Notorious Nineteen

by Janet Evanovich

  “It got you arrested,” I said.

  “Yeah. I look back at it now, and I think it was Tiki messin’ with my head, telling me to trash the car. I shouldn’t have taken him away from Pele.”

  “Who’s Pele?” Lula asked.

  “She’s the volcano goddess. She lives in Kilauea, and this guy here’s one of her dudes. So you see how I’m on a holy mission, right?”

  “Why don’t you just FedEx the dude back to Pele,” Lula said.

  “It don’t work that way. I have to put the tiki dude in the right spot. I gotta say words over him. Like how I’m sorry I put him in with my dirty laundry, and how now he and Pele can get it on.”

  “You’ll have a chance to explain all that to the judge,” I said. “And if you don’t have any priors you might get away with community service.”

  “Uh-oh,” Logan said. “I might have had a few substance indiscretions.”

  “Guess you’re goin’ to the pokey, then,” Lula said.

  His eyes darted from me to Lula and back to me, and he bolted, lunging out of the tent, knocking me over. “No!”

  I scrambled to my feet and ran flat out, but I couldn’t catch him. Logan dodged traffic on Third and disappeared down the street.

  Lula came clattering after me on her four-inch Via Spiga spike heels. “He’s a fast bugger,” she said, bending at the waist, trying to catch her breath. “You should have just shot him.”

  “He’s unarmed.”

  “Yeah, but he dissed you.”

  “I’m going back for the tiki,” I said to Lula. “At least Vinnie will have his collateral.”

  The three men were still standing in the same spot, still smoking, when Lula and I returned to the shantytown.

  “How’d that go?” one of them asked.

  “He got away,” Lula said. “He could really run.”

  “He got motivation,” the man said.

  I crawled into Logan’s tent and took the tiki. “Me too.”

  “Uh-oh,” the man said. “He’s not gonna like you take the tiki. That tiki talks to him.”

  I carted the tiki across the field, put it into the backseat, and clicked a seat belt around it.

  “Good thing your Uncle Sandor had seat belts put into this car,” Lula said. “Otherwise Tiki would be rolling around back there.”

  I got behind the wheel, plugged the key into the ignition, and jumped when someone rapped on my window.

  It was Ranger.

  “You left the contents of your purse in my car last night,” he said, handing me a plastic baggie.

  “Thanks. And I have your gun.” I pulled the Ruger out of my bag and gave it to Ranger.

  He held the gun flat in his hand and looked at it. “It smells like orange blossoms.”

  “I washed it and sprayed it with air freshener.”

  “You washed it?”

  “I wore rubber gloves and scrubbed it with my vegetable brush. It was . . . icky.”

  He yanked open the driver’s side door, pulled me out of the car, and kissed me. The kiss involved tongue and a hand on my ass, and made my nipples tingle.

  “I can always count on you to brighten my day,” Ranger said.

  Ranger drove off, and I got back into the Buick.

  “That was hot,” Lula said. “Imagine what he’d do if you washed his Glock.”

  “I’m a little flustered,” I said. “What was I doing before Ranger knocked on the window?”

  “You were gonna drive somewhere.”

  “Do you know where?”

  “You didn’t say, but we could ride around and look for bad guys.”

  I went back to Broad and took Broad to Stark Street.

  “This here’s a good choice,” Lula said. “There’s always lots of bad guys on Stark Street.”

  I was looking for one in particular. Melvin Barrel. I drove the length of Stark, all the way to the no-man’s-land where the redbrick row houses are covered with gang graffiti, the insides are gutted from crack fires, the rats are as big as barn cats, and the human inhabitants hide in the shadows.

  I made a U-turn and did another pass down Stark. I slowed when I got to Barrel’s rooming house, idled in front of the house for a moment, and was about to drive away when I saw Barrel on the next block, walking toward us.

  “Do you see him?” I asked Lula.

  “Yeah, I see him. And he don’t see us. He’s texting on his cellphone, not paying attention.”

  I cut the engine, and Lula and I got out and went to the sidewalk. I tucked cuffs into the waistband of my jeans for easy access, put my illegal stun gun into my back pocket, and got a grip on my pepper spray.

