Twisted Twenty-Six (Stephanie Plum 26)

by Janet Evanovich

  I threw a cookie at him, and he caught it one-handed.

  “You weren’t serious, were you? Do you really think I’ll never amount to anything?”

  “You’re already more successful than I am. You’ve accomplished more.”

  “What have I accomplished?”

  “You’re a nice person.”

  “So are you.”

  Ranger shook his head. “I’m many things. Nice isn’t one of them.”

  “You’re nice to me.”

  “You’re an experiment. I’m trying to learn.”

  “You’re full of crap,” I said.

  That got a smile out of him.

  “What I know about success in business is that it helps to have a passion,” Ranger said. “I feel passionate about tracking down bad people and protecting good people. It’s not a job for me . . . it’s a calling. And I’m willing to wade through some ugliness to do it.”

  “Don’t you get tired of the ugliness?”

  “Yes, but you deal with it. And you hope you’re helping to make things better.”

  “I don’t have a passion.”

  “Sometimes it takes a while to figure it out,” Ranger said.

  Rex came out of his can to see what was going on in the kitchen. I gave him a piece of butter cookie, and he scurried back into his soup can with it.

  “Life is easy when you’re a hamster,” I said to Ranger.

  “It looks boring. I’ll take ugly over boring.”

  I was going to tuck that statement away in a corner of my brain for future consideration.

  “This is the part of the night where you have to make a decision,” Ranger said. “You can ask me to stay or you can tell me to leave.”

  “I can’t ask you to stay.”

  Not because I didn’t want him to stay, but because he was part of the problem, and I wasn’t ready to confront him with the issue.

  “There’s another part to success,” Ranger said. “You have to be brave.”

  I dropped four chocolate chip cookies into a plastic baggie and handed them to Ranger. “I’m working on it.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  I WOKE UP thinking about being brave. Sometimes I believe I was brave on the job. I didn’t think of it as being brave when I was doing it. It was just something that had to get done. Like taking a look at Emory Lindal’s trailer. And tackling Steven Cross when I saw him reach for his gun. Okay, so it’s not like a firefighter running into a burning building or a cop putting his life on the line every day. It’s brave in a small way.

  Anyway, I don’t think that’s the kind of brave Ranger was talking about. He was talking about taking a chance on a dream. And taking a chance on a personal relationship. And I was sorely lacking in this kind of bravery.

  I called Grandma to see if she knew any more about Marvina.

  “Appendicitis,” Grandma said. “She’ll be home in a couple days, and we might want to make sure she hasn’t got that cookie tin sitting in her kitchen.”

  Lula was already in the office when I arrived. She’d eaten the Boston Kreme and many more. Her short hair was in a state of natural frizz, and she was dressed entirely in pink. Pink tank top. Pink leather skirt that was obscenely short. Pink thigh-high boots.

  “What happened to the boho?” I asked.

  “That was yesterday. Today I’m in homage to the Pink Panther. And I’m not referring to Steven Cross, who was a total imposter.”

  “Is there any news on Roman?” I asked Connie.

  “Nothing, but I’d keep a close watch on Grandma. I’m hearing that the La-Z-Boys are nervous.”

  “There are only three of them now,” I said. “Are they going to be able to pull off a kidnapping?”

  Connie shrugged. “It would be good if you could take Shine off the streets. That would narrow it down to Lou Salgusta, who is batshit crazy, and Benny.”

  “Were you ever able to get a current address for Shine?” I asked Connie.

  “No. He’s not leaving any tracks. No new credit action to indicate a hotel or a rental car. My mother and my Aunt Stella haven’t heard anything. My guess is that he’s staying with someone. He has friends and relatives who would be willing to hide him. He also has Darlene.”

  “Darlene is too obvious,” I said. “He might visit her, but I doubt he’s staying there.”

  “If the remaining La-Z-Boys are getting ready to make a move on Grandma, they could be huddling at the Mole Hole,” Connie said.

  I checked the time. It was early for the Mole Hole.

