Fearless Fourteen: A Stephanie Plum Novel

by Janet Evanovich

  “I’m gonna be a June bride and I need to consider some wedding cakes,” Lula said to Betty. “I like the one in the window with the three tiers and the big white roses with the green leaves, but before I get down to business, I need an éclair.”

  “Me, too,” I said to Betty. “I need three.”

  “Three?” Lula said. “I’m the one with the wedding jitters, and you’re trumping me on éclairs. What’s with that?”

  “I have Zook and Loretta jitters.”

  “That don’t seem like three-éclair jitters to me,” Lula said. “That’s barely a single éclair. That might be a half a éclair. Maybe I need more éclairs.” She looked over at Betty. “You might want to put a couple more éclairs in that box.”

  Betty boxed up six éclairs and handed them over. “What kind of cake are you thinking about?” Betty asked. “Chocolate, vanilla, carrot cake, rum cake, chocolate chip, spice, banana? And then you get to choose the filling between the layers. Lemon pudding, chocolate mousse, whipped cream, coconut cream, tropical fruit filling?”

  “I like all them cakes,” Lula said. “The part I want to talk about is the bride and groom. The little people on top the cake have to be right. Tank and me are darker than the little people you got displayed. And we’re more . . . full-bodied. You see what I’m saying?”

  The door to the bakery opened and Morelli sauntered in, draped an arm around my shoulders, and gave me a friendly kiss just above my ear. “Saw your car parked at the curb,” he said. “Nice paint job.”

  “Protects me from Moondog.”

  “One less thing for me to worry about,” Morelli said.

  I took the box of éclairs and went outside to talk. I opened the box and offered it to Morelli. “Hungry?”

  Morelli’s eyes went beyond the box to my T-shirt and traveled south. “Yeah,” he said.

  “Right now, I’m only offering éclairs.”

  Morelli blew out a sigh and took one. I did the same, and we stood in the sun with our backs to the building and ate our éclairs.

  “I had a disturbing conversation with Dominic Rizzi,” I said to Morelli. “His contention is that not only did you steal his Aunt Rose’s house out from under him, but that you’re Mario’s father.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Morelli said.

  “Dom claims he caught you in the act with Loretta in her father’s garage, and nine months later Mario was born.”

  Morelli chewed slowly and thought about it. “I went through a lot of women back then. I don’t remember all of them.”

  “Seems to me you’d remember having sex with your cousin.”

  “To begin with, Loretta’s not exactly part of the family tree. It’s more like she’s in the forest.”

  “What the heck is that supposed to mean?”

  “I don’t know. It’s like we’re forty-third cousins or something.” He finished eating and took a paper napkin from me. “I guess I have some vague recollection of a skirmish in the garage, but I don’t recall doing it with Loretta.”

  “Then who was in the garage with you?”

  “I don’t know,” Morelli said. “It was dark.” He looked at the éclair box. “Can I have another one?”

  “No.”

  “You’re mad.”

  “Of course I’m mad. How could you have been so irresponsible? God, you were such a . . . pig.”

  “That’s not exactly a secret,” Morelli said. “Everyone knew I was a pig. You knew I was a pig.”

  “There’s more bad news,” I told him.

  “Terrific. What is it?”

  “Dominic has decided you should die, and he’s going to kill you.”

  “I need to have a talk with Loretta. And then I’ll talk to Dom. See if I can get him interested in solving his mental health issues.” He gave me a kiss on my forehead. “Gotta go. Are you working tonight?”

  “Yes. Brenda has a press conference this afternoon and dinner with the mayor tonight.”

  “Will you be able to pick Zook up after school?”

  “If I can’t, I’ll get someone else to do it. And I’m going to leave him with my parents this afternoon, if Loretta isn’t bonded out. Dom is too irrational about you. I don’t want to make things worse by putting his nephew in your house.” And what went unsaid was that I was still spooked by the guy in the basement. Morelli’s house didn’t feel secure.

  Morelli opened the driver’s side door to his SUV and clumps of dog hair tumbled out and drifted off on a breeze. “Be careful tonight,” he said.

