground. The two men bolted out of the lot and disappeared into the night.
I felt my ear to make sure it was still there, and I looked up at Grandma. “Are you done shooting?”
“I guess so,” she said. “Are you okay?”
I stood and dusted myself off. “You almost removed my ear.”
“My gun got stuck in my pocketbook, so I just started shooting. It’s hard to take aim when your gun’s in your pocketbook.” She turned her purse upside down and examined it. “I’m going to need a new bag,” she said. “This one got all torn up.”
Ranger ran over to us. “We heard gunshots,” he said.
“Two guys jumped us,” I said. “Grandma took a couple shots at them, and they ran away.”
“Anyone injured?”
“Not that I could tell,” I said, “but she took out my window.”
“They were big brutes, and they were armed,” Grandma said. “I saw a stun gun, but I didn’t see any weapons beyond that,” I said.
“Well, I shot at them so they must have shot at me first,” Grandma said.
It was very dark, but Ranger’s teeth are very white, and I could see that he was smiling. “That sounds logical,” Ranger said.
I nodded. “My mistake. Now that I think about it, I do remember seeing guns.”
Tank joined us. “Everything okay?”
“What did these guys look like?” Ranger asked me.
“Average height. Stocky. Wearing dark hoodies and surgical masks. Caucasian. Couldn’t see much more than that,” I said. “It’s dark and it went down fast. No one said anything.”
“That’s not true,” Grandma said. “One of them said the word for poop when I started shooting.”
“Caca?” Tank asked.
“No,” Grandma said. “The S-word.”
“Since when aren’t you saying the S-word?” I asked Grandma.
“It’s left over from Lent. God told me to keep going with it.”
Tank looked impressed. “Did God really talk to you?”
“I’m pretty sure it was God,” Grandma said. “It happened at Mass when I couldn’t find my phone. I said you-know-what and this voice told me not to ever say that word again. It was either God or Morgan Freeman.”
I thought it was unlikely that either of them would be talking to Grandma, but hell, I’ve been wrong before.
Tank opened the passenger-side door for Grandma, who settled herself and put her purse on her lap.
Ranger opened my car door and brushed chunks of window glass off my seat. “Do you want me to send someone over to fix this?”
“Thanks,” I said, sliding behind the wheel. “I can handle it.”
“Babe,” Ranger said.
He closed the door and waited while I backed up and left the lot.
Grandma took another look at her purse. “We have to figure out what we’re going to tell your mother. And I’m going to need a new black pocketbook.”
“Take your phone but leave your bag and gun with me. I’ll get you a replacement tomorrow. Are you going to a viewing tomorrow?”
“No,” Grandma said. “Tomorrow I’m going to bingo. I like to mix it up a little. You don’t want to go to a viewing every night. After a while the lilies get to me.”
I dropped Grandma off and headed for home. I turned onto Hamilton and noticed I’d picked up a tail. I called Ranger.
“Are you following me?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he said. “I want to make sure I’m the only one attacking you in your parking lot.”
Fifteen minutes later I parked in my building’s lot and Ranger parked next to me. He walked me to my door and unlocked it for me.
“No one attacked me,” I said.
“Disappointed?”
“No. I’ve already been attacked once tonight. Once is already too much.”
We stepped into my apartment and Ranger flipped the light switch. “Did you see enough of the two men tonight to recognize them as the kidnappers?”
“I saw enough to say that they might be the kidnappers. I’m struggling with the motive. Why would they come after me?”
“Intimidation. Interrogation. They’re losing patience. They thought this would be easy and it’s going south on them. There’s something valuable about the coin. They might be worried that you’ve discovered the value and are trying to cash in.”
“And sacrifice Connie?”
“We’re dealing with men who kidnapped a woman and maybe murdered a man. It wouldn’t be a stretch for them to think you’d sacrifice Connie.” His phone buzzed and he answered it. He listened for a moment and nodded. “Where is he?” he asked. He nodded again and disconnected.
“Bad news?” I asked.
“One of my men has been injured. Not life-threatening but I have to check on him.” He gave me a quick kiss. “I’d feel better if you didn’t look so relieved to see me go.”
“I’m not entirely relieved,” I said.
I locked and bolted the door, went into my kitchen, and stared into Rex’s cage. He was running on his wheel.
“I’m a mess,” I said to Rex.
