Twisted Twenty-Six (Stephanie Plum 26)

by Janet Evanovich

“I’ll be right there.”

  Morelli raised his eyebrows.

  “Not worth talking about,” I told him. “Could you drop me off at my parents’ house?”

  “Do you want me to stay?”

  “Not necessary, but thanks for the offer.”

  My father was standing in the doorway. He had the knife in his hand, and he was trying hard to look fierce. Ranger and his men were keeping their distance.

  “What’s going on?” I said to my father.

  “Nothing’s going on,” he said. “And nothing’s going to go on. I don’t want a security system. I don’t need one.”

  “In less than a week’s time you had a firebomb thrown through your window and you had someone break in and trash the place.”

  “It wasn’t trashed. It was disrupted. I’ll take care of it.”

  “How?”

  “I’m going to get my guns back,” he said.

  “Not going to happen.”

  “I’ll promise not to shoot your grandmother.”

  “That’s a start,” I said, “but you’re not getting the guns back.”

  “Why not?”

  “We sold your guns.”

  “What?”

  “We bought your big-screen television with them.”

  My father’s face turned red, and his eyes bulged out. “You had no right to sell my guns! Those were my guns.” He pressed his lips tight together. “Okay, fine. No big deal. I can get new guns. I don’t need them anyway. I have a baseball bat.”

  “And the security system?” I asked.

  “No! No security system. It’s like those TSA people at the airport. They don’t make me feel safe. They’re a big fat reminder that some nutjob wants to blow up my plane. You put a security system in because you’re afraid. It’s a sign of fear. Like those body scanners that show your privates.”

  “You’re carrying a knife and a baseball bat around with you. Isn’t that a sign of fear?”

  “No. It’s a sign that I’m pissed off.”

  I waved at Ranger. “No security system.”

  Ranger smiled and told his men to pack up and head out.

  “I saw that smile,” I yelled at him. “You have a sick sense of humor.”

  I went inside and took a position on the couch. Stephanie Plum, bodyguard, on the job. My mother sat on one side of me and Grandma sat on the other. My father settled into his chair, took possession of the remote, and clicked the television on. After that instant, it was all a blur of game shows and talent shows and commercials about drugs to cure psoriasis, drugs to give you a stiffy, and Marie Osmond helping you to lose fifty pounds.

  My father fell asleep in his chair at nine o’clock. My mother finished her Big Gulp and went to bed. Grandma took over the remote and tuned in to a rerun of Naked and Afraid.

  “I got all these shows recorded,” Grandma said. “I got enough to take us to midnight.”

  One episode of Naked and Afraid might be fun. A marathon would be hell on earth. I love my family. Truly. But I’d have a hard time choosing between a Naked and Afraid marathon and letting someone firebomb the house.

  “Gosh,” I said to Grandma, “I’d love to stay, but I promised Morelli I’d spend the night with him.”

  “I can’t compete with that,” Grandma said. “He’s hot. Jimmy was okay, but he wasn’t no Morelli.”

  This was true. Not many men were Morelli. I packed up and told Grandma to call if there was a problem. I trudged out to the Buick, turned the key in the ignition, and the car sputtered and died. I looked at the gas gauge. Empty. I abandoned the Buick and bummed a ride to Morelli’s house with the Rangeman guys.

  I called Ranger and told him I’d be staying with Morelli tonight, so his guys could leave. That was the deal when Ranger was in protection mode. If I was with Morelli, Ranger felt I was safe, and he could back off.

  “Babe,” Ranger said.

  I wasn’t sure what Babe meant in this instance. It sounded a little like he thought I was settling for second best.

  Morelli was watching hockey with Bob when I walked in.

  “So?” he said.

  “Crisis averted.”

  I sat next to him, and he wrapped an arm around me. “I’m glad you came back,” Morelli said.

  “How glad?”

  “Glad enough to shut the television off.”

  “Wow. That’s really glad.”

  “Okay, I have to be honest with you,” Morelli said. “It’s only pre-season and the Rangers are losing. And it’s not the same since they traded Zuccarello.”