  “What’s the plan?” Lula asked. “How about I distract him by offering him some ’ho services, and then you could sneak up behind him and give him a thousand volts. How’s that sound?”

  “Sounds good. Make sure you turn him around so he doesn’t see me.”

  I slipped into the doorway of a building, Lula headed for Barrel, and Barrel stepped off the curb still texting. A shiny black Mercedes sped down the side street and hit Barrel straight on. Barrel got punted about ten feet, and the Mercedes ran over him. My stomach instantly got sick and my breath caught in my throat.

  “Ow,” Lula said. “That gotta hurt.”

  The Mercedes came to a stop, and two men got out. They were all blinged up in gold chains and flashy running suits, and the one had a lightning bolt cut into his hair.

  Lula and I ran into the street and joined the men who were standing, staring down at Barrel. Barrel wasn’t moving, and he had tire tracks across his chest.

  “That’s Melvin Barrel,” the driver said.

  The other guy squatted down for a closer look. “Yep. It’s Barrel all right.”

  “Is he okay?” Lula asked.

  “Looks to me like he’s dead,” the guy said.

  “The idiot walked right in front of my car,” the driver said. “Who does that?”

  “He was texting,” Lula said.

  “Well, he’s not texting no more,” the driver said. He pulled out a gun and shot Barrel five times. “That’s for hitting my car, asshole.”

  Lula and I sucked in some air and stumbled back about ten feet. And the two guys got into the Mercedes and drove away.

  I punched 911 into my cellphone with a shaky finger and reported the accident. I called Morelli and reported the accident. And then Lula and I stood guard over the body so it didn’t get scooped up by God-knows-who like the last time we were on Stark. On a personal level, I didn’t actually care what happened to Barrel. As a professional, if the body disappeared my payday went with it. And as a woman, I was slightly nauseous.

  A patrol car was the first on the scene. It was followed by the EMT truck, Morelli, and two more cop cars.

  Morelli parked and sauntered over to me. “Your FTA has tire tracks on his chest.”

  I made a small grimace. “Two guys in a Mercedes drove over him.”

  “Technically it wasn’t a hit-and-run, though,” Lula told Morelli. “They stopped, but they just didn’t stay. They only stayed long enough to shoot him.”

  “He got run over by the Mercedes, and then he got shot?” Morelli asked.

  “That’s right,” Lula said. “But it was recreational shooting. Barrel was already dead from being run over.”

  One of the uniforms was cordoning off the area with yellow crime scene tape. The two EMTs were shuffling around, waiting for the medical examiner to show up and take over. A small crowd was gathering, gawking at Barrel.

  Morelli turned his attention to me. “You do understand that your life isn’t normal, right?”

  “Barrel was texting and he stepped off a curb without looking,” I said.

  “But you were here,” Morelli said. “How does it happen that you’re always right in the precise spot where disaster strikes? Your car’s been blown up how many times? And it’s never your fault. Remember when you fell off the fire escape into dog diarrhea? And the time you dated a seri
al killer?”

  “I liked that serial killer,” Lula said. “He could make a damn good pork chop.”

  “Is there a point to this?” I asked Morelli.

  “No,” he said. “I’m venting. It scares the crap out of me that I’m in love with you.”

  “Aw, that’s sweet,” Lula said.

  I thought so too. It was kind of a backhanded admission, but it made my heart get fluttery. The sight of Barrel lying on the ground oozing body fluids snapped me back to the moment. I took my phone out of my bag. “You don’t mind if I take a picture of this guy with my cellphone, do you? I need to prove he’s dead.”

  “Knock yourself out,” Morelli said. “Last time an FTA of yours went dead you asked the EMTs to drive him to the courthouse.”

  “There’s a lot of paperwork when the FTA is dead,” I said. “It’s easier when you can have him show up in court.”

  I took my pictures and gave Morelli a detailed description of the Mercedes driver. The medical examiner was on the scene, and the crime scene photographer was at work. Lula was looking like she was ready to break out in hives.

  “I’m moving on,” I said to Morelli. “Things to do. Will I see you tonight?”

  “Dinner at seven. My house. I’ll get Chinese.”