Rex stopped running for a beat and looked at me with his shiny black eyes. He twitched his whiskers and resumed running.
“Exactly,” I said. “We have a lot in common. We keep running in place.”
Chapter Twelve
I had a frozen strawberry Pop-Tart for breakfast and told myself it was healthy because it was strawberry. Strawberry is a fruit, right? Check that food group off the list of today’s requirements. I washed the Pop-Tart down with black coffee, said goodbye to Rex, and told him I loved him. I was extra vigilant leaving my apartment, keeping watch for chunky guys in hoodies. I felt more relaxed once I was in my car. True, my window was mostly missing, but at least the doors were locked. I drove to the office and parked at the curb.
“Hey, sunshine,” Lula said when I walked in. “How’d the viewing go?”
“The viewing was uneventful, but after the viewing Grandma and I were attacked in the parking lot. Two guys in hoodies. One of them tried to stun gun me.”
“Shut up!”
“Grandma took a shot at him and scared them away.”
“Did she hit him?”
“No, but she took out my driver’s-side window.”
“You want me to call the Glass Guy?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
A half hour later the mobile glass repair truck parked behind my Honda, and the guy got out and stood staring at my window. Lula and I joined him.
“I’m guessing someone shot at you,” he said.
“Occupational hazard,” I told him. “Can you fix it?”
“Of course I can fix it,” he said. “I’m the Glass Guy.”
I got the new window put in and Grandma called.
“I think I’m onto something,” she said.
Grandma was at the front door when I pulled into my parents’ driveway. Lula and I followed her into the kitchen, where my mother was knitting.
“I see you got the mental health knitting thing going,” Lula said to my mom. “Can’t blame you what with the stress of life and all.”
“It’s too early to drink,” my mom said. “I’ve got six hours and ten minutes to go.”
“You could probably add about a quarter mile to that scarf by then,” Lula said. “You’re going along at a good clip.”
“What have you got for me?” I asked Grandma.
“It just occurred to me that one of the men you’re looking for is Benji, the comic book guy, right?”
“Right.”
“Maybe he’s at GoComic.”
“What’s GoComic?”
“It’s a big deal,” Grandma said. “It’s almost as big as Comic-Con. It’s at the convention center in Atlantic City this week. I was thinking of going with Carol Lumbardi, but she punked out on me.”
“Are you a comic book fan?” Lula asked Grandma.
“No. I heard Jason Momoa is going to be there. I thought he might be worth seeing.”
“He’s hot,” Lula said. “Not as hot as Ranger, but still pretty darn hot.”
“Local news did a story on it this morning and I thought about Benji,” Grandma said.
“Good thinking,” Lula said. “When’s this comic thingy start?”
“It’s going on now,” Grandma said. “Yesterday was the first day and it runs through the weekend.”
“There will be hundreds, maybe thousands of people attending,” I said. “What are the chances of finding Benji?”
“Here’s Miss Rain-on-the-Parade,” Lula said. “You gotta think positive. And if we can’t find Benji, we might be able to find Jason Momoa.” Lula looked over at my mom. “How about you, Mrs. P? Are you up for GoComic? We got room in the car.”
“I’m going to stay home and knit, but thank you for asking,” she said. “There’s a crafts show coming up next month and I thought I might enter my scarf if I can get enough length.”
“If it gets much bigger, you’re gonna have to rent a truck to get it to the show,” Lula said.
Atlantic City is a little less than an hour and a half from Trenton. Considering it’s Jersey, it’s a fairly pleasant ride. I took Hamilton Avenue to Route 129, drove south, and got onto I-295. The rest was a straight shot down 295 and the Atlantic City Expressway.
“I’m on the GoComic website,” Lula said. “It looks like you gotta pay to get into this.”
“I get a break because I’m a senior citizen,” Grandma said.
“How much does it cost for us?” I asked Lula.
“It’s fifty dollars. Good thing this is official business. I brought petty cash from the office, and I got a new credit card that I gave myself as temporary office manager.”
“Do you see anything about Jason Momoa?” Grandma asked.
“There’s an Aquaman panel discussion but it doesn’t say who’s on it.”
Here’s something promising, I thought. Benji’s wasted roommate said Benji was going to hang out with Aquaman. I was about to get lucky.
“When is the Aquaman panel?” I asked Lula. “Three o’clock.”