  “Let’s talk to Darlene,” I said to Lula. “If we don’t learn anything from her, we can stake out the Mole Hole.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me,” Lula said.

  We crept through town in rush-hour traffic. Retail wasn’t open for business yet, but office buildings were filling up. Darlene’s parking lot was already half empty.

  “A lot of government workers live in this building,” Lula said. “They get to work early so they can leave early and play golf.”

  We took the elevator to the third floor and rang Darlene’s doorbell. There was no answer, so I knocked.

  I could hear movement on the other side, and Lula put her face up to the security peephole.

  “Hey, Darlene,” she said. “It’s Lula.”

  The door cracked open with the chain attached, and Darlene looked out.

  “I’m not up to visitors,” she said.

  “Good lord,” Lula said, taking in Darlene’s swollen face. “What happened to you?”

  “I can’t talk right now,” Darlene said.

  “You need help,” Lula said. “Open the door. If you don’t open the door, I’ll break it down. I could do it too. I got a lot of skills since I went into law enforcement.”

  Darlene slipped the chain, and we hurried in. Her eye was swollen shut. Her cheek was bruised and swollen. Her lip was split open.

  “What happened?” Lula asked.

  I looked around. A round end table was overturned, and a vase was smashed on the floor. The floor by the smashed vase had a blood smear.

  “Are you alone?” I asked Darlene.

  “Yes,” she said. “And I’m going to stay that way.”

  She slowly walked toward the bedroom, holding her side. “I need to keep moving,” she said. “I need to be out of here before he returns.”

  “Charlie?” Lula asked.

  “Yeah. He let himself in around two o’clock. Drunk.” She put her hand to her mouth. “Sorry, I know I’m hard to understand. It’s painful to talk.”

  “Honey, you need stitches,” Lula said.

  “I need to get out of here first,” Darlene said.

  “No problem,” Lula said. “We’re gonna help you. Do you have someplace to go?”

  “I’m going to stay with my sister in Piscataway until I get a job and a place of my own.”

  “Are you going back to hooking?”

  “No. My sister said she might be able to get me something where she works. And I’ve been putting money aside. I have some savings.”

  “We’re still looking for Charlie,” I said. “Do you have any idea where we might find him?”

  “He’s staying with someone. I don’t know more than that. He goes to the Mole Hole. That’s where they all collect.” She took a stack of T-shirts from a dresser and put them into a half-filled suitcase that was on the bed. “You want to be careful,” she said. “He’s in a nasty mind. I’m lucky he didn’t kill me. He was drunk and angry. Ranting about Jimmy being an idiot. How the keys were a stupid idea, and he couldn’t leave Trenton until they were found. He said if he’d had his way, Edna would have talked by now. He blamed the delay on Julius Roman. Said he had no guts.”

  “Do you think he killed Roman?” I asked.

  “I’d like to pin it on him. And he’s capable of doing it. Unfortunately, he was with me when Roman was killed.”

  Lula was emptying closets and stuffing clothes and shoes into large black plastic garbage bags.


  “What else do you want?” Lula asked Darlene. “You got jewelry? Personal stuff, like photographs? Do you have a car parked outside?”

  “Charlie owns the car and this apartment,” she said. “I don’t want to make more trouble by taking it.”

  Fifteen minutes later we had the apartment cleaned out and the Porsche stuffed full of bags. Darlene didn’t want to get medical care in Trenton, so we drove her to her sister’s house.

  “I hated to leave Darlene like that,” Lula said when we were back on the road.

  “Her sister seems nice. She’ll take care of her.”

  “I guess. But it’s terrible to see someone get beat up like that.”

  It was almost lunchtime when we pulled into the Mole Hole parking lot. Lula and I went inside and sat at a table that gave us a view of the inner sanctum door. No way to know who was inside.

  We ordered lunch and watched the door. The two slick-haired kids who worked for Benny the Skootch went in and came out five minutes later. No sign of Stan. We got our mega-burgers and fries, and a waitress exited the kitchen and went to the door. She had three plates, plus sides, stacked on a large tray. She balanced the tray on her shoulder and knocked on the door. It opened and she went in. She came out minutes later without the food.