  NINE

  LULA AND I climbed into the Buick, I rolled the engine over and pulled into traffic.

  “I almost forgot about Tiki back there,” Lula said. “You don’t suppose he really talks, do you?” She swiveled in her seat. “Hey, Tiki, how’s it goin’?”

  I stopped for a light and glanced at Lula. “Well? Is he saying anything to you?”

  “No, but I think he might be smiling. Hold on here. Something’s coming through. He’s telling me it’s lunchtime and he wants a bucket of chicken.”

  “Tiki said that?”

  “Well, someone said it. It was in my head.”

  “It might have been you thinking it.”

  “Yeah, but I’m pretty sure it had a Hawaiian accent.”

  Cluck-in-a-Bucket was all the way across town. I took Broad to Hamilton, and we made a fast stop for chicken. Lula got a bucket of extra crispy, a side of fries, and a side of slaw. I got a biscuit. My stomach wasn’t in top form after last night’s poisoning. We took the food to the office, and I lugged Tiki in, along with my biscuit.

  “We had a good day,” Lula said to Connie. “We had all kinds of success. Do you want a piece of chicken? I got the big bucket in case I had to share.”

  Connie passed on the chicken, and Vinnie popped out of his office.

  “What kind of success? Did you get Cubbin?”

  “Not yet,” Lula said. “But we got Melvin Barrel.”

  “Melvin Barrel is good,” Vinnie said. “Does he want to get rebonded?”

  “Probably not,” Lula said. “He’s dead.”

  I showed Vinnie the picture on my cellphone.

  “Are those tire tracks on his chest?” Vinnie asked. “And bullet holes? Christ, how many times did you shoot him?”

  “I didn’t shoot him,” I said. “He got hit by a car, and the driver got out and shot him . . . five times.”

  “And we went after Brody Logan too,” Lula said, digging into the bucket of chicken. “Except he got away.”

  I set the tiki on Connie’s desk. “Logan ran off, so I confiscated his tiki.”

  “That’s the tiki?” Vinnie asked, eyes bulging out of their sockets. “Are you nuts? You brought the tiki here?”

  “I thought you wanted it.”

  “Yeah, but not here! That thing’s evil. It’s a bad influence.”

  “That could be true,” Lula said. “I was planning on just getting a couple pieces of chicken, and it told me to get the big bucket.”

  I did such a gigantic eye roll I almost fell over.

  “Get that thing out of here, and go find Cubbin,” Vinnie said. “I’ve got enough problems without a tiki putting ideas in my head. Lucille has me going to Sex Addicts Anonymous.”

  “How’s that working for you?” Lula asked.

  “It’s a nightmare. I go there, and I’m in a room filled with perverts. It’s like being in a bakery where everything is free and you can’t eat anything.”

  “Speaking of bakery, I wouldn’t mind having some dessert,” Lula said. “I need something sweet to get my mind off the grease and salt attack I’m having.”

  I hefted Tiki and tucked him under my arm. “I want to talk to Mrs. Cubbin again. We can stop at Tasty Pastry on the way.”

  Ten minutes later Lula came out of Tasty Pastry with a box of Italian cookies, six fresh-made cannoli, and a bag of donuts.

  “That’s a lot of dessert,” I said.

  “I just wanted a cookie. I was gonna get one of them black-and-whites, but Tiki couldn’t make up his mind.”

  “Tiki told you to buy all this?”

  “Yeah. I’m pretty sure it was Tiki. It was like someone was whispering in my ear.”

  “That’s ridiculous. You’re using Tiki as an excuse.”

  “I don’t think so. I definitely heard someone whispering.” Lula selected a cannoli. “I don’t usually get cannoli, but Tiki had a good suggestion here.” She held the box out to me. “You want one? They’re good for you on account of there’s dairy in them.”

  “Sure,” I said. “Give me a cannoli.”

  I ate my cannoli while I drove to Susan Cubbin’s house. Okay, I get that it’s not the perfect marriage, but it seems to me if anyone had a lead on Cubbin it would be his wife. Wives know things. They snoop around. They especially snoop around if they think they’re getting screwed out of money.

  I parked in front of the white ranch with the black shutters, told Tiki to behave himself, and Lula and I went to the door.