“That makes things tight for us,” Grandma said to me. “Your mother isn’t going to be happy if we’re late for dinner.”
“You can’t be thinking about dinner at a time when we’re about to crack this case wide open,” Lula said to Grandma. “One of our prime suspects could be in the audience for that Aquaman panel. Aquaman himself might even help us make an apprehension.”
“I guess when you put it that way it would make sense to miss dinner,” Grandma said.
“We want to talk to Benji, not apprehend him,” I said. “He hasn’t committed a crime. At least none that we know about.”
+++
The Atlantic City Convention Center is a massive structure at the end of the Atlantic City Expressway. It isn’t directly on the ocean but it isn’t far away either. I parked in the center’s garage, and we all hustled over to the main building.
“This is exciting,” Grandma said. “I always wanted to go to one of these things. I’ve seen pictures of people who come dressed up like their favorite characters. If I’d known ahead, I would have dressed up like a Power Ranger. I got all the moves.”
“I’d be Sexy Loki,” Lula said. She looked at me. “Who would you want to be?”
“Iron Man.”
“That’s a serious superhero,” Grandma said.
Lula bought our tickets and got a map and a schedule of events.
“This is bigger than I expected,” Grandma said. “It’s like you don’t know where to go and there’s people smashed in everywhere.”
She was right about the people. They were packed in the cavernous building like sardines in a can. They were taking selfies, buying franchise junk, and rushing off to panel discussions and autograph sessions.
“I see Thor,” Grandma said, “but I don’t think he’s the real one.” “Now that we’re here, I want to get horns like Loki,” Lula said.
“We’re supposed to be looking for Benji,” I said.
“Yeah, but I’m one of those multitaskers,” Lula said. “I can shop with one eye and look out with the other. The map they gave us makes it easy to find the Loki stuff.”
“I want a cape like Doctor Strange,” Grandma said. “How much do you think one of them would cost?”
“It wouldn’t cost anything,” Lula said. “We got an expense account. We’re on official business relating to Carpenter Beedle.”
“You’re a good office manager,” Grandma said. “You know how to take charge.”
“You bet your ass,” Lula said. “And you notice I’m even willing to do fieldwork like going on this trip.”
“According to the map, the Avengers section is next to the food court,” Grandma said. “I wouldn’t mind grabbing something for lunch.”
We joined the tide of conventioneers moving toward food, swept along cheek by jowl with Darth Vader, Bart Simpson, some hobbits, and a bunch of lowly Muggles.
By three o’clock Grandma had a red cape, and Lula was wearing Loki horns. We’d managed to get into the room that was hosting the Aquaman panel, and we were all on the lookout for Benji. I was in the very back of the room because I wanted to see everyone leaving. Grandma and Lula were in the second row. They wanted to see Aquaman. As it turned out it was an Aquaman stand-in, but they wanted to see him all the same.
After forty minutes of Aquaman lore I still hadn’t caught sight of Benji. The event came to a close. We all applauded. Everyone stampeded to the door. And there he was. Benji. Wearing a T-shirt and jeans. No horns. No cape. Not carrying an Aquaman trident.
Part of the horde trying to get to the next event. I stood on my seat and waved at Lula and Grandma, pointing to the door, mouthing, Benji!
Lula waved back and lowered her horns to get through the crush of people. I jumped off my seat and shoved my way to the door.
“So sorry,” I said. “Excuse me. Emergency.”
I made it out of the room, and I saw Benji turn toward the food court. There were a lot of people between us, and I was doing my best to weave my way through them. I lost visual on Benji and my fear was that he’d turned into one of the side aisles without my realizing it. The food court was just ahead. It was a wide-open space filled with tables and I would have a better shot at finding him there.
I finally broke out of the crowd and was able to scan the area. I saw Benji a good distance in front of me, making his way to an exit that led to more exhibits. There was a commotion going on behind me. Raised voices, a couple shrieks, and a woman yelled, “Crazy horned bitch.”
Benji turned to see what was going on and spotted me. For a beat he froze, deer in headlights, and then he was off and running. I ran after him, dodging people carrying drinks and burgers, skirting tables. I reached the exit and heard more noise behind me. I took a quick glance back and cringed when I saw Lula on the floor with another woman. In an instant Lula was on her feet and running.
“I’m coming,” Lula yelled. “I got your back.”
