Twisted Twenty-Six (Stephanie Plum 26)

by Janet Evanovich

  “So you killed him?”

  “I didn’t need his help, and I wasn’t in a mood to share.”

  “What about Jeanine?” I asked.

  “Jeanine will be fine. She can cross the driveway and drink wine with her dim-witted mother every night. She can go to Mass and talk to God or Jesus or Mary. Jeanine has lots of friends. The house is paid for. All she has to do is keep up with the taxes and cut the grass once in a while.”

  “What happens if they won’t pay your price for Grandma?”

  “We’ve already agreed on a price. We just have to work out the swap. Granny for a big bag of money.”

  “And me?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Bernie said. “If they don’t want you, I guess I’ll kill you. That might be better for you anyway since I’m told Lou Salgusta is ready to fire up his tools of persuasion.”

  “You’re a little nutty,” Grandma said.

  “Yeah,” Bernie said. “And I’m tired. It’s been a long day. I’ll see you girls in the morning.”

  We watched him leave, dragging the recycling container behind him. The door clicked closed and locked.

  “This is a real bummer,” Grandma said.

  I looked at the chain around my ankle. “There has to be a way out of here.”

  I walked into the bathroom. Toilet and sink. The chains were padlocked around the sink plumbing. I went back to Grandma.

  “I don’t suppose you have a nail file.”

  “No. I don’t have a stick of dynamite, either.”

  “How did he get you to go with him?”

  “He had a kitten. He said he wanted to take it to the shelter, and he asked me if I could hold it for him. And then when I got in the car with the little cutie, he zapped me. How about you? Did you fall for the kitten thing?”

  “Yep.”

  “It was a really cute kitten,” Grandma said. “I keep wondering what happened to it.”

  “It never occurred to me that it might be Bernie,” I said. “I thought it was Barbara.”

  I looked around. Sacks of sand were stacked against one wall. A jumble of equipment was against another wall. A band saw. A leaf blower. Coils of hoses. Machinery parts that were alien to me. A long folding table and a single folding chair. A shop vac.

  “Where are we?” I asked Grandma.

  “I don’t know for sure. He had a sack over my head, and my hands were handcuffed when he brought me here. You can’t hear any sounds from outside. From the way he would come in and out I thought this must be part of the Concrete Plant. Like he would work some and then come check on me, even though it was a Saturday. This room looks industrial.”

  I agreed with Grandma. The room looked industrial. It seemed to be some sort of storeroom.

  “Are you scared?” I asked Grandma.

  “Sure, I’m scared. Aren’t you scared?”

  “Yes, and I’d be even more scared if I wasn’t so tired.”

  “I don’t like being scared,” Grandma said. “It makes my stomach feel squishy. I always thought your job sounded so great. Putting your life on the line for justice. And going into all kinds of dangerous situations. But now that I’m in a dangerous situation I’m thinking it isn’t anything I want to do again. I can see why you don’t always like your job.”

  It isn’t the danger that I hate, I thought. It’s the ick.

  It was late, and the cot was big enough for only one person. I persuaded Grandma to lie down on the cot, and I stretched out on the floor. It wasn’t comfortable, but I was exhausted, and for the next several hours I slipped in and out of sleep.

  Bernie showed up again at eight o’clock. He had a couple bags of breakfast sandwiches and two containers of coffee. He slid the sandwiches over to us and placed the coffee within reach, making sure he didn’t get too close to me.

  “We’re making the swap this morning,” he said. “It’s going to take place here.”

  “Where is here?” I asked him.

  “We’re at the plant. This is a storage facility that’s never used. It’s behind the truck garages. Sometimes I come here when I want to get away from everyone and take a nap or watch a ball game. I get good reception on my iPad in here. I’m the only one with a key, and no one would come here anyway.”

  I ate half a sandwich and sipped my coffee.

  “The police will track you down, and you’ll spend the rest of your life in jail,” I said to Bernie.