  “You want me to go looking in the windows?” Lula asked.

  “No!”

  I rang the bell and waited. No answer. I rang again. Nothing.

  “Maybe she’s shopping,” Lula said. “Taking her mind off her troubles. The other possibility is she fell down the stairs and broke her hip and can’t get up like that lady in the commercial. In which case we have a obligation to break in and help her. Least that’s what Tiki says.”

  “I’m surprised you can hear Tiki when he’s in the car and you’re in the bakery or standing here on the porch.”

  “Yeah, he’s got good range for a chunk of wood.” Lula pushed on the door and it swung open. “Hunh, look at this. The door’s not locked. It wasn’t even all closed.”

  I stepped inside. “Hello,” I called. “Anybody home?”

  No answer.

  Lula followed me in and closed the door. “Look at the bottom of the stairs. That’s where they land when they fall.”

  “This is a ranch house. There are no stairs.”

  Lula looked around. “You’re right. I never thought of that.”

  I walked through the house to the kitchen. Susan Cubbin had decorated the house in American Farmhouse style. Upholstered pieces were slipcovered in ill-fitting floral fabric. End tables looked like they’d been beaten with a chain. The chandelier over the trestle dining room table was fashioned to look like a wagon wheel.

  “Only thing missing from this house is chickens,” Lula said. “Maybe she’s got some in the backyard.”

  I looked in the fridge. “No food,” I said. “Ketchup, mustard, mayo, but no milk or orange juice.”

  “Sounds like your house,” Lula said.

  “Yes, but Susan cooks. She has spices, and pots and pans, and a waffle iron.” I opened the door to the pantry. Flour, sugar, rice, breadcrumbs, oatmeal, graham crackers, macaroni. “She cleaned the perishables out of her refrigerator.”

  “Like she was going on a trip,” Lula said. “Maybe her husband sent her a check, and she went on vacation.”

  The counters were clean. A cat’s water bowl and food dish were in the dish drain. There was a landline phone on the counter. A basket with assorted scraps of paper and miscellaneous receipts sat next to the
phone. One of the receipts caught my attention. It was a printout from an online store selling surveillance equipment. On Thursday, Susan had bought binoculars, a camera with motion sensors, and a remote-controlled audio amplifier.

  “Susan was going to snoop on someone,” I said.

  I opened the door leading to the attached garage and flipped the light on. No car. I walked through the rest of the house. The guest bedrooms looked like they were seldom used. No clothes in the closets and dressers. No toiletries in the bathroom. No room designated as a home office. I investigated the master bedroom last. The bed was made. I went through the dresser drawers and bathroom medicine chest. Nothing out of the ordinary. Hard to tell if anything was missing.

  I opened the closet door in the master, and a monster jumped out at me. He was easily 6'6". He had long snow-white hair, bushy white eyebrows, and one blue eye and one brown eye. And he had a stun gun.

  “It’s the Yeti!” Lula screamed. “Lord help me.”

  The next thing I heard was zzzzzzzt. And I was incapacitated, on my back on the carpet.

  It took a couple minutes for my brain to unscramble and start sending coherent messages to my nerve endings. My head cleared and I looked over at Lula. She was sprawled next to me, and she was twitching.

  I got to my hands and knees, and then to my feet. “Hey,” I said to Lula. “Are you okay?”

  “Yuh,” Lula said. “Did I wet myself? I hate when that happens.”

  I leaned against the dresser, taking deep breaths while my muscle memory returned. The house was quiet. No one walking around. No one slamming doors. No one making Yeti sounds. I carefully made my way to the closet and looked inside. It was a large walk-in. Geoffrey Cubbin’s clothes were on one side, and Susan’s on the other. Again, nothing looked out of the ordinary.

  Lula was on her feet, adjusting her boobs, tugging her skirt back into place. “What the heck was that about?” she asked. “That scared the crap out of me. I thought she just had a cat. Nobody said anything about having a Yeti.”

  “That wasn’t a Yeti. It was a big albino guy.”

  “I don’t think so. I know a Yeti when I see one. I saw a Yeti at Disney World. It’s like Chewbacca but it’s all white.”