Grandma was a short distance behind Lula. “Me too,” she yelled. “Don’t let the little bugger get away!”
I left the food court and lost Benji. He’d been swallowed up by the crowd. I stopped to catch my breath and Lula and Grandma caught up to me. Lula had what looked like a chocolate milkshake down the front of her and some French fries stuck in her cleavage.
“These people don’t know enough to get out of the way,” Lula said. “Anybody could see I was on the chase. There’s a bunch of dumb people here.”
“She might have gored someone,” Grandma said. “We should watch the news tonight.”
I hurried Grandma and Lula through the main hall, to the building’s entrance. “We can hang here and watch the doors,” I said. “Maybe we can catch him leaving.”
“Is this the only way out?” Lula asked.
“I’m sure there are lots of other ways out,” I said. “Vendors and employees would use other doors, but this is the one available to fans. You watch for Benji. I’m going to canvass hotels to see if he’s staying around here.”
I called my mom and told her we were still in Atlantic City and wouldn’t be home for dinner. I called Morelli next. We have a standing date for Friday night. Usually, he eats dinner with me at my parents’ house and then we spend the night together.
“I’m in Atlantic City,” I said. “I’m going to miss dinner, but I’ll see you later.”
“That’s the best part anyway,” he said. “If you’re not here by eleven o’clock I’m going to start without you.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
I tried the Sheraton first since it was the convention center hotel. No luck there. I tried some other budget hotels. Nothing. I sat down on a bench, looked at a map, and called some of the classics. Caesars, Showboat, Bally’s, Tropicana, Harrah’s. I tried Hard Rock last. No Benjamin Crup.
I left my bench and walked over to Lula and Grandma, standing watch a short distance away. “I’ve tried the most obvious hotels, and no one has Benji registered,” I said.
“Maybe he’s not using his real name,” Grandma said.
“Yeah, or maybe he’s with somebody,” Lula said. “Maybe Sparks is here parading around like Sir Lancelot and the room is under his name. You said the Sir Lancelot costume was missing from his closet, right? We didn’t see him but maybe that’s on account of we weren’t looking for him. Maybe the Sir Lancelot people were hanging out in a different part of the building.”
I went back to my bench and started calling my way through the hotels asking for Sparks. Halfway through I stopped to think about the three men. If they were working together, who would most likely be in charge? Carpenter Beedle. He had the most education, and more important, he was an accountant before becoming a panhandler. He was a detail guy. I continued calling hotels but now I was asking for Beedle. I got a positive hit on the Hard Rock. Mental head slap. I should have gone to the Hard Rock first. It was the right fit for a guy who’d just reinvented himself with new clothes and an expensive car.
“They’re staying at the Hard Rock,” I said to Grandma and Lula.
“Good choice of hotel,” Lula said. “What’s the plan?”
“Benji ran when he saw me,” I said. “He had no reason to do that. It’s not as if he’s one of Vinnie’s skips. He ran because he didn’t want to talk to me. I’m sure he knows we’re onto him about the coin.”
“He thinks we know something,” Grandma said, “but what he doesn’t know is that we really don’t know anything. So we have the advantage.”
“All true,” I said.
“We gotta be sneaky about this,” Lula said. “You can’t go busting down the door at the Hard Rock. And ordinarily we could be pizza delivery people or offer our services as erectile engineers, but since Benji saw Stephanie, they’re going to be suspicious.”
“I can legally apprehend Beedle,” I said. “We can wait in the lobby and get him on the way to the elevators. It will be easier to catch him in the more confined space.”
“I like that idea,” Lula said. “It’ll be comfy in the Hard Rock lobby. And the café is right there.”
+++
I drove out of the parking garage and got onto Virginia Avenue, and it took us straight to the Hard Rock. I parked in a nearby lot, and we marched into the hotel lobby. We stopped after a couple feet and looked around.
“I haven’t been here in a while,” Grandma said. “I’d forgotten how big it is.”
I was having the same thought. The lobby was larger than I’d remembered, and at this time of the day there were a lot of people passing through. And a lot of them were from GoComic. They were carrying GoComic bags, and they were in various stages of GoComic dress. If Benji, Beedle, and Sparks came through the lobby as stormtroopers or Wookiees, I wouldn’t recognize them. “We’d be better off waiting for them in their room,” Lula said. “We could easily miss them here.”