  “He’s in there,” I said.

  “You don’t know for sure,” Lula said.

  “I have a feeling.”

  “Oh boy.” She added extra salt and ketchup to her burger. “How are you going to get him out?”

  “I guess I’m going to drag him out.”

  “You and who else?”

  “You. And Ranger.”

  “Okay, now you’re talking.”

  I called Ranger and asked for help. I told him to give me ten minutes so I could finish my lunch.

  “Babe,” he said. End of conversation.

  After eight minutes I pushed back from the table.

  “Are you carrying?” I asked Lula.

  “Do bears poop in the woods?” Lula said.

  “Pass me your gun under the table.”

  “Say what?”

  “I need a gun, and mine is home in the cookie jar.”

  “I got a Glock nine with me,” Lula said. “Do you know how to use a Glock nine?”

  “You pull the trigger and it goes bang?”

  “That would be your little Smith and Wesson.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I don’t intend to use it.”

  I slipped Lula’s Glock into my sweatshirt pocket and went to the bar. I ordered a Coke and watched the front door. At precisely ten minutes after I hung up with Ranger, the front door opened, and Ranger and Tank walked in.

  Tank is appropriately named. He’s huge and has tough guy written all over him. He was in special ops with Ranger, and he’s the number-two guy at Rangeman. He’s the guy who watches Ranger’s back. They were in Rangeman black fatigues, wearing full gun belts. Sidearms strapped to their legs. If I didn’t know them and was seeing them for the first time, I’d flat-out have a panic attack.

  Since I’d slept with one of them and knew what he was capable of doing, the adrenaline surge that would have fueled a panic attack instead produced a rush of sexual desire so strong I almost dropped Lula’s gun.

  The bartender spotted them and reached for the phone, just as I thought he would. Standard operating procedure. This was how I got to meet Stan. I pulled myself together and discreetly pointed the Glock at the bartender, suggesting that he take a step back away from the phone. I caught Ranger’s eye and directed his attention to the door behind the bar. By the time Ranger and Tank reached the door, the Mole Hole had emptied out. The floor-show music was still playing, but there was no pole girl.

  I gave the gun back to Lula, told her to keep her eye on things, and joined Ranger and Tank. I felt small in comparison but totally empowered, flanked by the two men in black. I knocked, and Stan opened the door.

  “Hello again,” I said.

  He attempted to close the door, and Ranger stiff-armed it open. Benny the Skootch was in his chair with a napkin tucked into his shirt like a bib. Lou Salgusta was eating his lunch at a card table. Charlie Shine had been at the table with Lou, but he jumped up when I walked in with Ranger and Tank.

  “What the fuck?” Charlie said. “What the fuck?”

  “You missed your court date,” I said to Charlie. “You need to come with us to reschedule.”

  “This is bullshit,” Charlie said. “Benny, get my lawyer on the phone. Tell him to get the fuck down to the courthouse.”

  Ranger attempted to cuff Charlie, and Charlie struck out at him. In a nanosecond Ranger face-planted Charlie onto the card table. Charlie was searched and his weapon removed, and his hands were cuffed behind his back. Ranger jerked him to his feet and force-marched him out of the Mole Hole.

  “Very sorry to have disrupted your lunch,” I said to Benny and Lou. “It all looks delicious.”

  I paid for lunch and met Ranger in the parking lot.

  “Would you like us to drop him off, or would you like to have the pleasure?” Ranger asked.

  “I’ll take him in,” I said. “Thank you. I really appreciate the help. I didn’t know who was in the room. And I probably couldn’t have cuffed Shine without Lula shooting him first.”

  Connie gave us a double thumbs-up when we walked into the office.

  “Another job well done,” Lula said. “We took Shine straight to the court and the judge set his bail at twice the original amount. No one will put up that kind of money.”

  “For sure not this office,” Connie said. “And we have one less FTA to worry about. Emory Lindal was arrested last night. Drunk and disorderly.”

