Eleven on top

Eleven on top

by Janet Evanovich

ONE

My name is Stephanie Plum. When I was eighteen I got a job working a hot dog

stand on the boardwalk on the Jersey shore. I worked the last shift at Dave's Dogs, and I was supposed to start shutting down a half hour before closing so I could clean up for the day crew. We did chili dogs, cheese dogs, kraut dogs, and bean-topped barking dogs. We grilled them on a big grill with rotating rods. Round and round the rods went all day long, turning the dogs.

Dave Loogie owned the dog stand and came by every night to lock the stand

down. He checked the garbage to make sure nothing good was thrown away, and he counted the dogs that were left on the grill.

"You gotta plan ahead," Dave told me every night. "You got more than five

dogs left on the grill when we close, I'm gonna fire your ass and hire someone with bigger tits."

So every night, fifteen minutes before closing, before Dave showed up, I ate hot dogs. Not a good way to go when you're working at the shore nights and on the beach in a skimpy bathing suit by day. One night I ate fourteen hot dogs. Okay, maybe it was only nine, but it felt like fourteen. Anyway, it was too many hot dogs. Well hell, I needed the job.

For years Dave's Dogs took the number-one slot on my list of all-time crappy jobs held. This morning, I decided my present position had finally won the honor of replacing Dave's Dogs. I'm a bounty hunter. A bond enforcement agent, if you want to make me sound more legitimate. I work for my cousin Vinnie in his bail bonds office in the Chambersburg section of Trenton. At least I used to work for my cousin Vinnie. Thirty seconds ago, I quit. I handed in the phony badge I bought off the Net. I gave back my cuffs. And I dropped my remaining open files on Connies desk.

Vinnie writes the bonds. Connie shuffles the paperwork. My sidekick, Lula, files when the mood strikes her. And an incredibly sexy, incredibly handsome badass named Ranger and I hunt down the morons who don't show up for trial.

Until today. As of thirty seconds ago, all the morons got transferred to Ranger's list.

"Give me a break," Connie said. "You can't quit. I've got a stack of open files."

"Give them to Ranger."

"Ranger doesn't do the low bonds. He only takes the high-risk cases."

"Give them to Lula."

Lula was standing hand on hip, watching me spar with Connie. Lula's a size-sixteen black woman squashed into size-ten leopard print spandex. And the weird thing is, in her own way, Lula looks pretty good in the animal spandex.

"Hell yeah," Lula said. "I could catch them sonsabitches.

I could hunt down their asses good. Only I'm gonna miss you," she said to me. "What are you gonna do if you don't work here? And what brought this on?"

"Look at me!" I said. "What do you see?"

"I see a mess," Lula said. "You should take better care of yourself."

"I went after Sam Sporky this morning."

"Melon-head Sporky?"

"Yeah. Melon-head. I chased him through three yards. A dog tore a hole in my

jeans. Some crazy old lady shot at me. And I finally tackled Sporky behind the Tip Top Cafe."

"Looks like it was garbage day," Lula said. "You don't smell too good. And you got something looks like mustard all over your ass. Least I hope that's mustard."

"There were a bunch of garbage bags at the curb and Melon-head rolled me into them. We made sort of a mess. And then when I finally got him in cuffs, he spit on me!"

"I imagine that's the glob of something stuck in your hair?"

"No. He spit on my shoe. Is there something in my hair?" Lula gave an involuntary shiver.

"Sounds like a normal day," Connie said. "Hard to believe you're quitting because of Melon-head."

Truth is, I don't exactly know why I was quitting. My stomach feels icky when I get up in the morning. And I go to bed at night wondering where my life is heading. I've been working as a bounty hunter for a while now and I'm not the world's best. I barely make enough money to cover my rent each month.

I've been stalked by crazed killers, taunted by naked fat men, firebombed, shot at, spat at, cussed at, chased by humping dogs, attacked by a flock of Canadian honkers, rolled in garbage, and my cars get destroyed at an alarming rate. And maybe the two men in my life add to the icky feeling in my stomach. They're both Mr. Right. And they're both Mr. Wrong. They're both a little scary. I wasn't sure if I wanted a relationship with either of them. And I hadn't a clue how to choose between them. One wanted to marry me, sometimes. His name was Joe Morelli and he was a Trenton cop. Ranger was the other guy, and I wasn't sure what he wanted to do with me beyond get me naked and put a smile on my face.

Plus, there was the note that got slipped under my door two days ago. I'm back. What the heck did that mean? And the follow-up note tacked to my windshield.

DID YOU THINK I WAS DEAD?

My life is too weird. It's time for a change. Time to get a more sensible job and sort out my future.

Connie and Lula shifted their attention from me to the front door. The bonds office is located on Hamilton Avenue. It's a small two-room storefront setup with a cluttered storage area in the back, behind a bank of file cabinets. I didn't hear the door open. And I didn't hear footsteps. So either Connie and Lula were hallucinating or else Ranger was in the room.

Ranger is the mystery man. He's a half head taller than me, moves like a cat, kicks ass all day long, only wears black, smells warm and sexy, and is percent pure perfectly toned muscle. He gets his dark complexion and liquid brown eyes from Cuban ancestors. He was Special Forces, and that's about all anyone knows about Ranger.

Well hell, when you smell that good and look that good who cares about anything else, anyway?

I can usually feel Ranger standing behind me. Ranger doesn't ordinarily leave any space between us. Today, Ranger was keeping his distance. He reached around me and dropped a file and a body receipt on Connie's desk.

"I brought Angel Robbie in last night," he said to Connie. "You can mail the check to Rangeman."

Rangeman is Ranger's company. It's located in an office building in center city and specializes in security systems and fugitive apprehension.

"I got big news," Lula said to Ranger. "I've been promoted to bounty hunter on account of Stephanie just quit."

Ranger picked a couple strands of sauerkraut off my shirt and pitched them into Connie's wastebasket. "Is that true?"

"Yes," I said. "I quit. I'm done fighting crime. I've rolled in garbage for the last time."

"Hard to believe," Ranger said.

"I'm thinking of getting a job at the button factory," I told him. "I hear they're hiring."

"I don't have a lot of domestic instincts," Ranger said to me, his attention fixing on the unidentifiable glob of goo in my hair, "but I have a real strong urge to take you home and hose you down."

I went dry mouth. Connie bit into her lower lip, and Lula fanned herself with a file.

"I appreciate the offer," I told him. "Maybe some other time."

"Babe," Ranger said on a smile. He nodded to Lula and Connie and left the office.

No one said anything until he drove off in his shiny black Porsche Turbo.

"I think I wet my pants," Lula said. "Was that one of them double entendres?"

I drove back to my apartment, took a shower all by myself, and got dressed up in a stretchy white tank top and a tailored black suit with a short skirt.

I stepped into four-inch black heels, fluffed up my almost shoulder-length curly brown hair, and added one last layer to my mascara and lipstick.

I'd taken a couple minutes to print out a resume on my computer. It was pathetically short. Graduated with mediocre grades from Douglass College. Worked as a lingerie buyer for a cheap department store for a bunch of years. Got fired. Tracked down scumbags for my cousin Vinnie. Seeking management position in a classy company. Of course, this was Jersey and classy here might not be the national standard.

I grabbed my big black leather shoulder bag and yelled good-bye to my roomie, Rex-the-hamster. Rex lives in a glass aquarium on the kitchen counter. Rex is pretty much nocturnal so we're sort of like ships passing in the night. As an extra treat, once in a while I drop a Cheez Doodle into his cage and he emerges from his soup can home to retrieve the Doodle. That's about as complicated as our relationship gets.

I live on the second floor of a blocky, no-frills, three-story apartment building. My apartment looks out over the parking lot, which is fine by me. Most of the residents in my building are seniors. They're home in front of their televisions before the sun goes down, so the lot side is quiet at night.

I exited my apartment and locked up behind myself. I took the elevator to the small ground-floor lobby, pushed through the double glass doors, and crossed the lot to my car. I was driving a dark green Saturn SL-2. The Saturn had been the special of the day at Generous George's Used Car Emporium. I'd actually wanted a Lexus SC430, but Generous George thought the Saturn was more in line with my budget constraints.

I slid behind the wheel and cranked the engine over. I was heading off to apply for a job at the button factory and I was feeling down about it. I was telling myself it was a new beginning, but truth is, it felt more like a sad ending. I turned onto Hamilton and drove a couple blocks to Tasty Pastry Bakery, thinking a doughnut would be just the thing to brighten my mood.

Five minutes later, I was on the sidewalk in front of the bakery, doughnut bag in hand, and I was face-to-face with Morelli. He was wearing jeans and scuffed boots and a black V-neck sweater over a black T-shirt. Morelli is six feet of lean, hard muscle and hot Italian libido. He's Jersey guy smart, and he's not a man you'd want to annoy . . . unless you're me. I've been annoying Morelli all my life.

"I was driving by and saw you go in," Morelli said. He was standing close, smiling down at me, eyeing the bakery bag. "Boston creams?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"I needed happy food."

"You should have called me," he said, hooking his finger into the neckline of my white tank, pulling the neck out to take a look inside. "I have just the thing to make you happy."

I've cohabitated with Morelli from time to time and I knew this to be true.

"I have stuff to do this afternoon and doughnuts take less time."

"Cupcake, I haven't seen you in weeks. I could set a new land speed record for getting happy."

"Yeah, but that would be your happiness," I said, opening the bag, sharing the doughnuts with Morelli. "What about mine?"

"Your happiness would be top priority."

I took a bite of doughnut. "Tempting, but no. I have a job interview at the button factory. I'm done with bond enforcement."

"When did this happen?"

"About an hour ago," I said. "Okay, I don't actually have an interview appointment, but Karen Slobodsky works in the personnel office, and she said I should look her up if I ever wanted a job."

"I could give you a job," Morelli said. "The pay wouldn't be great but the benefits would be pretty decent."

"Gee," I said, "that's the second scariest offer I've had today."

"And the scariest offer would be?"

I didn't think it was smart to tell Morelli about Ranger's offer of a hosing down. Morelli was wearing a gun on his hip, and Ranger wore guns on multiple parts of his body. Seemed like a bad idea to say something that might ratchet up the competition between them.

I leaned into Morelli and kissed him lightly on the mouth. "It's too scary to share," I told him. He felt nice against me, and he tasted like doughnut.

I ran the tip of my tongue along his lower lip. "Yum," I said.

Morelli's fingers curled into the back of my jacket. "Yum is a little mild for what I'm feeling. And what I'm feeling shouldn't be happening on the sidewalk in front of the bakery. Maybe we could get together tonight."