  “They’ll never find me. The instant I get my money I’m gone.”

  A half hour later, Charlie Shine and Lou Salgusta arrived. They were each carrying two suitcases.

  “This is stupid,” Shine said to Bernie. “Nobody demands cash in a suitcase anymore. We wire money now. Do you know how hard it was to get this much cash? We had guys working all night.”

  “Leave the suitcases by the door,” Bernie said. “I’ll take them from here.”

  Shine looked down the room at Grandma and me. “What’s with this? We were supposed to get Jimmy’s old lady. I’m not paying for a second hostage.”

  “She’s a freebie,” Bernie said. “If you don’t want her, I’ll take her with me and get rid of her.”

  “I like it,” Salgusta said. “Two is always better. We’ll keep her.”

  Bernie took a suitcase in each hand and staggered a little under the weight. He walked out of the building, Shine followed him, and there were two gunshots.

  Grandma and I gave a start at the sound of rounds being fired. Grandma pressed her lips together, and I put my arm around her.

  Shine backed through the doorway, dragging Bernie to the side of the room, leaving a fresh blood smear on the concrete floor.

  “Fucking amateur,” Shine said, and he walked away from Bernie and over to Salgusta. “Now that we got two of them, do you want to change the plan?”

  “No,” Salgusta said. “It’s still a good plan. I can work here. It’s isolated. Nobody’s going to come bother us. And it’s got good acoustics. You torture someone in a room with rugs and curtains, and it mutes the sound of their moaning and screaming. Takes some of the fun out of it.”

  “Jesus, Lou,” Shine said, “you’re a sick bastard.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  “THE COT IS TOO LOW for me to work on,” Salgusta said, “but the table over by the sandbags will be good. Help me move it so it’s under the light. My eyes aren’t what they used to be.”

  “Maybe you’ve got cataracts,” Grandma said. “I’ve got a good doctor for that.”

  “Yeah, I’ll have to look into it,” Salgusta said.

  They moved the table and brought two of the suitcases over. Salgusta opened the cases and stepped back.

  “These are all my knives and pliers and restraints,” he said. “We can put the women on the table face up and tie them down with the buckle straps and ankle and wrist cuffs. It’ll work good. We attach one bracelet to a table leg and the other bracelet to a wrist or ankle. I got some big ones for ankles.” He checked Grandma out. “The old one is kind of scrawny. Maybe we use a wrist bracelet on her ankle.”

  “I got good ankles,” Grandma said. “They’re one of my best features. They haven’t started to sag yet.”

  “My torches must be in one of the other two suitcases,” Salgusta said. “I always like to start with the torches.” He looked over at me. “In the meantime, you should get undressed. I’m going to start with you, and I need you to be naked.” He looked to Grandma. “You too, Granny. You might as well get undressed now too. It’ll save time.”

  Grandma gave him the finger.

  “Nice,” Salgusta said. “How is that for an old lady to act?”

  Shine brought a third suitcase over to the table and opened it. “This looks like the right one,” he said.

  Salgusta took a slim silver tool out of the case. “This is the one I always start with. This is a beauty. I do real pretty work with this. It’s my precision butane soldering torch. This is the one that I use for my trademark signature. After I’m do
ne with that one, I go to my Bernzomatic.”

  He exchanged the small soldering torch for the Bernzomatic. He attached a yellow cylinder to the torch and held it up for us to see.

  “It’s got a quick start-and-stop trigger,” he said.

  He pressed the trigger, and a huge blue flame shot out of the torch.

  “Yeah,” he said. “This is what I’m talking about. You could do a good burn with this baby.”

  I still had my arm around Grandma, and I felt her shudder.

  Salgusta set the Bernzomatic on the table and went back to the little silver torch. He inserted a slim silver canister into the tool and pressed a tiny switch. Nothing happened. He removed the canister and shook it next to his ear. He reinserted it and tried again. Nothing.

  “Empty,” he said.

  “You got a spare, right?” Shine said.