  “That leaves our favorite person,” Lula said. “Carol Joyce, the little wiener.”

  As far as I was concerned, he could shoplift for the rest of his life. I had no desire to attempt another takedown of Carol Joyce.

  “How many attempts at capture will this make?” I asked Lula.

  “I stopped counting,” Lula said. “It’s humiliating. It’s not like he’s the Pink Panther or Jack the Ripper. This idiot lives with his mother and steals T-shirts for a living.”

  “We can drive past his house and his office and look for his SUV,” I said. “I guess we could cruise the Quaker Bridge parking lot.”

  “That sounds like a lame attempt,” Lula said. “What would Dog the Bounty Hunter do?”

  “He’d go to the Joyce house at one in the morning, kick the door in, and drag Carol Joyce out of bed,” I said.

  “That would seem extreme in this case,” Lula said, “on account of it would scare the bejeezus out of Mrs. Joyce. She thinks her son is a personal shopper. And there’s the ugly little dog to think about. It already has intestinal issues. I would hate to cause it more anxiety.”

  My mother called.

  “Your grandmother was caught breaking into Marvina’s house,” my mother said. “Luckily it was Eddie Gazarra who investigated. He’s got her in his patrol car, and he doesn’t know what to do with her.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “He’s in the All-Day Diner parking lot just past the hospital.”

  “I’m on my way.” I grabbed my bag and headed for the door. “Family problem,” I said. “Not life-threatening.”

  I pulled into the diner parking lot three minutes later and parked next to the patrol car. I grew up with Eddie Gazarra, and he was now married to my cousin Shirley the Whiner. I got out of the Porsche and looked in at Grandma. She was in the back seat, eating a cup of soft-serve ice cream. She smiled when she saw me and pointed to the cookie tin in her lap.

  “What’s up?” I said to Eddie.

  Eddie got out of the patrol car, stepped away, and turned his body mic off. “She bumped the lock on Marvina’s back door and let herself in. Tootie saw her do it and phoned it in. Luckily, dispatch sent me out, or Grandma would be sitting in the holding tank right now.”

  “Did she explain any of this to you?”

>   “No. She won’t talk. She said she had a righteous mission to perform, and she has no regrets.”

  “So, you bought her ice cream and called my mother?”

  “Yes.”

  Gazarra was great. It was a shame he married Shirley. He could have done much better. I gave him the long version of the regifting of potentially poisonous cookies. The more he heard, the larger the smile got until he was full-on cracked up.

  “Let me get this straight,” he said. “Barbara gave the cookies to Grandma. Grandma gave the cookies to the sisters. The sisters gave the cookies to Marvina. And Grandma broke in so she could get the cookies out of the house before Marvina came home and maybe ate another one.”

  “Yep.”

  “I love it,” Gazarra said. “I might have to confiscate that cookie tin. You never know when you want to give someone poison cookies. Good to have on hand.”

  “I’m going to bury it,” I said.

  “I’ll transfer Grandma over to your custody and write this up as mistaken identity.”

  “Thanks. I owe you.”

  “Really? I could use a babysitter next Saturday.”

  “Last time I babysat for your kids they set the kitchen on fire. I’d rather let you keep Grandma, and you could lock her up with the hookers.”

  “I don’t want her,” Gazarra said. “I’d be laughed out of the building. I’d be known as ‘Granny Cop,’ and my mother would be mad at me.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I TOOK GRANDMA back to my parents’ house. We emptied the cookies into a plastic bag, smashed them with a rolling pin, and put them in the garbage. If a pack of rats ate them at the landfill that was their problem.

  “We’ll never know if they were poisoned,” Grandma said.

  I nodded. “Another one of life’s mysteries.”

  It was early afternoon when I drove away. I reached the cross street and stopped because I had a dilemma. If I went back to the office, Lula would want to go after Carol Joyce. Not only did I see riding up and down lanes in a shopping center parking lot as a waste of time . . . I also didn’t give a fig about capturing Carol Joyce. I honestly didn’t care about any part of the bail bonds business. I know this is a terrible attitude, but there it was.