"For pizza?"

"Yeah, that too."

I'd been taking a time-out from Morelli and Ranger, hoping to get a better grip on my feelings, but I wasn't making much progress. It was like choosing between birthday cake and a big-boy margarita. How could I possibly decide?

And probably I'd be better off without either, but jeez, that wouldn't be any fun.

"Okay," I said. "I'll meet you at Pino's."

"I was thinking my house. The Mets are playing and Bob misses you."

Bob is Morelli's dog. Bob is a big, orange, incredibly huggable shaggy-haired monster with an eating disorder. Bob eats everything.

"No fair," I said. "You're using Bob to lure me to your house."

"Yeah," Morelli said. "So?"

I blew out a sigh. "I'll be over around six."

I drove a couple blocks down Hamilton and left-turned onto Olden. The button factory is just beyond the city limits of north Trenton. At four in the morning, it's a ten-minute drive from my apartment. At all other hours, the drive time is unpredictable. I stopped for a red light at the corner of Olden and State and just as the light flashed green I heard the pop of gunshot behind me and the zing, zing, zing of three rounds tearing into metal and fiberglass. I was pretty sure it was my metal and fiberglass, so I floored the Saturn and sailed across the intersection. I crossed North Clinton and kept going, checking my rearview mirror. Hard to tell in traffic, but I didn't think anyone was following me. My heart was racing, and I was telling myself to chill. No reason to believe this was anything more than a random shooting. Probably just some gang guy having fun, practicing his sniping. You've got to practice somewhere, right?

I fished my cell phone out of my purse and called Morelli. "Someone's taking

potshots at cars on the corner of Olden and State," I told him. "You might want to send someone over to check things out."

"Are you okay?"

"I'd be better if I had that second doughnut." Okay, so this was my best try at bravado. My hands were white-knuckled gripping the wheel and my foot was

shaking on the gas pedal. I sucked in some air and told myself I was just a little excited. Not panicked. Not terrified. Just a little excited. All I had to do was calm down and take a couple more deep breaths and I'd be fine.

Ten minutes later, I pulled the Saturn into the button factory parking lot.

The entire factory was housed in a mammoth three-story redbrick building.

The bricks were dark with age, the old-fashioned double-hung windows were

grimy, and the landscaping was lunar. Dickens would have loved it. I wasn't so sure it was my thing. But then, my thing wasn't clearly defined anymore.

I got out and walked to the rear of the car, hoping I'd been wrong about the

gunshot. I felt another dump of adrenaline when I saw the damage. I'd taken

three hits. Two rounds were embedded in the back panel and one had destroyed

a rear light.

No one had followed me into the lot, and I didn't see any cars lingering on the road. Wrong place, wrong time, I told myself. And I would have believed it entirely if it hadn't been for my lousy previous job and the two notes.

As it was, I had to back-burner some paranoia so as not to be in a terror-induced cold sweat while trying to talk some guy into hiring me.

I crossed the lot to the large glass double doors leading to the offices, and I sashayed through the doors into the lobby. The lobby was small with a chipped tile floor and seasick green walls. Somewhere, not far off, I could hear machines stamping out buttons. Phones rang in another part of the building. I approached the reception desk and asked for Karen Slobodsky.

"Sorry," the woman said. "You're two hours too late. She just quit. Stormed out of here like hurricane Slobodsky, yelling something about sexual harassment."

"So there's a job opening?" I asked, thinking my day was finally turning lucky.

"Sure looks that way. I'll buzz her boss, Jimmy Alizzi."

Ten minutes later, I was in Alizzi's office, sitting across from him. He was at his desk and his slight frame was dwarfed by his massive furniture. He looked to be in his late thirties to early forties. He had slicked-back black hair and an accent and skin tone that had me thinking Indian.

"I will tell you now that I am not Indian," Alizzi said. "Everyone thinks I am Indian, but that is a false assumption. I come from a very small island country off the coast of India."

"Sri Lanka?"

"No, no, no," he said, wagging his bony finger at me. "Not Sri Lanka. My country is even smaller. We are a very proud people, so you must be careful not to make ethnic slurs."

"Sure. You want to tell me the name of this country?"

"Latorran."

"Never heard of it."

"You see, already you are treading in very dangerous waters."

I squelched a grimace.

"So, you were a bounty hunter," he said, skimming over my resume, eyebrows

raised. "That is a quite exciting job. Why would you want to quit such a job?"

"I'm looking for something that has more potential for advancement."

"Oh dear, that would be my job you would eventually be seeking."

"Yes, well I'm sure it would take years, and then who knows . . . you might be president of the company by then."

"You are an outrageous flatterer," he said. "I like that. And what would you do if I were to ask you for sexual favors? Would you threaten to sue me?"

"No. I guess I'd ignore you. Unless you got physical. Then I'd have to kick you in a place that hurt a lot and you probably wouldn't be able to father any children."

"That sounds fair," he said. "It happens that I have an immediate position to fill, so you're hired. You can start tomorrow, promptly at eight o'clock. Do not be late."

Wonderful. I have a real job in a nice clean office where no one will shoot at me. I should be happy, yes? This was what I wanted, wasn't it? Then why do I feel so depressed?

I dragged myself down the stairs to the lobby and out to the parking lot. I found my car and the depression deepened. I hated my car. Not that it was a bad car. It just wasn't the right car. Not to mention, it would be great to have a car that didn't have three bullet holes in it.

Maybe I needed another doughnut.

A half hour later, I was back in my apartment. I'd stopped in at Tasty Pastry and left with a day-old birthday cake. The cake said Happy Birthday Larry.

I don't know how Larry celebrated his birthday, but apparently it was without cake. Larry's loss was my gain. If you want to get happy, birthday cake is the way to go. This was a yellow cake with thick, disgusting white frosting made with lard and artificial butter and artificial vanilla and a truckload of sugar. It was decorated with big gunky roses made out of pink and yellow and purple frosting. It was three layers thick with lemon cream between the layers. And it was designed to serve eight people, so it was just the right size.

I dropped my clothes on the floor and dug into the cake. I gave a chunk of cake to Rex, and I worked on the rest. I ate all the pieces with the big pink roses. I was starting to feel nauseous, but I pressed on. I ate all the pieces with the big yellow roses. I had a purple rose and a couple roseless pieces left. I couldn't do it. I couldn't eat any more cake. I staggered into my bedroom. I needed a nap.

I dropped a T-shirt over my head and pulled on a pair of Scooby-Doo boxers with an elastic waist. God, don't you love clothes with elastic? I had one knee on the bed when I saw the note pinned to my pillowcase,

BE AFRAID, BE VERY AFRAID. NEXT TIME I'll AIM HIGHER.

I thought I'd be more afraid if I hadn't just eaten five pieces of birthday cake. As it was, I was mostly afraid of throwing up. I looked under the bed, behind the shower curtain, and in all the closets. No knuckle-dragging monsters anywhere. I slid the bolt home on the front door and shuffled back to the bedroom.

Now, here's the thing. This isn't the first time someone's broken into my apartment. In fact, people regularly break in. Ranger slides in like smoke.

Morelli has a key. And various bad guys and psychos have managed to breach the three locks I keep on the door. Some have even left threatening messages. So I wasn't as freaked out as I might have been prior to my career in bounty huntering. My immediate feelings ran more toward numb despair. I wanted all the scary things to go away. I was tired of scary. I'd quit my scary job, and now I wanted the scary people out of my life. I didn't want to be kidnapped ever again.

I didn't want to be held at knifepoint or gunpoint. I didn't want to be threatened, stalked, or run off the road by a homicidal maniac.

I crawled under the covers and pulled the quilt over my head. I was almost

asleep when the quilt was yanked back. I let out a shriek and stared up at Ranger.

"What the heck are you doing?" I yelled at him, grabbing at the quilt.

"Visiting, Babe."

"Did you ever think about ringing a doorbell?"

Ranger smiled down at me. "That would take all the fun out of it."

"I didn't know you were interested in fun."

He sat on the side of the bed and the smile widened. "You smell good enough

to eat," Ranger said. "You smell like a party."

"It's birthday cake breath. And are we looking at another double entendre?"

"Yeah," Ranger said, "but it's not going anywhere. I have to get back to work. Tank's waiting for me with the motor running. I just wanted to find out if you're serious about quitting."

"I got a job at the button factory. I start tomorrow."

He reached across and removed the note from the pillowcase next to me. "New

boyfriend?"

"Someone broke in while I was out. And I guess he shot at me this afternoon."

Ranger stood. "You should discourage people from doing that. Do you need help?"

"Not yet."

"Babe," Ranger said. And he left.

I listened carefully, but I didn't hear the front door open or close. I got up and tiptoed through the apartment. No Ranger. All the locks were locked and the bolt was in place.

I suppose he could have gone out the living room window, but he would have

had to climb down the side of the building like Spider-Man.

The phone rang, and I waited to see the number pop up on my caller ID. It was Lula. "Yo," I said.

"Yo, your ass. You got some nerve sticking me with this job."

"You volunteered."

"I must've had sunstroke. A person have to be nuts to want this job."

"Something go wrong?"

"Hell, yes. Everything's wrong. I could use some assistance here. I'm trying to snag Willie Martin, and he's not cooperating."

"How uncooperative is he?"

"He hauled his nasty ass out of his apartment and left me handcuffed to his big stupid bed."

"That's pretty uncooperative."

"Yeah, and it gets worse. I sort of don't have any clothes on."

"Omigod! Did he attack you?"

"It's a little more complicated than that. He was in the shower when I busted in. You ever see Willie Martin naked? He is fine. He used to play pro ball until he made a mess of his knee and had to turn to boosting cars."

"Un hunh."

"Well, one thing led to another and here I am chained to his hunk-of-junk bed. Hell, it's not like I get it regular, you know. I'm real picky about my men. And besides, anybody would've jumped those bones. He's got muscles on muscles and a butt you want to sink your teeth into."

The mental image had me considering turning vegetarian.

Willie Martin lived in a third-floor loft in a graffiti-riddled warehouse that contained a ground-floor chop shop. It was located on the seven-hundred block of Stark Street, an area of urban decay that rivaled Iraqi bomb sites.

I parked behind Lula's red Firebird and transferred my five-shot Smith & Wesson from my purse to my jacket pocket. I'm not much of a gun person and almost never carry one, but I was sufficiently creeped out by the shooting and the notes that I didn't want to venture onto Stark Street unarmed. I locked the car, bypassed the rickety open-cage service elevator on the ground floor, and trudged up two flights of stairs. The stairwell opened to a small grimy foyer and a door with a size-nine high-heeled boot print on it. I guess Willie hadn't answered on the first knock and Lula got impatient.