  Salgusta pawed through the suitcase. “Doesn’t look like it. I haven’t had any use for this lately. Nobody wants burn jobs anymore.”

  “So, bypass the signature and go for the money,” Shine said.

  “No. That would be all wrong. I have a system. That would ruin everything. I just have to get a cartridge. Where’s the nearest Home Depot?”

  “I’m not going to no Home Depot,” Shine said. “Can’t you burn your initials into them with a match or a Bic?”

  “Maybe,” Shine said. “Do you have any matches?”

  “No. I had to give up smoking. I got emphysema. Once in a while I have a cigar.” He felt his pockets. “I don’t have any matches. Don’t you have matches? You’re the burn guy.”

  “I don’t usually burn with matches. It’s not like I’m a pyromaniac. I’m an intelligence-gathering specialist.”

  “Okay, so you got a Bic?”

  “No. I don’t have a Bic. I have a Bernzomatic, and I’m not using it until I’ve autographed my victims.”

  “Okay, fine. Go to Home Depot. Take my car. I’ll stay here and get the women stripped down.”

  “That won’t work,” Salgusta said. “I need someone to drive. I lost my license from when I ran into the school bus. Anyway, these women aren’t going anywhere. We can leave them alone for a half hour.”

  “This better not drag on,” Shine said. “I got a one o’clock appointment for a blood draw.”

  “You got a cholesterol problem?”

  “Yeah, but I’m on meds for that. This is prediabetes.”

  “They’re gonna tell you to lay off the grape.”

  “I’m already off the grape. I switched to vodka. It’s potatoes. Vegetables are good for you.”

  Bernie had left the key in the door. They took the key, closed the door, and locked it.

  “I’m going to get us out of here,” I whispered to Grandma. I heard their car engine turn over, and I strained to hear them drive away.

  “How are you going to do this?” Grandma asked.

  “Shine dragged Bernie to this side of the room. I think I might be able to reach him. He’s got the padlock key in his pocket.”

  I walked the chain out, but I was short. I lay flat on the floor and grabbed Bernie’s foot. I pulled him a couple feet closer, was able to get to my knees, and pulled him far enough to reach into his pocket. I found the key and scrambled away from the body. I ran to the bathroom and discovered the key didn’t unlock that padlock. I tried it on my ankle padlock and had success.

  “Hang on,” I said to Grandma. “There’s another key.”

  I went back to Bernie and searched his pockets again. Sure enough, a second key. I unlocked the bathroom padlock and Grandma was set free, but she still had the chain attached to her handcuffs.

  “I didn’t feel another key in any of his pockets,” I said. “And I don’t want to take any more time to look. Just hang on to the chain for now.”

  I grabbed the Bernzomatic that was sitting on the table and ran to the door. It was locked on the outside but not on the inside. I opened the door, looked out, and didn’t see a car or a truck. Shine and Salgusta were gone. Bernie must have parked someplace else. The recycling container was still there.

  The storeroom faced the back of the garage that housed the concrete trucks. I led Grandma around the garage and was about to cross a parking area when I saw a car coming at us.

  “It’s them,” Grandma said. “They must have forgot something.”

  I pulled Grandma into the garage through an open door and hoped we hadn’t been spotted. There were seven massive concrete mixer trucks parked inside. They were all red and yellow with the Concrete Plant logo on the mixing drum. I climbed up on the cab of the third truck and looked in the window. Keys were in the ignition.

  “This is it,” I said to Grandma.

  I ran around and opened the passenger’s side door for her. She got her foot on the high step and couldn’t get any further.

  “Alley-oop!” I said, shoving her up with my hand on her butt, sending Grandma sprawling across the seat.

  I slammed the door closed, ran around, jumped behind the wheel, and turned the key. The truck rumbled to life just as Shine and Salgusta appeared in the open doorway. I was desperately trying to find a garage door opener when Shine reached the truck and wrenched the driver’s side door open. I grabbed the Bernzomatic and pulled the trigger. A massive flame shot out. Shine screamed and fell back. I pulled the door closed, put the truck in gear, floored the gas pedal, and crashed through the bay door. I careened to a stop in the parking area and put my hand to my heart. It was beating at stroke level.