  “No problem. Brenda isn’t dangerous.”

  Morelli angled himself behind the wheel. “I was thinking of Ranger.”

  Lula bustled out of the store, and we watched Morelli drive off. “That man is fine,” Lula said, taking an éclair from the box. “I get a rush just looking at him.”

  I glanced over at her.

  “Well, hell,” she said. “I’m engaged. I’m not dead.”

  FIVE

  I WAS BACK in my black suit and black heels. In an effort to compete with Brenda, I’d added an extra swipe of mascara and I’d run a brush through my hair. If I’d had an extra hour and a half, I could have done a lot better.

  I reached the hotel five minutes late, and Tank was still on duty in front of Brenda’s door.

  “Ranger’s at a meeting with hotel security,” Tank said. “I’ll stay with you until he gets here.”

  Spending time with Tank was always excrutiating, because for the most part Tank didn’t talk. Ranger didn’t talk a lot, either, but he said a lot with his eyes and his touch. I’d reached a level of comfort with Ranger. Ranger looked at ease and in control when he was with me. Tank looked like he wanted to bolt and run.

  “So,” I said to Tank, doing some mental knucklecracking, searching for an icebreaker. “Congratulations.”

  “What?”

  “On your engagement.”

  “Oh jeez,” Tank said, his upper lip breaking out in a sweat. “You know about it?”

  “Lula told me.”

  “What did she say? Did she say how it happened? You know, how I proposed?”

  “She said it was very romantic.”

  Tank did a grimace. “Listen, can I talk to you real confidential? I mean, Ranger trusts you, and he doesn’t trust anyone, so maybe I can trust you, too, right?”

  “Sure.”

  “I don’t remember proposing. I guess I was so nervous, I blanked out or something. I don’t even remember buying the ring! All I remember is I fell asleep, and when I woke up, I was engaged. Lula was wearing the ring, and she was all excited.”

  Oh boy. “I guess the important thing is that you’re happy about it,” I told him. “You are happy, aren’t you?”

  “I don’t know. I’m confused. You won’t tell Ranger, will you? He’ll laugh his ass off.”

  “Ranger laughs?”

  “He laughs on the inside.”

  “You’re going to have to tell Ranger sooner or later,” I said to Tank.

  “Why?”

  “Because you’ll get married and . . .”

  “Married! We just got engaged.”

  “That’s usually followed by marriage.”

  Tank’s eyes were blank and his face went gray under the brown. He staggered back, went down to one knee, and crashed to the floor in a faint.

  The elevator doors opened, and Ranger stepped out and spied Tank stretched out on the carpet.

  “Fainted,” I said.

  Ranger walked to Tank and stood hands on hips, staring down at him. “Tank doesn’t faint. I’ve been in firefights with him. He’s a rock.”

  “Well, the rock fainted.”

  Ranger toed him, and Tank moaned a little and opened his eyes.

  “Why did he faint?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  Ranger cut his eyes to me. “Excuse me?”

  “I promised.”

  Ranger gave Tank another nudge with his foot. Actually, it was almost a kick.

  “I
do,” Tank said. “No, wait, I don’t. I do. I don’t.” He shook his head, his vision cleared, and he looked up at Ranger. “Crap.”

  “You fainted,” I told Tank.

  “I did not,” Tank said. “That’s a lie.”

  Ranger grabbed Tank by the shirt and pulled him to his feet. No small task, since Tank had about fifty pounds on Ranger.

  “Talk,” Ranger said to Tank.

  Tank looked at me.

  “You might as well,” I said to Tank. “He’ll find out anyway. He always does.”

  “I’m engaged,” Tank said. “I guess it’s to get married.”

  Ranger didn’t move for a beat. “Engaged,” he finally said. “And you think it’s to get married?”

  Tank nodded his head.

  “And your fiancée?”

  “Lula,” Tank said.

  Ranger rocked back on his heels, grinning. “No wonder you fainted.”

  “You gotta help me,” Tank said.