I tried the doorknob, and the door swung open. Thank God for small favors because I'd never had any success at kicking in a door. I tentatively stuck my head in and called "Hello."

"Hello, yourself," Lula said. "And don't say no more. I'm not in a good mood. Just unlock these piece-of-crap handcuffs and stand back because I need fries.

I need a whole shitload of fries. I'm having a fast-food emergency."

Lula was across the room, wrapped in a sheet, one hand cuffed to the iron headboard of the bed, the other hand holding the sheet together.

I pulled the universal handcuff key out of my pocket and looked around the room. "Where are your clothes?"

"He took them. Do you believe that? Said he was going to teach me a lesson not to go after him. I tell you, you can't trust a man. They get what they want and then next thing they got their tighty whities in their pocket and they're out the door. I don't know what he was so upset about, anyway. I was just doing my job. He said, 'Was that good for you?' And I said, 'Oh yeah baby, it was real good.' And then I tried to cuff him. Hell, truth is it wasn't all that good and besides, I'm a professional bounty hunter now. Bring 'em back dead or alive, with or without their pants, right? I had an obligation to cuff him."

"Yeah, well next time put your clothes on before you try to cuff a guy."

Lula unlocked the cuffs and tied a knot in the sheet to hold it closed.

"That's good advice. I'm gonna remember that. That's the kind of advice I need to be a first-class bounty hunter. At least he forgot to take my purse. I'd be really annoyed if he'd taken my purse." She went to a chest on the far wall, pulled out one of Willie's T-shirts and a pair of gym shorts, and put them on. Then she scooped the rest of the clothes out of the chest, carried them to the window, and threw them out.

"Okay," Lula said, "I'm starting to feel better now. Thanks for coming here to help me. And good news, it looks like no one's stolen your car. I saw it still sitting at the curb." Lula went to the closet and scooped up more clothes. Suits, shoes, and jackets. All went out the window. "I'm on a roll now," she said, looking around the loft. "What else we got that can go out the window? You think we can fit his big-ass TV out the window? Hey, how about some kitchen appliances? Go get me his toaster." She crossed the room, grabbed a table lamp, and brought it to the window. "Hey!" she yelled, head out the window, eyes focused on the street. "Get away from that car. Willie, is that you? What the hell are you doing?"

I ran to the window and looked out. Willie Martin was whaling away at my car with a sledgehammer.

"I'll show you to throw my clothes outta the window," he said, taking a swing at the right rear quarter panel.

"You dumb premature ejaculator," Lula shouted at him. "You dumb-ass moron!

That's not my car."

"Oh. Oops," Willie said. "Which one's your car?"

Lula hauled a Glock out of her purse, squeezed off two rounds in Willie's direction, and Willie left the scene. One of the rounds pinged off my car roof.

And the other round made a small hole in my windshield.

"Must be something wrong with the sight on this gun," Lula said to me.

"Sorry about that."

I trudged down the stairs and stood on the sidewalk examining my car. Deep scratch in roof from misplaced bullet. Hole in windshield plus embedded bullet in passenger seat. Bashed-in right rear quarter panel and right passenger-side door from sledgehammer. Previous damage from creepy gun attack by insane stalker. And someone had spray painted eat me on the driver's side door.

"Your car's a mess," Lula said. "I don't know what it is with you and cars."

TWO

Morelli drives an SUV. He used to own a 4x4 truck, but he traded it in so Bob could ride around with him and be more comfortable. This isn't normal behavior for Morelli men. Morelli men are known for being charming but worthless drunks who rarely care about the comfort of their wife and kids, much less the dog. How Joe escaped the Morelli Man syndrome is a mystery.

For a while he seemed destined to follow in his fathers footsteps, but somewhere in his late twenties, Joe stopped chasing women and fighting in bars and started working at being a good cop. He inherited his house from his Aunt Rose. He adopted Bob. And he decided, after years of hit-and-run sex, he was in love with me. Go figure that. Joseph Morelli with a house, a dog, a steady job, and an SUV.

And on odd days of the month he woke up wanting to marry me. It turns out I only want to marry him on even days of the month, so to date we've been spared commitment.

When I arrived at Morelli's house his SUV was parked curbside and Morelli and Bob were sitting on Morelli's tiny front porch. Usually Bob goes gonzo when he sees me, jumping around all smiley face. Today Bob was sitting there drooling, looking sad.

"What's with Bob?" I asked Morelli.

"I don't think he feels good. He was like this when I came home."

Bob stood and hunched. "Gak," Bob said. And he hacked up a sock and a lot of

Bob slime. He looked down at the sock. And then he looked up at me. And then he got happy. He jumped around, doing his goofy dance. I gave him a hug and he wandered off, tail wagging, into the house.

"Guess we can go in now," Morelli said. He got to his feet, slid his arm around my shoulders, and hugged me to him for a friendly kiss. He broke from the kiss and his eyes strayed to my car. "I don't suppose you'd want to tell me about the body damage?"

"Sledgehammer." Of course.

"You're pretty calm about all this," I said to him.

"I'm a calm kind of guy."

"No, you're not. You go nuts over this stuff. You always yell when people go after me with a sledgehammer."

"Yeah, but in the past you haven't liked that. I'm thinking if I start yelling it might screw up my chances of getting you naked. And I'm desperate. I really need to get you naked. Besides, you quit the bonds office, right? Maybe your life will settle down now. How'd the interview go?"

"I got the job. I start tomorrow."

I was wearing a T-shirt and jeans. Morelli grinned down at me and slid his hands under my T-shirt. "We should celebrate."

His hands felt nice against my skin, but I was starving and I didn't want to encourage any further celebrating until I got my pizza. He pulled me close and kissed his way up my neck. His lips moved to my ear and my temple and by the time he got to my mouth I was thinking the pizza could wait.

And then we heard it... the pizza delivery car coming down the street, stopping at the curb.

Morelli cut his eyes to the kid getting out of the car. "Maybe if we ignore him he'll go away."

The steaming extra-large, extra cheese, green peppers, pepperoni pizza smell oozed from the box the kid was carrying. The smell rushed over the porch and

into the house. Bob's toenails clattered on the polished wood hall floor as he took off from the kitchen and galloped for all he was worth at the kid.

Morelli stepped back from me and snagged Bob by the collar just as he was about to catapult himself off the porch.

"Ulk," Bob said, stopping abruptly, tongue out, eyes bugged, feet off the ground.

"Minor setback with the celebration plan," Morelli said.

"No rush," I told him. "We have all night."

Morelli's eyes got soft and dark and dreamy. Sort of the way Bob's eyes got when he ate Tastykake Butterscotch Krimpets and then someone rubbed his belly.

"All right," Morelli said. "I like the way that sounds."

Two minutes later, we were on the couch in Morelli's living room, watching the pregame show, eating pizza, and drinking beer.

"I heard you were working on the Barroni case," I said to Morelli. "Having any luck with it?"

Morelli took a second piece of pizza. "I have a lot out on it. So far nothings come in."

Michael Barroni mysteriously disappeared eight days ago. He was sixty-two years old and in good health when he vanished. He owned a nice house in the

heart of the Burg on Roebling and a hardware store on the corner of Rudd and

Liberty Street. He left behind a wife, two dogs, and three adult sons. One of the Barroni boys graduated with me, and one graduated two years earlier with Morelli.

There aren't a lot of secrets in the Burg and according to Burg gossip Michael Barroni didn't have a girlfriend, didn't play the numbers, and didn't have mob ties. His hardware store was running in the black. He didn't suffer from depression. He didn't do a lot of drinking, and he wasn't hooked on Levitra.

Barroni was last seen closing and locking the back door to the hardware store at the end of the day. He got into his car, drove away . . . and poof.

No more Michael Barroni.

"Did you ever find Barroni's car?" I asked Morelli.

"No. No car. No body. No sign of struggle. He was alone when Sol Rosen saw him lock up and take off. Sol said he was putting out trash from his diner and he saw Barroni leave. He said Barroni looked normal. Maybe distracted. Sol said Barroni waved but didn't say anything."

"Do you think it's a random crime? Barroni was in the wrong place at the wrong time?"

"No. Barroni lived four blocks from his store. Every day he went straight home from work. Four blocks through the Burg. If something had gone down on

Barroni's usual route home someone would have heard or seen something. The

day Barroni disappeared he went someplace else. He didn't take his usual route home."

"Maybe he just got tired of it all. Maybe he started driving west and didn't stop until he got to Flagstaff."

Morelli fed his pizza crust to Bob. "I'm going to tell you something that's just between us. We've had two other guys disappear on the exact same day as Barroni. They were both from Stark Street, and a missing person on Stark Street isn't big news, so no one's paid much attention. I ran across them when I checked Barroni's missing-person status.

"Both these guys owned their own businesses. They both locked up at the end of the day and were never seen again. One of the men was real stable. He had a wife and kids. He went to church. He ran a bar on Stark Street, but he was clean. The other guy, Benny Gorman, owned a garage. Probably a chump-change chop shop. He'd done time for armed robbery and grand theft auto. And two months ago he was charged with assault with a deadly weapon. Took a tire iron to a guy and almost killed him. He was supposed to go to trial last week but failed to appear. Ordinarily I'd say he skipped because of the charge but I'm not so sure on this one."

"Did Vinnie bond Gorman out?"

"Yeah. I talked to Connie. She handed Gorman off to Ranger."

"And you think the three guys are connected?"

A commercial came on and Morelli channel surfed through a bunch of stations.

"Don't know. I just have a feeling. Its too strong a coincidence."

I gave Bob the last piece of pizza and snuggled closer to Morelli.

"I have feelings about other things, too," Morelli said, sliding an arm around my shoulders, his fingertips skimming along my neck and down my arm.

"Would you like me to tell you about my other feelings?"

My toes curled in my shoes and I got warm in a bunch of private places. And that was the last we saw of the game.

Morelli is an early riser in many ways. I had a memory of him kissing my bare shoulder, whispering an obscene suggestion, and leaving the bed. He returned a short time later with his hair still damp from the shower. He kissed me again and wished me luck with my new job. And then he was gone... off on his mission to rid Trenton of bad guys.

It was still dark in Morelli's bedroom. The bed was warm and comfy. Bob was

sprawled on Morelli's side of the bed, snuffling into Morelli's pillow. I burrowed under the quilt, and when I reawakened the sunlight was pouring into the room through a break in the curtain. I had a moment of absolute delicious satisfaction immediately followed by panic. According to the bedside clock it was nine o'clock. I was massively late for my first day at the button factory!