“Two problems with that,” I said. “We need to get their room number and we need to get into the room.”
“I can get us into the room if you can get the number,” Lula said. “I got to be real good at getting into men’s hotel rooms when I was a ho.”
I called Ranger and asked if he could hack into the hotel system to get Carpenter Beedle’s room number. Ten minutes later I got a text with the number.
“You all wait here,” Lula said. “I’ll text you when I’m in and you come up and do the secret knock.”
“What’s the secret knock?” Grandma asked.
“Knock, knock, knock. And then you wait a beat and do another knock.”
Grandma and I hung out in the lobby, scanning the crowd. She was still wearing her red cape, and oddly enough, it made us less conspicuous. We fit right in with the geeks and freaks and uberfans who were filing in after a long day at the convention center.
“This is just like being on another planet,” Grandma said. “It’s like in the Star Wars movies when Han Solo goes into a cantina and all the people have two heads or it looks like their faces got melted. Maybe we want to blow off finding Benji and go to the casino.”
“That would be fun, but we’re supposed to be rescuing Connie.”
“I forgot about that for a minute.”
Lula called and said she was in Beedle’s room.
“It’s a long elevator ride,” she said, “but the view is good. When you get up here don’t let anybody see you.”
We took the south tower elevator to the thirty-eighth floor and Grandma gave the secret knock on Beedle’s door. Lula opened the door and hurried us in. “I told one of the housekeeping ladies I was here with Sir Lancelot and when I stepped out to get some horns, I forgot to take my key.”
“That worked?” Grandma asked.
“I can be real believable when I want to be,” Lula said. “And then I gave her a generous tip from petty cash.”
Beedle had taken one of the nicer suites. It had an ocean view, a small kitchen area with a dining table and six chairs, a separate bedroom, and a living room with a large flat-screen TV. There was a day pack that I thought belonged to Benji, a cheap, dented suitcase that I assigned to Sparks, and a small Tumi suitcase that I was guessing belonged to Beedle. A bunch of plastic bags from GoComic were stashed in a corner. I bolted the door, and we went to work searching for the coin.
“It’s not here,” Lula said. “Someone must have it on him. Or maybe they sold it.”
“We need a plan,” Grandma said. “What are we going to do when the three guys come back?”
“You two hide in the bedroom, and I’ll hide behind the door,” I said. “When they get inside, I’ll slam the door shut and tell them we want some answers.”
“What if they don’t want to give us answers?”
“I guess we’ll threaten them.”
“With what? We had to leave our guns in the car.”
“We’ll threaten to expose them. We’ll tell the kidnappers that Beedle, Benji, and Sparks have the coin. And we’ll remind them that Paul Mori is dead.”
“That’s good,” Grandma said. “That would scare me.”
We heard men talking in the hall and I ran to the door and flattened myself against the wall. Grandma and Lula ran into the bedroom. The door opened. Sir Lancelot, Beedle, and Benji walked in, and I slammed the door shut behind them.
“What the heck?” Benji said. “How did you get in here?”
“I have ways,” I said.
Grandma and Lula came out of the bedroom.
“Damn right she got ways,” Lula said. “We all got ways.”
“What do you want?” Beedle asked. “I haven’t skipped on my new court date.”
“I want the coin,” I told him.
“I gave it to Benji,” Beedle said.
“I gave it to Sparks,” Benji said.
“You had my six coins,” Sparks said. “You had all of them.”
“I want the seventh coin,” I said.
Sparks fidgeted with his fake sword. “There’s no seventh coin.”
“Liar liar pants on fire,” Lula said.
“Where did you get the money for the car and the clothes and this suite?” I asked Beedle.
“I got lucky panhandling.”
“I thought you liked the simple life,” I said to Beedle. “Remember how you were happy not having any encumbrances? What about all that?”
“I still don’t have any encumbrances,” he said. “I paid cash for the car and this suite. My life is still simple. It’s just simple in an expanded universe of luxury.”
“How about you?” I asked Benji. “Has your universe of luxury expanded?”
“I got a cool bike,” he said. “And I’m going to Hawaii to live in a yurt next to a waterfall.”
“Do you got a bathroom in that yurt?” Lula asked. “I wouldn’t want to live in a yurt without a bathroom.”
I looked at Sir Lancelot.
“I bought a Saxon helmet yesterday,” he said. “And I got a lap dance from a wench.”