  “So, are you hinting that you need pity sex because of Zuccarello?”

  “Would that work?”

  “Yeah, but what about me? Do I get Zuccarello pity sex too? Just before they traded him, I bought a Rangers jersey with his name on it.”

  “Cupcake, you’re going to get pity sex that will be life changing. You’re going to be a new woman when I’m done with you.”

  This had some appeal, since I was wanting to be a new woman anyway. Between the extensions and the pity sex, I’d be on my way to somewhere.

  “Okay,” I said. “Where do you want to do this? What’s the first step?”

  “I need the workbench to execute this properly.”

  The workbench was Morelli’s nickname for his bed.

  “Do we need candles?” I asked him.

  “Candles would be a distraction. Plus, I don’t have any.”

  “This isn’t going to involve any kinky stuff, is it?”

  “The only thing kinky is going to be you screaming for more.” Oh boy.

  CHAPTER TEN

  IT WAS DAYLIGHT when I woke up. Morelli was next to me, still asleep. I looked under the sheets and checked myself out. Naked. Not noticeably different. Not yet a completely new woman. Although the pity sex had been outstanding.

  “Hey!” I said to Morelli. “Are you awake?”

  Morelli half opened his eyes. “I am now.”

  “I’m hungry.”

  “And?”

  “I think we should go out for breakfast. Pancakes and eggs and bacon and stuff.”

  “Sure. But not now.”

  “Why can’t we go now?”

  “We can’t go now because you poked the bear.”

  “I didn’t poke the bear.”

  “You poked the bear awake. And you know how the bear always has this condition in the morning.”

  “Just once, couldn’t the bear wake up and want waffles?”

  “How could you possibly want waffles when you could have the bear?” Morelli asked. “I thought you had a good time with the bear last night.”

  “Best pity sex ever,” I said.

  “And I was right. You were screaming for more.”

  “I wasn’t screaming.”

  “You were begging.”

  “Okay, maybe I was begging.”

  I felt Morelli’s fingers walking a path from my navel to my hoo-ha.

  “I don’t think I’ve got a lot left down there,” I said. “It needs to rest awhile longer.”

  His fingers reached their goal.

  “Are you sure it wants to rest?” Morelli asked.

  “I might not be completely sure.”

  Morelli and I had just laid waste to the endless all-you-can-eat Sunday buffet at Jerry’s Diner.

  “Jerry outdid himself on this buffet,” I said.

  Morelli signaled the waitress for our check. “I don’t think there’s a Jerry anymore. I think Jerry died and the diner got sold to Amazon.”

  “Well, whoever owns it put out a kick-ass buffet.”

  “Agreed.”

  Morelli’s cellphone buzzed, and he checked for a text message.

  “Not good?” I asked.

  “Kelly has the flu, so I’m on call, and there’s a dead juvenile on Stark with gang graffiti tattooed onto his forehead.”

  “That’s ugly.”

  “Yeah, that’s my world. I’ll take you back to your parents’ house so you can get y
our car, and then I’ll go to work. This shouldn’t take long. It’s not like there are body parts spread all over.”

  Ten minutes later, we spotted Grandma a block from my parents’ house.

  “She’s on the move,” Morelli said. “She’s got her big black patent leather purse, which means she’s carrying. And I’m guessing she’s headed for the bakery.”

  We pulled up alongside Grandma, and I lowered my window. “Get in,” I said. “We’ll give you a ride.”

  “No thanks,” Grandma said. “I feel like getting some exercise. I gotta stay in shape now that I’m single again. I might want another boy toy after things calm down.”

  “I’ll walk with Grandma,” I said to Morelli. “Call if you wrap things up early.”

  “I’m going to the bakery,” Grandma said. “We’ve got leftover rump roast, and I’m going to get rolls, so we can have sandwiches for lunch. I might get some Italian cookies too. There were some at the wake, but I didn’t get a chance to eat any. I was too busy with my widow obligations.”

  “You must be relieved to have it behind you.”