I scrambled out of bed, gathered my clothes up off the floor, and tugged them on. I didn't bother with makeup or hair. No time. I took the stairs at a run, grabbed my purse and my car keys, and bolted out of the house.

I skirted traffic as best I could, pulled into the button factory parking lot on two wheels, parked, jumped out of the car, and hit the pavement running. The time was nine-thirty. I was an hour and a half late.

I took the stairs to save time and I was sweating by the time I skidded to a stop in Alizzi's office.

"You are late," Alizzi said.

"Yes, but..."

He wagged his finger at me. "This is not a good thing. I told you that you must be on time. And look at you. You are in a T-shirt. If you are going to be late you should at least wear something that is revealing and shows me your breasts. You are fired. Go away."

"No! Give me another chance. Just one more chance. If you give me another chance I'll wear something revealing tomorrow."

"Will you perform a lewd act?"

"What kind of lewd act?"

"Something very, very, very lewd. There would have to be nakedness and body

fluids."

"Ick. No!"

"Well then, you are still fired."

"That's horrible. I'm going to report you for sexual harassment."

"It will only serve to enhance my reputation."

Unh. Mental head slap.

"Okay. Fine," I said. "I didn't want this job anyway."

I turned on my heel and flounced out of Alizzi's office, down the stairs, through the lobby, and crossed the lot to my bashed-in, bullet-riddled, spray-painted car. I gave the door a vicious kick, wrenched it open, and slid behind the wheel. I punched Metallica into the sound system, cranked it up until the fillings in my teeth were vibrating, and motored across town.

By the time I got to Hamilton I was feeling pretty decent. I had the whole day to myself. True, I wasn't making any money, but there was always tomorrow, right? I stopped at Tasty Pastry, bought a bag of doughnuts, and drove three blocks into the Burg to Mary Lou Stankovic's house. Mary Lou was my best friend all through school. She's married now and has a bunch of kids. We're still friends but our paths don't cross as much as they used to.

I walked an obstacle course from my car to Mary Lou's front door, around bikes, dismembered action figures, soccer balls, remote-control cars, beheaded Barbie dolls, and plastic guns that looked frighteningly real.

"Omigod," Mary Lou said when she opened the door. "It's the angel of mercy.

Are those doughnuts?"

"Do you need some?"

"I need a new life, but I'll make do with doughnuts."

I handed the doughnuts off to Mary Lou and followed her into the kitchen.

"You have a good life. You like your life."

"Not today. I have three kids home sick with colds. The dog has diarrhoea. And I think there was a hole in the condom we used last night."

"Aren't you on the pill?"

"Gives me water retention."

I could hear the kids in the living room, coughing at the television, whining at each other. Mary Lou's kids were cute when they were asleep and for the first fifteen minutes after they'd had a bath. All other times the kids were a screaming advertisement for birth control. It wasn't that they were bad kids. Okay, so they dismembered every doll that came through the door, but they hadn't yet barbecued the dog. That was a good sign, right? It was more that Mary Lou's kids had an excess of energy. Mary Lou said it came from the Stankovic side of the family. I thought it might be coming from the bakery. That's where I got my energy.

Mary Lou opened the doughnut bag and the kids came rushing into the kitchen.

"They can hear a bakery bag crinkle a mile away," Mary Lou said.

I'd brought four doughnuts so we gave one to each kid and Mary Lou and I shared a doughnut over coffee.

"What's new?" Mary Lou wanted to know.

"I quit my job at the bonds office."

"Any special reason?"

"No. My reasoning was sort of vague. I got a job at the button factory, but I spent the night with Joe to celebrate and then I overslept this morning and was late for my first day and got fired."

Mary Lou took a sip of coffee and waggled her eyebrows at me. "Was it worth it?"

I took a moment to consider. "Yeah."

Mary Lou gave her head a small shake. "He's been making trouble worthwhile for you since you were five years old. I don't know why you don't marry him."

My reasoning was sort of vague on that one, too.

It was late morning when I left Mary Lou. I cut over two blocks to High Street and parked in front of my parents' house. It was a small house on a small lot. It had three bedrooms and bath up and a living room, dining room, kitchen down. It shared a common wall with a mirror image owned by Mabel Markowitz. Mabel was old beyond imagining. Her husband had passed on and her kids were off on their own, so she lived alone in the house, baking coffee cakes and watching television. Her half of the house is painted lime green because the paint had been on clearance when she'd needed it. My parents' house is painted Gulden mustard yellow and dark brown. I'm not sure which house is worse. In the fall my mom puts pumpkins on the front porch and it all seems to work. In the spring the paint scheme is depressing as hell.

Since it was the end of September, the pumpkins were on display and a cardboard witch on a broomstick was stuck to the front door. Halloween was just four weeks away, and the Burg is big on holidays.

Grandma Mazur was at the front door when I set foot on the porch. Grandma moved in with my parents when my Grandpa Mazur got a hot pass to heaven compliments of more than a half century of bacon fat and butter cookies.

"We heard you quit your job," Grandma said. "We've been calling and calling, but you haven't been answering your phone. I need to know the details. I got a beauty parlor appointment this afternoon and I gotta get the story straight."

"Not much of a story," I said, following Grandma into the hallway foyer. "I just thought it was time for a change."

"That's it? Time for a change? I can't tell people that story. It's boring. I need something better. How about we tell them you're pregnant? Or maybe we could say you got a rare blood disease. Or there was a big contract put on your head unless you gave up being a bounty hunter."

"Sorry," I said. "None of those things are true."

"Yeah, but that don't matter. Everybody knows you can't believe everything you hear."

My mother was at the dining room table with a bunch of round pieces of paper spread out in front of her. My sister, Valerie, was getting married in a week, and my mother was still working on the seating arrangements.

"I can't make this work," my mother said. "These round tables don't hold the right number of people. I'm going to have to seat the Krugers at two different tables. And no one gets along with old Mrs. Kruger."

"You should do away with the seating chart," Grandma said. "Just open the doors to the hall and let them fight for their seats."

I love my sister, but I'd deport her to Bosnia if I thought I could get away with it and it'd get me out of her wedding. I'm supposed to be her maid of honor and somehow through my lack of participation and a fabric swatch inaccuracy I've been ordered a gown that makes me look like a giant eggplant.

"We heard you quit your job," my mother said to me. "Thank goodness. I can finally sleep at night knowing you're not running around the worst parts of town chasing after criminals. And I understand you have a wonderful job at the button factory. Marjorie Kuzak called yesterday and told us all about it. Her daughter works in the employment office."

"Actually, I sort of got fired from that job," I said.

"Already? How could you possibly get fired on your first day?"

"It's complicated. I don't suppose you know anybody who's hiring?"

"What kind of job are you looking for?" Grandma asked.

"Professional. Something with career advancement potential."

"I saw a sign up at the cleaners," Grandma said. "I don't know about career advancement, but they do a lot of professional pressing. I see a lot of people taking their business suits there."

"I was hoping for something a little more challenging."

"Dry cleaning's challenging," Grandma said. "It's not easy getting all them spots out. And you gotta have people skills. I heard them talking behind the counter about how hard it was to find someone with people skills."

"And no one would shoot at you," my mother said. "No one ever robs a dry cleaner."

I had to admit, that part appealed to me. It would be nice not to have to worry about getting shot. Maybe working at the dry cleaners would be an okay temporary job until the right thing came along.

I got myself a cup of coffee and poked through the refrigerator, searching for food. I settled on a piece of apple pie and carted the coffee and pie back to the dining room, where my mom was still arranging the paper tables.

"What's going on in the Burg?" I asked her.

"Harry Farstein died yesterday. Heart attack. He's at Stiva's."

"He's gonna have a viewing tonight," Grandma said. "It's gonna be a good one, too. His lodge will be there. And Lydia Farstein is the drama queen of the Burg. She'll be carrying on something awful. If you haven't got anything better to do, you should come to the viewing with me. I could use a ride."

Grandma loved going to viewings. Stiva's Funeral Home was the social center of the Burg. I thought having my thumb amputated would be a preferred activity.

"And everyone's going to be talking about the Barroni thing," Grandma said.

"I can't believe he hasn't turned up. It's like he was abducted by Martians."

Okay, now this interested me. Morelli was working on the Barroni disappearance. And Ranger was working on the Gorman disappearance, which

might be connected to the Barroni disappearance. I was glad I wasn't working on either of those cases, but on the other hand, I felt a smidgeon left out.

So sue me, I'm nosy.

"Sure," I said. "I'll pick you up at seven o'clock."

"Your father got gravy on his gray slacks," my mother said. "If you're going to apply for a job at the cleaner, would you mind taking the slacks with you? It would save me a trip."

A half hour later, I had a job with Kan Klean. The hours were seven to three. They were open seven days a week, and I agreed to work weekends. The pay wasn't great, but I could wear jeans and a T-shirt to work, and they confirmed my mother's suspicion that they'd never been held up and that to date none of their employees had been shot while on the job. I handed over the gravy-stained slacks and agreed to show up at seven the next morning. I didn't feel quite as nauseated as I had after getting the button factory job. So I was making progress, right?

I drove three blocks down Hamilton and stopped at the bonds office to say hello.

"Look what the wind blew in," Lula said when she saw me. "I heard you got the job at the button factory. How come you're not working?"

"I spent the night with Morelli and overslept. So I was late rolling in to work."

"And?"

"And I got fired."

"That was fast," Lula said. "You're good. It takes most people a couple days to get fired."

"Maybe it all worked out for the best. I got another job already at Kan Klean."

"Do you get a discount?" Lula wanted to know. "I got some dry cleaning to send out. You could pick it up tomorrow here at the office on your way to work."

"Sure," I said. "Why not." I shuffled through the small stack of files on Connie's desk. "Anything fun come in?"

"Yeah, its all fun," Connie said. "We got a rapist. We got a guy who beat up his girlfriend. We got a couple pushers."

"I'm doing the DV this afternoon," Lula said.

"DV?"

"Domestic violence. My time's real valuable now that I'm a bounty hunter. I gotta use abbreviations. Like I'm doing the DV in the PM."

I heard Vinnie growl from his inner office. "Jesus HIM. Christmas," he said.

"Who would have thought my life would come to this?"

"Hey, Vinnie," I yelled to him. "How's it going?"

Vinnie poked his head out his door. "I gave you a job when you needed one and now you desert me. Where's the gratitude?"

Vinnie is a couple inches taller than me and has the slim, boneless body of a ferret. His coloring is Mediterranean. His hair looks like it's slicked back with olive oil. He wears pointy-toed shoes and a lot of gold. He's the family pervert. He's married to Harry-the-Hammer's daughter. And in spite of his personality shortcomings (or maybe because of them) he's an okay bail bondsman. Vinnie understands the criminal mind.