“This is all terrific,” I said, “but I’m pretty sure this fun stuff has been bought with money you made off the Knights Templar coin. And here’s the problem. There are some very bad guys who want that coin. They kidnapped our office manager and they’re holding her for ransom. I’m ninety-nine percent sure that they killed Paul Mori. All this for the coin. So, what I’m going to do is tell them that you three guys have what they want. I’m taking myself out of it. You’re on your own. You can deal with the kidnappers.”
“And don’t forget they’re killers, too,” Grandma said.
“For real?” Benji asked.
“Yes,” I said.
Benji looked at Beedle. “This isn’t good.”
“I hadn’t planned on this development,” Beedle said.
“You’ve got an impulsive nature,” Grandma said to him. “This is like when you decided to rob the armored truck.”
“Not true,” Beedle said. “I’m really very methodical. I think things through. I make decisions based on logical thought. The armored truck was a fluke. My sudden windfall is the result of my knowledge of finance. And I admit that luck played a part. I was in the right place at the right time. My stars were all in alignment.”
“And now?” I asked. “How are your stars now?”
“They’d still be in alignment if you weren’t such a meanie,” Beedle said. “You’re ruining our good time.”
“Do you understand that there’s a woman being held hostage somewhere?” I said. “That we have no idea what sort of condition she’s in? That she’s got to be terrified?”
“I didn’t know that,” Beedle said.
“Me either,” Sparks said.
“Me either,” Benji said.
“Does it make a difference?” I asked them.
“Sure,” Beedle said. “You can have the coin, but we already spent the money.”
Oh boy. “What money?” I asked him.
“When Melvin got the coin he examined it under magnifica- tion,” Beedle said.
“It’s standard procedure for us collectors,” Sparks said. “It helps to determine the value of the coin. In this case there was a small visible smudge on the knight side. When I looked at it magnified, I could see that it was numbers and alphabet letters. I figured it meant something, so I asked Benji where he got the coin.”
“And Benji came to me,” Beedle said. “I knew right away that the letters and numbers were a cryptocurrency password. It took me a while to finagle my way into the right account but eventually I got in.”
“And?” I asked.
“And there was money in the account. We figured it was finders keepers and that we’d divide it up between us.”
“How much money?” I asked.
“When it got changed to dollars it came to eleven million,” Beedle said.
“Damn,” Lula said. “Losers weepers.”
“It’s stealing,” I said.
“We didn’t see it that way,” Beedle said. “It’s one of those chances you take with cryptocurrency. People lose their passwords all the time. Especially if it’s an older account without backup systems. Once you lose your password the money is gone. You can’t access it and it stays in the account forever. Not doing anybody any good. So, we figured the way everything progressed from me relieving Vinnie of what was assumed to be a nearly worthless coin, to it eventually going to a collector who was smart enough to examine it—it was like providence. Divine intervention. Like God wanted us to have the money. And we didn’t see anybody getting hurt by it.”
“Somebody lost eleven million dollars,” I said. “You didn’t see that as being painful?”
“It was an old account, started back when mostly criminals were using crypto,” Beedle said. “Besides, we didn’t see how it could get traced back to us, and we didn’t know about the kidnapping.”
“Makes sense to me,” Grandma said. “I’d have kept the money.”
“Me too,” Lula said. “I’m not in favor of rewarding killers with good deeds.”
“Okay, so where’s the money now?” I asked Beedle. “How much is left?”
“Nothing’s left. I cleaned out the account,” Beedle said. “Usually, you have to remove your currency in relatively small increments, but I knew how to move it into other investments that I could trade and sell. Everything we took out of the account has been washed and dispersed.”
Oh boy, again.
“That’s a wonderful story,” Grandma said. “It’s like you got a second chance at having a life.”
“Yeah,” Lula said. “You were three losers and now you’re rich. It’s one of them life-affirming stories you hear about on the news. Makes me believe in the American dream all over again.” She dabbed at her eye. “Gets me all choked up.”
Beedle took the coin out of his pocket and gave it to me.
“I was carrying it for luck, but you can have it,” he said. “Are you going to rat us out?”
“No,” I said. “I can’t see any good coming from that.”
“Dilly dilly,” Sir Lancelot said.
“Dilly dilly,” we all repeated.
+++
“You didn’t sound like you had your heart in the dilly dilly,” Lula said to me when we were back in the lobby.