  “In the beginning I wanted to do a real good job. And I have to admit, I was liking the attention. I didn’t feel so bad about Jimmy after I got over the shock. I figured he was going to do okay, making deals with Jesus or God or whoever is in charge of that stuff. Jimmy was good at making deals. But in the end, it was just sad and tiring. You know what was the best part of the funeral and the wake? Your hair. It has sparkly blue streaks, and it’s filled with life, and I always knew where you were, except when I couldn’t see you. Looking at it made me not so tired.”

  Jeez. Who would have thought?

  “Thanks, Grandma,” I said. “That’s really nice to hear. I’ve been feeling boring lately. I thought the blue extensions might help.”

  “You aren’t boring. The blue streaky things work because that’s who you are. You’re like the sky at midnight, when the moon is shining, and the wind is blowing.”

  I got totally choked up. It was such a beautiful thing for Grandma to say. And I wanted to be the moon and the wind, but I couldn’t see it. At this point in time I felt more like a cloudy day with the promise of rain.

  We reached the bakery and took a number.

  “It’s always crowded like this on Sunday,” Grandma said. “Everyone comes here after church. It’s like when you’re praying, you ask the Lord for a babka and then you just gotta come pick it up.”

  We were next in line when I saw Jimmy’s sister Rose enter the bakery. Angie was behind her. Both women narrowed their eyes when they saw Grandma and me.

  “What’s with these women?” Grandma said, catching sight of them. “They’re everywhere. And they’re giving us the stink face.”

  “Ignore them. We’re next.”

  Patti Benn was working behind the counter. “Number sixty-four,” she called out.

  “That’s me,” Grandma said. “I want six sandwich rolls and a half pound of Italian cookies.”

  “That’s my number,” Rose said, pushing to the front. “We dropped it, and that slut gold digger picked it up before we could get to it.”

  “That’s exactly right,” Angie said. “I couldn’t hold on to the ticket because the slut broke all my fingers.”

  “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Grandma said. “I got this ticket from the machine. You two old hags gotta go to the end of the line.”

  “Ladies,” Patti said. “Let’s all take a step back.”

  “I’m not taking a step anywhere until I get my rolls and cookies,” Grandma said.

  “Typical,” Rose said. “Hungarian.”

  Grandma cut her eyes to Rose. “You got a problem with Hungarians?”

  “They aren’t Italian.”

  “You got that right,” Grandma said. “And proud of it.”

  “Nobody likes Hungarians,” Rose said. “They’re all fornicators.”

  “You bet,” Grandma said. “And I’m proud of that too. You’re just jealous because you’re such a dried-up ugly prune you can’t even get any fornicating.”

  Patti threw some rolls and about two pounds of cookies into a bag and handed it over to Grandma. “On the house,” she said. “Next?”

  Mrs. Ruiz stepped up. “I’m next,” she said. “I have number sixty-five. And I’m from Guatemala. Everybody likes us.”

  I hustled Grandma out of the bakery, being careful to stay between her and Rose and Angie.

  “Those women are so disagreeable,” Grandma said when we were on the sidewalk. “Jimmy could never get along with them. They hardly ever talked, and now you’d think they were joined at the hip.”

  “It’s about money,” I said. “And who will inherit it.”

  “Jimmy had a will. He said he had it drawn up a while ago and it gave everything over to his wife . . . whoever she was at the time.” Grandma shook her head. “It’s a shame people get so worked up over money. It’s not like Jimmy’s sisters don’t have any. They’re all living okay.”

  There’s never a lot of traffic in the Burg. On weekdays, people leave for work in the morning and come home in the evening. Saturday morning is for shopping and car washing. Sunday is church. We were a block from my parents’ house when I heard a car come up behind us. I turned to look and saw that Rose was behind the wheel and Angie was next to her. They slowly drove past us and made a rude Italian gesture to Grandma and me.

  “Va fangool!” Grandma yelled at them, and she gave them the finger.

  Rose drove half a block, made a U-turn, and gunned it straight for us. She jumped the curb, and I yanked Grandma to safety with about three inches to spare. Rose cut across Gary Luckett’s front lawn, spun around, and came back at us. Grandma dropped the bakery bag, pulled her gun out of her purse, and squeezed off three rounds. Rose swerved away from us and drove down the street.