"You didn't give me the job," I said to Vinnie. "I blackmailed you into it. And I got good numbers when I was working for you. My apprehension rate was close to ninety percent."

"You were lucky," Vinnie said.

This was true.

Lula took her big black leather purse from the bottom file drawer and stuffed it under her arm. "I'm going out. I'm gonna get that DV and I'm gonna lack his ass all the way back to jail."

"No!" Vinnie said. "You're not gonna kick his ass anywhere. Ass kicking is not entirely legal. You will introduce yourself and you will cuff him. And then you will escort him to the station in a civilized manner."

"Sure," Lula said. "I knew that."

"Maybe you want to go with her," Vinnie said to me. "Since it looks like you don't have anything better to do."

"I start a new job tomorrow. I got a job at Kan Klean."

Vinnie's eyes lit up. "Do you get a discount? I got a shitload of dry cleaning."

"I wouldn't mind if you rode along," Lula said. "This guys gonna be slam barn, thank you, ma'am. And then we drop his sorry behind off at the police station and go get some burgers."

"I don't want to get involved," I told her.

"You can stay in the Firebird. It'll only take me a minute to cuff this guy and drag ... I mean, escort him out to the car.

"Okay," I said, "but I really don't want to get involved."

A half hour later we were at the public housing project on the other side of town and Lula was motoring the Firebird down Carter Street, looking for 2475A.

"Here's the plan," Lula said. "You just sit tight and I'll go get this guy. I got pepper spray, a stun gun, a head-bashing flashlight, two pairs of cuffs, and the BP in my purse."

"BP?"

"Big Persuader. That's what I call my Glock." She pulled to the curb and jerked her thumb at the apartment building. "This here's the building. I'll be back in a minute."

"Try to keep your clothes on," I said to her.

"Hunh," Lula said. "Funny."

Lula walked to the door and knocked. The door opened. Lula disappeared inside the house and the door closed behind her. I looked at my watch and decided I'd give her ten minutes. After ten minutes I'd do something, but I wasn't sure what it would be. I could call the police. I could call Vinnie. I could run around the outside of the building yelling fire! Or I could do the least appealing of all the options - I could go in after her.

I didn't have to make the decision because the front door opened after just two minutes. Lula tumbled out the door, rolled off the stoop, landed on a patch of hard packed dirt that would have been lawn in a more prosperous neighborhood, and the door slammed shut behind her. Lula scrambled to her feet, tugged her spandex lime green miniskirt back down over her ass, and marched up to the door.

"Open this door!" she yelled. "You open this door right now or there's gonna be big trouble." She tried the doorknob. She rang the bell. She kicked the door with her Via Spigas. The door didn't open. Lula turned and looked over at me. "Don't worry," she said. "This here's just a minor setback. They don't understand the severity of the situation. I slid lower in my seat and became engrossed in the mechanics of my seat belt.

"I'm giving you one more chance to open this door and then I'm going to take action," Lula yelled at the house.

The door didn't open.

"Hunh," Lula said. She backed off from the door and cut over to a front window. Curtains had been drawn across the window, but the flicker of a television screen could faintly be seen through the sheers. Lula stood on tiptoes and tried to open the window, but the window wouldn't budge. "I'm starting to get annoyed now," Lula said. "You know what I think? I think this here's an accident waiting to happen."

Lula pulled her big Maglite out of her purse, set her purse on the ground, and smashed the window with the Maglite. She bent to retrieve her purse and what remained of the window was blown out with a shotgun blast from inside.

If Lula hadn't bent down to get her purse, the surgeon of the day at St. Francis would have spent the rest of his afternoon picking pellets out of her.

"What the F!" Lula said. And Lula did a fast sprint to the car. She wrenched the drivers-side door open, crammed herself behind the wheel, and there was a second shotgun blast through the apartment window. "That dumb son of a bitch shot at me!" Lula said.

"Yeah," I said. "I saw. I was impressed you could run like that in those heels."

"I wasn't expecting him to shoot at me. He had no call to do that."

"You broke his window."

"It was an accident."

"It wasn't an accident. I saw you do it with the Maglite."

"That guy's nuts," Lula said, taking off from the curb, leaving a couple inches of rubber on the road. "He should be reported to somebody. He should be arrested."

"You were supposed to arrest him."

"I was supposed to escort him. Vinnie made that real clear. Escort him. And I could escort the hell out of him except I'm hungry. I gotta get something to eat," Lula said. "I work better on a happy stomach. I could take that woman-beating moron in anytime I want, so what's the rush, right? Might as well get a burger first, that's what I think. And anyway, he might be more Ranger's speed. I wouldn't want to step on Rangers toes. You know how Ranger likes all that shooting stuff."

"I thought you liked the shooting stuff."

"I don't want to hog it."

"Considerate of you."

"Yeah, I'm real considerate," Lula said, turning into a Cluck-in-a-Bucket drive-thru. "I'm seriously thinking of giving this case to Ranger."

"What if Ranger doesn't want it?"

"You think he'd turn down a good case like this?"

"Yeah."

"Hunh," Lula said. "Wouldn't that be a bitch?"

She got a Cluck Burger with cheese, a large side of fries, a chocolate shake, and an Apple Clucky Pie. I wasn't in a Cluck-in-a-Bucket mood so I passed.

Lula finished off the last piece of the pie and looked at her watch. "I'd go back and root out that nutso loser, but it's getting late. Don't you think it's late?"

"Almost three o'clock."

"Practically quitting time."

Especially for me, since I quit yesterday.

THREE

I'm not the world's best cook, but I have some specialties, and almost all of them include peanut butter. You can't go wrong with peanut butter. Today I was having a peanut butter and olive and potato chip sandwich for dinner.

Very efficient since it combines legumes and vegetables plus some worthless white bread carbohydrates all in one tidy package. I was standing in the kitchen, washing the sandwich down with a cold Corona, and Morelli called.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Eating."

"Why aren't you eating in my house?"

"I don't live in your house."

"You were living in my house last night."

"I was visiting your house last night. That's different from living. Living involves commitment and closet allocation."

"We don't seem to be all that good at commitment, but I'd be happy to give up a couple closets in exchange for wild gorilla sex at least five days out of seven."

"Good grief."

"Okay, four days out of seven, but that's my best offer. How's the new job at the button factory going?"

"Got fired. And it was your fault. I was late for work on my first day."

I could feel Morelli smile at the other end of the line. "Am I good, or what?"

"I got a job at Kan Klean. I start tomorrow."

"We should celebrate."

"No celebrating! That's what lost me the button factory job. Don't you want to ask me if I can get you discount cleaning?"

"I don't clean my clothes. I wear them until they fall apart and then I throw them away."

I finished the sandwich and chugged the beer. "I've got to go," I told Morelli. "I told Grandma I'd pick her up at seven. We're going to Harry Farstein's viewing at Stiva's."

"I can't compete with that," Morelli said.

Grandma was waiting at the door when I drove up. She was dressed in powder blue slacks, a matching floral-print blouse, a white cotton cardigan, and white tennis shoes. She had her big black patent-leather purse in the crook of her arm. Her gray hair was freshly set in tight little baloney curls that marched across her pink skull. Her nails were newly manicured and painted fire-engine red. Her lipstick matched her nails.

"I'm ready to go," she said, hurrying over to the car. "We don't get a move on, we're not gonna get a good seat. There's gonna be a crowd tonight and ever since Spiro took off, Stiva hasn't been all that good with organization. Spiro was a nasty little cockroach but he could organize a crowd like no one else."

Spiro was Constantine Stiva's kid. I went to school with Spiro and near the end I guess I inadvertently helped him disappear. He was a miserable excuse for a human being, involved in running guns and God knows what else. He tried to kill Grandma and me, there was a shoot-out and a spectacular fire at the funeral home, and somehow, in the confusion, Spiro vanished into thin air.

When I got the notes saying I'm back and did you think I was dead? Spiro was one of the potential psychos who came to mind. Sad to say, he was just one name among many. And he wasn't the most likely candidate. Spiro had been a lot of things . . . dumb wasn't one of them. Plus I couldn't see Spiro being obsessed with revenge. Spiro had wanted money and power.

The funeral home was on Hamilton, a couple blocks down from the bail bonds office. It had been rebuilt after the fire and was now a jumble of new brick construction and old Victorian mansion. The two-story front half of the house was white aluminum siding with black shutters. A large porch wrapped around the front and south side of the house. Some of the viewing rooms and all of the embalming rooms were located in the new brick addition at the rear. The preferred viewing rooms were in the front and Stiva had given them names: the Blue Salon, the Rest in Peace Salon, and the Executive Slumber Salon.

It was a five-minute drive from my parents' house to Stiva's. I dropped Grandma at the door and found street parking half a block away. When I got to the funeral home Grandma was waiting for me at the entrance to the Executive Slumber Salon.

"I don't know why they call this the Executive Salon," she said. "It's not like Stiva's laying a lot of executives to rest. Think it's just a big phony-baloney name."

The Executive Slumber Salon was the largest of the viewing rooms and was already packed with people. Lydia Farstein was at the far end, one hand dramatically touching the open casket. She was in her seventies and looked surprisingly happy for a woman who had just lost her husband of fifty-odd years.

"Looks like Lydia's been hitting the sauce," Grandma said. "Last time I saw her that happy was... never. I'm going back to give her my condolences and take a look at Harry."

Looking at dead people wasn't high on my list of favorite activities, so I separated from Grandma and wandered to the far side of the entrance hall, where complimentary cookies had been set out.

I scarfed down a couple sugar cookies and a couple spice cookies and I felt a prickling sensation at the back of my neck. I turned and looked across the room and saw Morelli's Grandma Bella glaring at me. Grandma Bella is a white-haired old lady who dresses in black and looks like an extra out of a Godfather flashback. She has visions, and she puts spells on people. And she scares the crap out of me.

Bitsy Mullen was standing next to me at the cookie table. "Omigod," Bitsy said. "I hope she's glaring at you and not me. Last week she put the eye on Francine Blainey, and Francine got a bunch of big herpes sores all over her face."

The eye is like Grandma Bella voodoo. She puts her finger to her eye and she mumbles something and whatever calamity happens to you after that you can pin on the eye. I guess it's a little like believing in hell. You hope it's bogus, but you never really know for sure, do you?

"I'm betting Francine got herpes from her worthless boyfriend," I said to Bitsy.