  “Holy shit pickles,” Grandma said.

  I didn’t take the time to look for Shine or Salgusta. I drove the truck out of the parking lot, through the Concrete Plant complex, and onto the service road. I wasn’t sure where I was going, but after after what seemed like a lifetime of blind panic driving, I saw the turnoff to Route One. I headed for the ramp and took out a highway sign. I was so frazzled I didn’t know if I was going to or away from Trenton. I just knew I was on the highway.

  “D-d-do you know where we’re going?” I asked Grandma.

  “We’re heading for Trenton,” she said. “You’re doing good, but you might want to slow down a tad.”

  I checked the speedometer and saw that I was doing eighty. Pretty good for a concrete truck, I thought. Cars were moving out of my way. Not wanting to compete with the huge yellow and red behemoth that was rocketing up their ass.

  A cop car passed me, and then another. I had two in front of me and one on the side. I looked in my rearview mirror. Three more cop cars. All with their lights flashing. I took this as a good sign. Even if I got a speeding ticket, it was still good.

  I stopped the truck in the middle of the road and a Rangeman SUV immediately slid up beside me. Ranger jumped out, ran up to the truck, and pulled me out. He wrapped his arms around me and held me close, and I realized I was crying.

  “Babe,” he said. “Who knew you could drive a concrete truck?”

  “Omigod,” I said, wiping tears away. “This was a nightmare. How did you find me?”

  “Surveillance cameras, and then I followed the trail of metallic blue extensions.”

  “I’ve got Grandma with me.”

  “Tank is with her. Do we need to have an EMT check her out?”

  “No. She’s okay. We were able to escape before the bad things started to happen.”

  “Morelli is dealing with Stupe. I’m supposed to take you and Grandma home. You can give a statement when you’re up to it.”

  “Do the police have Charlie Shine and Lou Salgusta in custody?”

  “Not that I know. Stupe was on the floor, dead, when I got there with Morelli. The chopper spotted you in the concrete truck. Charlie Shine and Lou Salgusta weren’t on the scene.”

  I leaned into Ranger. He was warm and comforting. I always felt safe when I was with him. “Has someone told my mom that Grandma is okay?”

  “I’ll get a phone to Grandma. She can make the call.”

  He whistled to Tank and told him to give his phone to
Grandma.

  “Where do you want to go?” Ranger asked. “Do you want to go home or to your parents’ house?”

  “Home. I miss Rex.”

  Ranger commandeered the Rangeman SUV and wove around the cop cars that were clustered around the concrete truck. At least three miles of congestion was behind the cop cars. I called Morelli and told him Shine and Salgusta were responsible for Stupe and for kidnapping Grandma and me. I was hoping they were stuck in the three miles of stopped traffic.

  We didn’t talk on the ride home. I was too numb for conversation. Ranger maneuvered me out of the SUV, into my building, and into my apartment. I looked in at Rex and felt better. Everyone in my family was okay.

  “Are you hungry?” Ranger said. “I can make you an omelet.”

  I managed a smile at that. “I hate to pass it up, but I’m exhausted.”

  He looked in my fridge and my freezer. “Ice cream?”

  “Yes. Ice cream would be amazing.”

  We sat side by side on the couch and ate ice cream.

  “It’s a shame you don’t want to get married,” I said to Ranger. “You’re actually reasonably domesticated.”

  “Babe,” Ranger said. “Are you going to propose?”

  “Not at this moment, but I’m thinking about it.”

  “Would you like me to stay here tonight?”

  “It would be a waste. I can barely keep my eyes open. I’m going to go to bed and sleep for days.”

  “I might not care.”

  I punched him in the arm, and he got up and walked to the door.

  “Call if you need me,” he said.