  “No way I’m getting involved in this. You’re on your own.” Ranger glanced at the door to Brenda’s suite. “Any word from the diva?”

  “Haven’t seen her all day,” Tank said. “The PR person is in there.”

  Ranger checked his watch and rapped on the door. Nothing happened, so he rapped again, and Nancy answered. “Five minutes,” Ranger said.

  Ten minutes later, Ranger opened the door with his key card, and we walked in on Brenda. She was in a hotel bathrobe, and she was talking on the phone.

  “I’m in the middle of something,” she said to Ranger.

  “We need to leave,” Ranger said.

  “Be a good boy or mommy will spank you,” Brenda said to Ranger.

  Ranger yanked the phone cord out of the wall, and the little plastic clip popped off and flew across the room.

  Brenda looked Ranger over. “Very masterful,” she said. “I like your style.”

  Hard to tell if it was sarcasm, or if Brenda was feeling like she wouldn’t mind wearing Ranger’s handcuffs. I was going with some of both.

  Ranger looked at Nancy. “Does she have clothes?”

  Nancy had a bunch of dresses draped over her arm. “We’re working on it.”

  “Work on it faster,” Ranger said.

  I could hear muffled voices and scuffling sounds in the hall. There was a loud thud, someone shrieked, and that led to more voices all talking at once.

  Ranger opened the door, and we looked out at Tank. He was surrounded by women carrying signs protesting Brenda and breast augmentation. Tank had one of the signs in one hand and a woman by the back of her jacket in the other. The woman’s feet weren’t touching the ground.

  “What’s going on?” Ranger asked Tank.

  “They wanted to get in to see Brenda, but I wouldn’t let them, and then this one hit me with her sign,” Tank said.

  “That’s assault,” Ranger said to the woman. “We could have you arrested.”

  The woman looked at Ranger and sucked in some air.

  “Put her down,” Ranger said to Tank, “and return her sign.” He faced the rest of the women. “You can’t protest here. You have to return to the lobby. You can have your demonstration down there. Brenda will be walking through in a couple minutes.”

  The women turned and got into the elevator and disappeared.

  Ranger punched hotel security into his cell phone. “We have protestors in the elevator, heading for the lobby,” he said. “I want them escorted out of the hotel.”

  “You’re sneaky,” I said to Ranger.

  Ranger ushered me back into the suite. “Something to remember.”

  Brenda had crammed herself into a low-cut black sweater and tight black jeans. The sweater gave a first-rate display of her spectacularly augmented breasts. Truth is, for a moment I was just a teensy jealous. I was half her age, and I was worried that even on a good day, I didn’t look as sexy as Brenda. She was wearing strappy heels and long, dangly diamond earrings that caught the light when she moved.

  “What was that all about?” she asked.

  “More animal cruelty protestors in the hall,” I said. “They’re gone.” I thought this was easier than explaining about the breast augmentation issue.

  “Honestly, I don’t know what their problem is! It’s not like I’m torturing puppies. It was a friggin’ mink coat. Those minks were born to be coats. Has anyone ever explained that to them?” She turned and pointed her finger at Nancy. “I want you to talk to them. It’s your job to make things run smoothly and effortlessly for me. This is all your fault.”

  “I’m getting a migraine,” Nancy whispered to me. “I might have to skip the press conference.”

  “A migraine isn’t going to get you out of this,” I told her. “If you died, I’d drag your cold, dead body to that press conference. If I have to go . . . you have to go.”

  _______

  THE WOMEN AGAINST Augmentation were MIA when we walked into the lobby with Brenda. A few die-hard fans were milling around, clumped together behind the potted plants, but we swished through before they realized Brenda was in their space. Ranger was wasting no time moving her to the large conference room at the opposite end of the hotel. Nancy was practically running in an attempt to keep ahead of him as he towed Brenda, his hand wrapped around her wrist, partially to hurry her along, partially to keep her from grabbing him. I was last in line, guarding the rear.