"I'm not taking any chances," Bitsy said. "I'm going to hide in the ladies' room until the viewing is over. Oh no! Omigod. Here she comes. What should I do? I can't breathe. I'm gonna faint."

"Probably she just wants a cookie," I said to Bitsy. Not that I believed it.

Grandma Bella had her beady eyes fixed on me. I'd seen the look before and it wasn't good.

"You!" Grandma Bella said, pointing her finger at me. "You broke my Joseph's heart."

"No way," I said. "Swear to God."

"Is there a ring on your finger?"

"N-N-No."

"It's a scandal," she said. "You've brought disgrace to my house. A respectable woman would be married and have children by now. You go to his house and tempt him with your body and then you leave. Shame on you. Shame. Shame. I should put the eye on you. Make your teeth fall out of your head. Turn your hair gray. Cause your female parts to shrink away until there's nothing left of them."

Grandma Mazur elbowed her way through the crush of people around the cookie table. "What's going on here?" she asked. "What'd I miss about female parts?"

"Your granddaughter is a Jezebel," Grandma Bella said. "Jumping in and out of my Joseph's bed."

"Half the women in the Burg have been in and out of his bed," Grandma Mazur said. "Heck, half the women in the state ..."

"Not lately," I said. "He's different now."

"I'm going to put the eye on her," Grandma Bella said. "I'm going to make her female parts turn to dust."

"Over my dead body," Grandma Mazur said.

Bella scrunched up her face. "That could be arranged."

"You better watch it, sister," Grandma Mazur said. "You don't want to get me mad. I'm a holy terror when I'm mad."

"Hah, you don't scare me," Bella said. "Stand back. I'm going to give the eye."

Grandma Mazur pulled a .45 long barrel out of her big black patent-leather purse and pointed it at Bella. "You put your finger to your eye and I'll put a hole in your head that's so big you could push a potato through it."

Bellas eyes rolled around in her head. "I'm having a vision. I'm having a vision."

I grabbed the gun from Grandma and shoved it back into her bag. "No shooting! She's just a crazy old lady."

Bella snapped to attention. "Crazy old lady? Crazy old lady? I'll show you crazy old lady. I'll give you a thrashing. Someone get me a stick. I'll put the eye on everyone if someone doesn't give me a stick."

"No one thrashes my granddaughter," Grandma Mazur said. "And besides, look around. Do you see any sticks? It's not like you're in the woods. You know what your problem is? You gotta learn how to chill."

Bella grabbed Grandma Mazur by the nose. She was so fast Grandma never saw it coming. "You're a demon woman!" Bella shouted.

Grandma Mazur clocked Bella on the side of the head with the big patent-leather purse, but Bella had a death grip on Grandma Mazur. Grandma hit her a second time and Bella hunkered in. Bella scrunched up her face and held tight to the nose.

I was in the mix, trying to wrestle Bella away. Grandma accidentally caught me with a roundhouse swing of the purse that knocked me off my feet.

Bitsy Mullen was jumping around, wringing her hands and shrieking. "Help! Stop! Someone do something!"

Mrs. Lubchek was behind Bitsy, at the cookie table, watching the whole thing. "Oh, for the love of God," Mrs. Lubchek said with an eyeroll. And Mrs. Lubchek grabbed the pitcher of iced tea off the cookie table and dumped it on Grandma Bella and Grandma Mazur.

Grandma Bella released Grandma Mazur's nose and looked down at herself. "I'm wet. What is this?"

"Iced tea," Mrs. Lubchek said. "I poured iced tea on you."

"I'll turn you into an artichoke."

"You need to take a pill," Mrs. Lubchek said. "You're nutsy cuckoo."

Stiva hurried across the room with Joe's mother close on his heels.

"We're out of iced tea," Mrs. Lubchek said to Stiva.

"I'm having a vision," Grandma Bella said, her eyes rolling around in her head. "I see fire. A terrible fire. I see rats escaping, running from the fire. Big, ugly, sick rats. And one of the rats has come back." Bella's eyes snapped open and focused on me. "He's come back to get you."

"Omigod," Bitsy said. "Omigod. Omigod!"

"I need to lay down now. I always get tired after I have a vision," Bella said.

"Wait," I said to her. "What kind of a vision is that? A rat? Are you sure about this vision thing?"

"Yeah, and what do you mean the rat's sick?" Grandma Mazur wanted to know.

"Does it have rabies?"

"That's all I'm going to say," Bella said. "It's a vision. A vision is a vision. I'm going home."

Bella whirled on her heel and walked to the door with her back ramrod straight and Joe's mom behind her, scurrying to keep up.

Grandma Mazur turned to the cookie tray and picked through the cookies, looking for a chocolate chip. "I tell you a person's gotta get here early or there's only leftovers."

We were both dripping iced tea. And Grandma Mazur's nose was red and swollen.

"We should go home," I said to Grandma Mazur. "I have to get out of this shirt."

"Yeah," Grandma Mazur said. "I guess I could go. I paid my respects to the deceased and this cookie tray's a big disappointment."

"Did you hear anything about Michael Barroni?"

Grandma dabbed at her shirt with a napkin. "Only that he's still missing. The boys are running the store, but Emma Wilson tells me they're not getting along.

Emma works there part-time. She said the young one is a trial."

"Anthony."

"That's the one. He was always a troublemaker. Remember there was that business with Mary Jane Roman."

"Date rape."

"Nothing ever came of that," Grandma said. "But I never doubted Mary Jane.

There was always something off about Anthony."

We'd walked out of the funeral home and down the street to the car. I looked inside the car and saw a note on the drivers seat.

"How'd that get in there?" Grandma wanted to know. "Don't you lock your car?"

"I stopped locking it. I'm hoping someone will steal it."

Grandma took a good look at the car. "That makes sense."

We both got in and I read the note, your turn to burn, bitch.

"Such language," Grandma said. "I tell you the world's going to heck in a handbasket."

Grandma was upset about the language. I was upset about the threat. I wasn't exactly sure what it meant, but it didn't feel good. It was crazy and scary.

Who was this person, anyway?

I pulled away from the curb and headed for my parents' house.

"I can't get that dumb note out of my head," Grandma said when we were half

a block from home. "I could swear I even smell smoke."

Now that she mentioned it...

I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw flames licking up the backseat. I raced the half block to my parents' house, careened into the driveway, and jerked to a stop.

"Get out," I yelled. "The backseats on fire."

Grandma turned and looked. "Danged if it isn't."

I ran into the house, told my mother to call the fire department, grabbed the fire extinguisher that was kept in the kitchen under the sink, and ran back to the car. I broke the seal on the extinguisher and sprayed the flaming backseat. My father appeared with the garden hose and between the two of us we got the fire under control.

A half hour later, the backseat of the Saturn was pronounced dead and flame free by the fire department. The fire truck rumbled away down the street, and the crowd of curious neighbors dispersed. The sun had set, but the Saturn could be seen in the ambient light from the house. Water dripped from the undercarriage and pooled on the cement driveway in grease-slicked puddles. The stench of cooked upholstery hung in the air.

Morelli had arrived seconds behind the fire truck. He was now standing in my parents' front yard with his hands in his pockets, wearing his unreadable cop face.

"So," I said to him. "What's up?"

"Where's the note?"

"What note?"

His eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

"How do you know there was a note?" I asked.

"Just another one of those feelings."

I took the note from my pocket and handed it over.

"Do you think this has something to do with the rat?" Grandma asked me.

"Remember how Bella had that vision about the fire and the rat? And she said the rat was gonna get you. Well, I bet it was the rat that wrote the note and started the fire."

"Rats can't write," I said.

"What about human rats?" Grandma wanted to know. "What about big mutant human rats?"

Morelli cut his eyes to me. "Do I want to know about this vision?"

"No," I told him. "And you also don't want to know about the fight in the funeral home between Bella and Grandma Mazur when Grandma tried to stop Bella from putting a curse on me for breaking your heart."

Morelli smiled. "I've always been her favorite."

"I didn't break your heart."

"Cupcake, you've been breaking my heart for as long as I've known you."

"How did you know about the fire?" I asked Morelli.

"Dispatch called me. They always call me when your car explodes or goes up in flames."

"I'm surprised Ranger isn't here."

"He got me on my cell. I told him you were okay."

I moved closer to the Saturn and peered inside. Most of the water and fire damage was confined to the backseat.

Morelli had his hand at the nape of my neck. "You're not thinking of driving this, are you?"

"It doesn't look so bad. It probably runs fine."

"The backseat is completely gutted and there's a big hole in the floorboard."

"Yeah, but other than that it's okay, right?"

Morelli looked at me for a couple beats. Probably trying to decide if this was worth a fight.

"It's too dark to get a really good assessment of the damage," he finally said. "Why don't we go home and come back in the morning and take another look. You don't want to drive it tonight anyway. You want to open the windows and let it air out."

He was right about the airing out part. The car reeked. And I knew he was also right about looking at the car when the light was better. Problem was, this was the only car I had. The only thing worse than driving this car would be borrowing the '53 Buick Grandma Mazur inherited from my Great Uncle Sandor.

Been there, done that, don't want to do it again.

And the danger involved in driving this car seemed to me to be hardly worth mentioning compared to the threat I was facing from the criminally insane stalker who set the fire.

"I'm more worried about the arsonist than I am about the car," I said to Morelli.

"I haven't got a grip on the arsonist," Morelli said. "I don't know what to do about him. The car I have some control over. Let me give you a ride home."

Five minutes later we were parked in front of Morelli's house.

"Let me guess," I said to Morelli. "Bob still misses me."

Morelli ran a finger along the line of my jaw. "Bob could care less. I'm the one who misses you. And I miss you bad."

"How bad?"

Morelli kissed me. "Painfully bad."

At six-fifteen I dragged myself out of Morelli's bed and into the shower.

I'd thrown my clothes in the washer and dryer the night before, and Morelli had them in the bathroom, waiting for me. I did a half-assed job of drying my hair, swiped some mascara on my lashes, and followed my nose to the kitchen, where Morelli had coffee brewing.

Both of the men in my life looked great in the morning. They woke up clear-eyed and alert, ready to save the world. I was a befuddled mess in the morning, stumbling around until I got my caffeine fix.

"We're running late," Morelli said, handing me a travel mug of coffee and a toasted bagel. "I'll drop you off at the cleaner. You can check the car out after work."

"No. I have time. This will only take a minute. I'm sure the car is fine."

"I'm sure the car isn't fine," Morelli said, nudging me out of the kitchen and down the hall to the front door. He locked the door behind us and beeped his SUV open with the remote.

Minutes later we were at my parents' house, arguing on the front lawn.

"You're not driving this car," Morelli said.