“I’m getting worn down,” I said. “It’s like I’m always taking one step forward and two steps backward. I finally have the coin but I’m not sure it’s going to get Connie released. And even if she does get released, they’re going to come after me when they realize their money is gone.”
“You’re in deep doody,” Lula said. “I’m glad I’m not you.”
+++
We had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe and by the time we got home it was nine o’clock. I dropped Grandma off and called Morelli.
“Where are you?” I asked him.
“I’m in your apartment. Rex was lonely.”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes. Do you want me to pick anything up? Did you have dinner?”
“I already ate. My mom brought me meatballs in red sauce. I have enough for two weeks.”
Morelli’s mom is a good cook. It’s a requirement for living in the Burg. Every woman in the Burg is a good cook. Except me. If I hadn’t moved out of the Burg I would have been kicked out. I have a pot, a fry pan, and a glass casserole dish. I buy food magazines and I watch the food channel. I eat food all the time. That’s as far as it goes.
I pulled into my parking lot and found a place close to the back door. I had Ranger’s gun in my messenger bag. I didn’t see anyone hanging out. I had Morelli in my apartment, and he’d hear me screaming unless he had the TV too loud. I left my car, hurried into the building, and took the stairs two at a time.
Morelli met me at my door.
“I was watching you from the window,” he said. “You sat in your car for a while and then you ran into the building. The cop part of me is curious.”
“Two men attempted to stun gun me after the viewing last night. Grandma fired off a couple shots and scared them away.”
“Was this a random attack?”
“Might have been,” I said, “but more likely it was the kidnap- pers getting impatient.”
I hung my messenger bag on a hook in what served as a foyer and went into the kitchen. I said hello to Rex and looked in the fridge. Jackpot. Morelli’d brought me a six-pack of beer and saved me some of his mom’s meatballs in sauce.
“If I’d known this was in my fridge I would have run faster,” I said.
I got a fork and ate a meatball. No need to get fancy and heat it up and sprinkle it with grated cheese. A cold meatball is still a treasure. I forked a second meatball and brought it into the living room.
“Catch me up,” Morelli said, sitting next to me.
“Do you want the short version or the long version?”
“The long version.”
An hour later I was at the end of my story and Morelli was leaning forward, taking it all in.
“So that’s why I was being careful in the parking lot just now,” I said.
“They cleaned out the crypto account.”
“Yup.”
“And you have the coin?”
I pulled it out of my jeans pocket and handed it over to Morelli.
“I’m a cop,” Morelli said. “I’m supposed to be the one with the dangerous job, but you keep one-upping me.”
“You’re just being modest. What about the women who beat you up on the bridge?”
“You’re right. That was scary.”
“So where do I go from here? Do you have any suggestions?”
“If it was me, I’d throw Benji, Beedle, and Sparks under the bus.”
“I don’t want to do that.”
“They’ve probably broken at least a dozen laws.”
“I know, but they aren’t bad people and putting them in prison would ruin their lives.”
“You’re a bounty hunter. It’s what you do.”
“It feels different.”
Morelli froze for a beat, no doubt trying to adjust to the logic of female reasoning.
“You’re limiting your options,” he said. “You can’t bring the feds in without implicating Benji, Beedle, and Sparks.”
“I’m not ready to bring the feds in anyway. Now that we know all this . . . what should I do?”
“Go proactive. Give them the coin and let them find out for themselves that they’ve been robbed. You were right in assuming they’re going to come after you. Ranger will have to be ready to take them out.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“I hate it.”
“Yeah, me too,” I said. “You have any other ideas?”
“Aside from putting you on a plane to Costa Rica, no.”
I was relieved that I’d spewed out the big secret to Morelli. A nice warm glow swirled through my stomach.
“How about ideas not related to Benji, Beedle, and Sparks,” I said to Morelli. “You have any ideas on other subjects?”
Morelli grinned. “I have lots of ideas.” He slid his hand under my T-shirt. “I’ve waited all week to demonstrate my ideas.”
“New stuff?”
“Some new stuff and some old favorites.”
“And you’re going to cram all this into one night?”
“I have a plan.”
You gotta love a man with a plan.
From GOING ROGUE by Janet Evanovich. Copyright © 2022 by Evanovich, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Atria Books, an Imprint of Simon & Schuster, LLC.
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