  “How’d I do?” Grandma asked.

  “You took out a side mirror, but I think the other two shots went wide.”

  “I was rushed.”

  I picked the bakery bag up from the ground and looked inside.

  “Well?” Grandma said.

  “Everything’s okay.”

  “Good thing, because your mother won’t be happy if I don’t bring rolls home.”

  Grandma and I decided not to mention the shooting incident to anyone, but there was always the chance that someone had witnessed it and called my mom. The subject didn’t come up during lunch, and I felt I was home free when, after lunch, my mom didn’t turn to ironing or chugging bourbon. Morelli hadn’t phoned, and that was okay with me. Between the brunch buffet and the rump roast sandwiches for lunch, I was thinking I needed a nap. Fortunately, my father had very nicely gassed up the Buick for me.

  Grandma said she was taking the night off from socializing and was skipping Greta Nelson’s viewing at Stiva’s. I thought this was a good decision. She was probably safe if she stayed home. After all, my father had his baseball bat.

  I took a baggie of Italian cookies from my mom, trudged out to my car, and drove to my apartment in a food stupor.

  I let myself into my apartment and gave Rex half an almond cookie.

  “Suppose you had a really important key,” I said to Rex. “Where would you keep it?”

  It was a rhetorical question because I already knew the answer. He’d keep the key in his soup can. That’s where he kept everything. Jimmy Rosolli had other options.

  I took my MacBook Air and a steno pad to the dining room table and asked myself the same question I’d asked Rex. Where would I keep an important key? My keys were all on a key ring that I kept in the messenger bag that doubled as my purse. Okay, but suppose I had some keys that were too valuable for the key ring? Safe-deposit box? Gym locker? Safe? None of the above for me. I didn’t go to a gym. I didn’t have a safe. And a safe-deposit box would require a trip to the bank, and that was a pain in the ass. I’d hide the keys in my underwear drawer. This did me no good, since rumor had it that multiple people had already looked in J
immy’s underwear drawer.

  This was made even more ridiculous by the fact that I didn’t know how many keys were involved or what those keys looked like. Big? Little? Key cards? I didn’t know what the keys opened. And I didn’t know what sort of treasure they kept locked away.

  There were six La-Z-Boys. One was dead. One was unknown. One was going to avoid me at all costs because he was a fugitive. That left Lou Salgusta, Benny the Skootch, and Julius Roman. It would help if I could get one of them to talk to me. First thing tomorrow I’d have Connie run background checks. Next thing I’d start knocking on doors. Trying to talk to them at the Mole Hole wasn’t going to work. I was going to have to get them alone. I suspected my funeral grace period was over, so I needed to be extra vigilant.

  I checked on Grandma at six o’clock. It was all good. Maybe it would stay good. It could happen, right? The keys could turn up. They could be in the pocket of a jacket that was taken to the cleaners, or they could be in the freezer behind the cookie dough ice cream. Jimmy was old. He probably misplaced things all the time.

  Morelli called at seven o’clock. “I got stuck doing paperwork and then I got talked into football with some guys from work. Is everything okay with you?”

  “Jimmy’s sister Rose tried to run over Grandma and me when we were walking home from the bakery, but we jumped out of the way. Grandma shot off a side mirror, and Rose took off down the road.”

  “I don’t know who’s crazier . . . Rose or Grandma.”

  “Yeah, that’s a tough one. Where are you? It sounds like you’re in a sports bar.”

  “I’m home. Some of the guys came with me to watch the game. There’s still pizza left if you want to come over.”

  “Thanks, but I’ll pass. I’ve got stuff to think about.”

  I called Grandma at eight o’clock and at ten o’clock. Nothing new going on. No firebombs. No break-ins. No attempted kidnappings. Yay!

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  I DROVE PAST my parents’ house on my way to work. There were no strange cars parked on the street, and the house felt benign, so I continued on to the bail bonds office. Connie had just arrived and unlocked the front door. Lula wasn’t there yet.

  “This doesn’t happen often,” Connie said, setting the box of donuts on her desk. “You get first pick.”