"Excuse me? Did I hear you give me an order?"

"Cut me some slack here. You and I both know this car isn't drivable."

"I don't know any such thing. Okay, it's got some problems, but they're all cosmetic. I'm sure the engine is fine." I slid behind the wheel and proved my point by rolling the engine over. "See?" I said.

"Get out of this wreck and let me drive you to work."

"No."

"In twenty seconds I'm going to drag you out and reignite the fire until there's nothing left of this death trap but a smoking cinder."

"I hate when you do the macho-man thing."

"I hate when you're stubborn."

I hit the door locks and automatic windows, put the car into reverse, and screeched out of the driveway into the road. I changed gears and roared away, gagging on the odor of wet barbecued car. He was right, of course. The car was a death trap, and I was being stubborn. Problem was, I couldn't help myself.

Morelli brought out the stubborn in me.

Kan Klean was a small mom-and-pop dry cleaners that had been operating in the Burg for as long as I can remember. The Macaroni family owned Kan Klean.

Mama Macaroni, Mario Macaroni, and Gina Macaroni were the principals, and a bunch of miscellaneous Macaronis helped out when needed.

Mama Macaroni was a contemporary of Grandma Bella and Grandma Mazur. Mama Macaroni's fierce raptor eyes took the world in under drooping folds of parchment-thin skin. Her shrunken body, wrapped in layers of black, curved over her cane and conjured up images of mummified larvae. She had a boulder of a mole set into the roadmap of her face somewhere in the vicinity of Atlanta. Three hairs grew out of the mole. The mole was horrifying and compelling. It was the dermatological equivalent of a seven-car crash with blood and guts spread all over the highway.

I'd never been to Kan Klean that Mama Macaroni wasn't sitting on a stool behind the counter. Mama nodded to customers but seldom spoke. Mama only spoke when there was a problem. Mama Macaroni was the problem solver. Her son Mario supervised the day-to-day operation. Her daughter-in-law, Gina, kept the books and ran day care for the hordes of grandchildren produced by her four daughters and two sons.

"It's not difficult," Gina said to me. "You'll be working the register. You take the clothes from the customer and you do a count. Then you fill out the order form and give a copy to the customer. You put a copy in the bag with the clothes and you put the third copy in the box by the register. Then you put the bag in one of the rolling bins. One bin is laundry and one bin is dry cleaning. That's the way we do it. When a customer comes in to pick up his cleaned clothes you search for the clothes by the number on the top of his receipt. Make sure you always take a count so the customer gets all his clothes."

Mama Macaroni mumbled something in Italian and slid her dentures around in her mouth.

"Mama says you should be careful. She says she's keeping her eye on you," Gina said.

I smiled at Mama Macaroni and gave her a thumbs-up. Mama Macaroni responded with a death glare.

"When you have time between customers you can tag the clothes," Gina said.

"Every single garment must get tagged. We have a machine that you use, and you have to make sure that the number on the tag is the same as the number on the customer's receipt."

By noon I'd completely lost the use of my right thumb from using the tagging machine.

"You got to go faster," Mama Macaroni said to me from her stool. "I see you slow down. You think we pay for nothing?"

A man hurried through the front door and approached the counter. He was mid-forties and dressed in a suit and tie. "I picked my dry cleaning up yesterday," he said, "and all the buttons are broken off my shirt."

Mama Macaroni got off her stool and caned her way to the counter. "What?" she said.

"The buttons are broken."

She shook her head. "I no understand."

He showed her the shirt. "The buttons are all broken."

"Yes," Mama Macaroni said.

"You broke them."

"No," Mama said. "Impossible."

"The buttons were fine when I brought the shirt in. I picked the shirt up and the buttons were all broken."

"I no understand."

"What don't you understand?"

"English. My English no good."

The man looked at me. "Do you speak English?"

"What?" I said.

The man whipped the shirt off the counter and left the store.

"Maybe you not so slow," Mama Macaroni said to me. "But don't get any ideas about taking it easy. We don't pay you good money to stand around doing nothing."

I started watching the clock at one o'clock. By three o'clock I was sure I'd been tagging clothes for at least five days without a break. My thumb was throbbing, my feet ached from standing for eight hours, and I had a nervous twitch in my eye from Mama Macaroni's constant scrutiny.

I took my bag from under the counter and I looked over at Mama Macaroni.

"See you tomorrow."

"What you mean, see you tomorrow? Where you think you going?" "Home. It's three o'clock. My shift is over."

"Look at little miss clock watcher here. Three o'clock on the dot. Bing. The bell rings and you out the door." She threw her parchment hands into the air.

"Go! Go home. Who needs you? And don't be late tomorrow. Sunday is big day.

We the only cleaner open on Sunday."

"Okay," I said. "And have a nice mole." Shit! Did I just say that? "Have a nice day!" I yelled. Crap.

I'd parked the Saturn in the small lot adjacent to Kan Klean. I left the building and circled the car. I didn't see any notes. I didn't smell anything burning.

No one shot at me. Guess my stalker was taking a day off.

I got into the car, turned my cell phone on, and scrolled to messages.

First message. "Stephanie." That was the whole message. It was from Morelli at seven-ten this morning. It sounded like it had been said through clenched teeth.

Second message. Morelli breathing at seven-thirty.

Third message. "Call me when you turn your phone on." Morelli again.

Fourth message. "It's two-thirty and we just found Barroni's car. Call me."

Barroni's car! I dialed in Joe's cell number.

"It's me," I said. "I just got off work. I had to turn my phone off because Mama Macaroni said it was giving her brain cancer. Not that it would matter."

"Where are you?"

"I'm on the road. I'm going home to take a nap. I'm all done in."

The car . . .

"The car is okay," I told Morelli.

"The car is not okay."

"Give up on the car. What about Barroni?"

"I lied about Barroni. I figured that was the only way you'd call."

I put my finger to my eye to stop the twitching, disconnected Morelli, and cruised into my lot.

Old Mr. Ginzler was walking to his Buick when I pulled in. "That's some lookin' car you got there, chicky," Mr. Ginzler said. "And it stinks."

"I paid extra for the smell," I told Mr. Ginzler.

"Smart-ass kid," Mr. Ginzler said. But he smiled when he said it. Mr. Ginzler liked me. I was almost sure of it.

Rex was snoozing in his soup can when I let myself into my apartment. There were no messages on my machine. Most people called my cell these days. Even my mother called my cell. I shuffled into the bedroom, kicked my shoes off, and crawled under the covers. The best I could say about today was that it was marginally better than yesterday. At least I hadn't gotten fired.

Problem was, it was hard to tell if not getting fired from Kan Klean was a good thing or a bad thing. I closed my eyes and willed myself to sleep, telling myself when I woke up my life would be great. Okay, it was sort of a fib, but it kept me from bursting into tears or smashing all my dishes.

A couple hours later I was still awake and I was thinking less about breaking something and more about eating something. I strolled out to the kitchen and took stock. I could construct another peanut butter sandwich. I could mooch dinner off my mother. I could take myself off to search for fast food. The last two choices meant I'd have to get back into the Saturn. Not an appealing prospect, but still better than another peanut butter sandwich.

I laced up my sneakers, ran a brush through my hair, and applied lip gloss.

The natural look. Acceptable in Jersey only if you've had your boobs enhanced to the point where no one looked beyond them. I hadn't had my boobs enhanced, and most people found it easy to look beyond them, but I didn't care a whole lot today.

I took the stairs debating the merits of a chicken quesadilla against the satisfaction of a dozen doughnuts. I was still undecided when I pushed through the lobby door and crossed the lot to my car. Turns out it wasn't a decision I needed to make because my car was wearing a police boot.

I ripped my cell phone out of my bag and punched in Morelli's number.

"There's a police boot on my car," I said to him. "Did you put it on?"

"Not personally."

"I want it off."

"I'm crimes against persons. I'm not traffic."

"Fine. I want to report a crime against a person. Some jerk booted my car."

Morelli blew out a sigh and disconnected.

I dialed Ranger. "I have a problem," I said to Ranger.

"And?"

"I was hoping you could solve it."

"Give me a hint."

"My car's been booted."

"And?"

"I need to get the boot off."

"Anything else?"

"I could use some doughnuts. I haven't had dinner."

"Where are you?"

"My apartment."

"Babe," Ranger said, and the connection went dead.

Ten minutes later, Rangers Porsche rolled to a stop next to the Saturn.

Ranger got out and handed me a bag. Ranger was in his usual black. Black

T-shirt that looked like it was painted onto his biceps and clung to his washboard stomach. Black cargo pants that had lots of pockets for Rangers goodies, although clearly not all his goodies were relegated to the pockets.

His hair was medium cut and silky straight, falling across his forehead.

"Doughnuts?" I asked.

"Turkey club. Doughnuts will kill you."

"And?"

Ranger almost smiled at me. "If I had to drive this Saturn I'd want to die, too."

FOUR

"Can you get the boot off?" I asked Ranger.

Ranger toed the big chunk of metal that was wrapped around my tire. "Tank's on his way with the equipment. How'd you manage to get booted in the lot?"

"Morelli. He thinks the car's unsafe."

"And?"

"Okay, so it's got some cosmetic problems."

"Babe, it's got a twelve-inch hole in the floor."

"Yeah, but the hole's in the back and I can't even see it when I'm in the front. And if I leave the back windows open the fumes get sucked out before they get to me."

"Good to know you've thought this through."

"Are you laughing at me?"

"Do I look like I'm laughing?"

"I thought I saw your mouth twitch."

"How'd this happen?"

I took the turkey club out of the bag and unwrapped it. "It was the note guy. I took Grandma to a viewing at Stivas, and when we left, there was a note in the car. It said it was my turn to burn . . . and then the backseat caught fire on the way to my parents' house." I took a bite of the sandwich.

"I have a feeling about the note guy. I think the note guy is Stiva's kid. Spiro. Joe's Grandma Bella told me she had a vision about rats running away from a fire. And one of the rats was sick and it came back to get me."

"And you think that rat is Spiro?"

"Do you remember Spiro? Beady rat eyes. No chin. Bad overbite. Mousy brown hair."

"Bella's a little crazy, Babe."

I finished the turkey club. "A guy named Michael Barroni disappeared ten days ago. Sixty-two years old. Upstanding citizen. Had a house on Roebling. Owned the hardware store on Rudd and Liberty. Locked the store up at the end of the day and disappeared off the face of the earth. Morelli punched Barroni into missing persons and found there were two other similar cases. Benny Gorman and Louis Lazar. Connie said you're looking for Gorman."

"Yeah, and he feels like a dead end."