  The conference room was filled with media when we arrived. A small, raised stage had been set in place. It held two chairs and a table with a vase of flowers and two handheld microphones. Brenda took a chair and Lew Pepper, the concert promoter who had hired Ranger, took the other. Pepper looked over at Ranger, and Ranger deadpanned a cold-eyed stare, extended his index finger at Lew, thumb up to simulate a gun, and pulled the trigger. Lew laughed but looked nervous and pointed to the first reporter up.

  A small man with gray hair tied back in a ponytail and wearing a lumpy sports coat of no specific color stood. “I’m from the Princeton paper, and I’d like to know if you feel the lyrics to your latest album are relevant in today’s culture.”

  “They weren’t even relevant when I made the album,” she said. “I always try to avoid content in my songs.”

  A woman from a Hunterdon County weekly asked Brenda if she liked horses.

  “Sure,” Brenda said. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  That was followed by a guy who looked like he’d been kicked around the block a few times, recently. “I’m from the Newark paper, and I’d like to know what the gate is on this concert.”

  “Not as big as your booze bill,” Brenda said.

  Everyone laughed. These people all knew one another. This was a conference for local newsmen. Brenda was a big deal in Trenton, but New York wouldn’t cross the river for her. But then, New York didn’t cross the river for anyone.

  Halfway through the interview, a guy from the Asbury Park paper stood and said he’d heard a rumor that Brenda was being harassed by a stalker who had unsuccessfully tried to kidnap her. Was that issue being addressed while she was in Trenton?

  “Absolutely,” Lew Pepper said. “No one’s going to kidnap Brenda while she’s in Trenton. All stalkers are going to have to be content with buying an album.”

  Everyone laughed but Ranger. Ranger was watching the room.

  “Is it being addressed?” I asked him.

  “He’s in the third row. Pudgy guy. White hair. Blackrimmed glasses. In his forties.”

  “Why don’t you have him ejected? Isn’t there a restraining order against him?”

  “Yes, but I’d rather have him where I can see him.”

  A reporter for one of the Trenton papers got the nod. He looked mid-twenties. Probably fresh out of college. He was slim and dressed in an oversize shirt and khaki slacks.

  “Brenda,” he said, “my grandfather has been a huge fan ever since he first heard you perform when he was in college. Do you expect to see much of that early fan base here at your concert in Trenton?”

&n
bsp; “Cripes,” Brenda said. “Your grandfather? How old are you? You look like the last guy I dated.”

  Nancy jumped out of her chair. “And that concludes our press conference. Thank you all for coming.”

  Ranger helped Brenda off the stage and handed her a can of soda and a cookie from the refreshment table set out for the press.

  “Keeping her hands occupied?” I asked him.

  “Trying.”

  He put his hand to Brenda’s back and guided her through the crowd. I watched for the stalker guy and put myself between him and Brenda when he moved toward her.

  “Are you her bodyguard?” the stalker asked.

  “I’m part of the security team.”

  “I gotta talk to her.”

  “No can do,” I said.

  “You don’t understand. It’s critical. I had a new vision.”

  I moved closer to Ranger, closing the gap, and followed him into the elevator. The doors closed and Brenda’s stalker was out of my life, stuck in the lobby with the rest of the crazies.

  Brenda drank some soda and nibbled the cookie. “Where am I again?”

  “Trenton.”

  She did an exaggerated eye roll. “I hate Trenton. It’s dreary and provincial. Why can’t I be in New York or Paris?”

  “No one wanted you there,” Nancy said. “We could only get you a gig in Trenton.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Brenda said. “It’s your incompetence that has me stuck here. Why do I always get the incompetent assistants?”

  Tank was in the hall when we stepped out of the elevator. He was back to silent mode after spilling his guts about his engagement. I thought he probably wouldn’t speak to me again for another four or five years. We lured Nancy and Brenda into the suite with the promise of room service and closed the door after them.

  “Tank and I can take it for the rest of the afternoon,” Ranger said. “I’d like you back here at six-thirty. The dinner is at seven. It’s formal. Black tie.”

  “Formal! You never told me the dinner was formal. I haven’t got anything to wear.”