"Maybe it's a dead end because he's dead."

"Its crossed my mind."

I crumpled the sandwich bag and tossed it into the back of the Saturn. It bounced off the charred backseat and fell through the hole in the floor, onto the pavement, under the car.

Ranger gave a single, barely visible shake to his head. Hard to tell if he was amused or if he was appalled.

"Did you know Barroni?" Ranger asked me.

"I went to school with his youngest son, Anthony. Here's the thing about Michael Barroni. There's no obvious reason why he disappeared. No gambling debts. No drinking or drug problems. No health problems. No secret sex life.

He just locked up the store, got into his car, and drove off into the sunset. He did this on the same day and at the same time Lazar and Gorman drove off into the sunset. It was like they were all going to a meeting."

"I made the Lazar connection," Ranger said. "I didn't know there was a third."

"That's because you're the Stark Street expert and I'm the Burg expert."

"You handed your cuffs and fake badge over to Connie," Ranger said. "Why the interest in Barroni and Lazar and Gorman?"

"In the beginning, Barroni was just Burg gossip and cop talk. Now I'm thinking Spiro's gone psycho and he's back in town and stalking me. And Barroni might be connected to Spiro. I know that sounds like a stretch, but Spiro makes bad things happen. And he drags his friends into the muck with him. All through school, Spiro hung out with Anthony Barroni. Suppose Spiro's back and he's got something bad going on. Suppose Anthony's involved and somehow his dad got in the way."

"That's a lot of supposing. Have you talked to Morelli about this?"

"No. I'm not talking to Morelli about anything. He booted my car. I'm doing all my talking to you."

"His loss is my gain?"

"This is your lucky day," I said to Ranger.

Ranger curled his fingers into the front of my jean jacket and pulled me close. "How much luck are we talking about?"

"Not that much luck."

Ranger brushed a light kiss over my lips. "Someday," he said.

And he was probably right. Ranger and I have a strange relationship. He's my mentor and protector and friend. He's also hot and mysterious and oozes testosterone.

A while ago, he was my lover for a single spectacular night. We both walked away wanting more, but to date, my practical Burg upbringing plus strong survival instincts have kept Ranger out of my bed. This is in direct contrast to Rangers instincts. His instincts run more to keeping his eye on the prize while he enjoys the chase and waits for his chance to move in for the kill. He is, after all, a hunter of men... and women.

Ranger released my jacket. "I'm going to take a look at Barroni's house and store. Do you want to ride along?"

"Okay, but it's just to keep you company. It's not like I'm involved. I'm done with all that fugitive apprehension stuff."

"Still my lucky day," Ranger said.

My apartment is only a couple miles from the store, but it was after six by the time we got to Rudd and Liberty, and the store was closed. We cruised past the front, turned the corner, and took the service road at the rear.

Ranger drove the Porsche down the road and paused at Barroni's back door.

There was a black Corvette parked in the small lot.

"Someone's working late," Ranger said. "Do you know the car?"

"No, but I'm guessing it belongs to Anthony. His two older brothers are married and have kids, and I can't see them finding money for a toy like this."

Ranger continued on, turned the corner, and pulled to the curb. There'd been heavy cloud cover all day and now it was drizzling. Streetlights stood out in the gloom and red brake lights traced across Ranger's rain-streaked windshield.

After five minutes, the Corvette rolled past us with Anthony driving. Ranger put the Porsche in gear and followed Anthony at a distance. Anthony wandered through the Burg and stopped at Pino's Pizza. He was inside Pino's for a couple minutes and returned to his car carrying two large pizza boxes. He found his way to Hamilton Avenue, crossed Hamilton, and after two blocks he pulled into a driveway that belonged to a two-story town house. The town house had an attached garage, but Anthony didn't use it. Anthony parked in the driveway and hustled to the small front porch. He fumbled with his keys, got the door open, and rushed inside.

"That's a lot of pizza for a single guy," Ranger said. "And he has something occupying space in his garage. It's raining, and he has his hands full of pizza boxes, and he parked in the driveway."

"Maybe Spiro's in there. Maybe he's got his car parked in Anthonys garage."

"I can see that possibility turns you on," Ranger said.

"It would be nice to find Spiro and put an end to the harassment."

Shades were drawn on all the windows. Ranger idled for a few minutes in front of the town house and moved on. He retraced the route to the hardware store and had me take him from the store to Michael Barroni's house on Roebling.

It was a large house by Burg standards. Maybe two thousand square feet. Upstairs and downstairs. Detached garage. The front of the house was gray fake stone. The other three sides were white vinyl siding. It had a full front porch and a postage-stamp front yard. There was a plaster statue of the Virgin Mary in the front yard. A small basket of plastic flowers had been placed at her feet. Shades were up in the Barroni house and it was easy to look from one end to the other. A lone woman moved in the house. Carla Barroni, Michael Barroni's wife. She settled herself in front of the television in the living room and lost herself to the evening news. I was spellbound, watching Carla. "It must be awful not to know," I said to Ranger. "To have someone you love disappear. Not to know if he was murdered and buried in a shallow grave, or if you drove him away, or if he was sick and couldn't find his way home. It makes my problems seem trivial."

"Being on the receiving end of threatening letters isn't trivial," Ranger said.

Everything's relative, I thought. The threatening letters weren't nearly as frightening as the prospect of spending another eight hours with Mama-the-Mole Macaroni. And the problems I was thinking about were personal.

My life had no clear direction. My goals were small and immediate. Pay the rent. Get a better car. Make a dinner decision. I didn't have a career. I didn't have a husband. I didn't have any special talents. I didn't have a consuming passion. I didn't have a hobby. Even my pet was small... a hamster. I liked Rex a lot, but he didn't exactly make a big statement.

Ranger broke into my moment. "Babe, I get the feeling you're standing on a ledge, looking down."

"Just thinking."

Ranger put the Porsche into gear and headed across town. We checked out Louis Lazar's house and bar. Then we went four blocks north on Stark and parked in front of Gorman's garage. The garage was dark. No sign of life inside. A CLOSED sign hung on the office door.

"Gorman's manager kept the garage going for a week on his own and then cut out," Ranger said. "Gorman isn't married. He was living with a woman, but she has no claim to his property. He has a pack of kids, all with different mothers. The kids are too young to run the business. The rest of Gorman's relatives are in South Carolina. I did a South Carolina search, and it came back negative. From what I can tell the business was operating in the black. Gorman had a mean streak, but he wasn't stupid. He would have made arrangements to keep the garage running if he was going FTA. I can't see him just walking away. Usually I pick up a vibe from someone . . . mother, girlfriend, coworker. I'm not getting anything on this."

We cut back two blocks and parked in front of a rundown apartment building.

"This was Gorman's last known address," Ranger said. "His girlfriend didn't wait as long as his manager. The girlfriend had a new guy hanging his clothes in her closet on day five. If she knew Gorman's location, she'd have given him up for a pass to the multiplex."

"No one saw him after he drove away from the garage?"

Ranger watched the building. "No. All I know is he drove north on Stark. Consistent with Lazar."

North on Stark didn't mean much. Stark Street deteriorated as it went north. Eventually Stark got so bad even the gangs abandoned it. At the very edge of the city line Stark was a deserted war zone of fire-gutted brick buildings with boarded-up windows. It was a graveyard for stolen, stripped-down cars and used-up heroin addicts. It was a do-it-yourself garbage dump. North on Stark also led to Route 1 and Route 1 led to the entire rest of the country. Rangers pager buzzed, he checked the message, and pulled away from the curb, into the stream of traffic. Ranger is hot, but he has a few personality quirks that drive me nuts. He doesn't eat dessert, he has an overdeveloped sense of secret, and unless he's trying to seduce me or instruct me in the finer points of bounty huntering, conversation can be nonexistent.

"Hey," I finally said, "Man of Mystery... what's with the pager?"

"Business."

"And?"

Ranger slid a glance my way.

"It's no wonder you aren't married," I said to him. "You have a lot to learn about social skills."

Ranger smiled at me. Ranger thought I was amusing.

"That was my office," Ranger said. "Elroy Dish went FTA two days ago. I've been waiting for him to show up at Blue Fish, and he just walked in."

Vinnie's bonded out three generations of Dishes. Elroy is the youngest. His specialties are armed robbery and domestic violence, but Elroy is capable of most anything.

When Elroy's drunk or drugged he's fearless and wicked crazy. When he's clean and sober he's just plain mean.

Blue Fish is a bar on lower Stark, dead center in Dish country. No point to breaking down a door and attempting to drag a Dish out of his rat-trap apartment when you can just wait for him to waltz into Blue Fish for a cold one.

Ranger brought the Porsche to the curb two doors from Blue Fish, cut the motor and the lights. Three minutes later, a black SUV rolled down the street and parked in front of us. Tank and Hal, dressed in Rangeman black, got out of the SUV and strapped on utility belts. Tank is Ranger's shadow. He watches Ranger's back, and he's second in the line of command at Rangeman. His name is self-explanatory. Hal is newer to the game. He's not the sharpest tack on the corkboard, but he tries hard. He's just slightly smaller than Tank and reminds me of a big lumbering dinosaur. He's a Halosaurus.

Ranger reached behind him and grabbed a flak vest from the small backseat.

"Stay here," he said. "This will only take a couple minutes and then I'll drive you home."

Ranger angled out of the Porsche, nodded to Tank and Hal, and the three of them disappeared inside Blue Fish. I checked my watch, and I stared at the door to the bar. Ranger didn't waste time when he made an apprehension. He identified his quarry, clapped the cuffs on, and turned the guy over to Tank and Hal for the forced march to the SUV.

I was feeling a little left out, but I was telling myself it was much better this way. No more danger. No more mess. No more embarrassing screw-ups. I was focused on the door to the bar, not paying a lot of attention to the street, and suddenly the drivers-side door to the Porsche was wrenched open and a guy slid in next to me. He was in his twenties, wearing a ball cap sideways and about sixty pounds of gold chains around his neck. He had a diamond chip implanted into his front tooth and the two teeth next to the chip were missing. He smiled at me and pressed the barrel of a gleamingsilver-plated monster gun into my temple.

"Yo bitch," he said. "How about you get your ass out of my car."

In my mind I saw myself out of the car and running, but the reality of the situation was that all systems were down. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't move.

I couldn't speak. I stared openmouthed and glassy-eyed at the guy with the diamond dental chip. Somewhere deep in my brain the word carjack was struggling to rise to the surface.

Diamond dental chip turned the key in the Porsche's ignition and revved the engine. "Out of the car," he yelled, pushing the gun barrel against my head.

"I'm giving you one second and then I'm gonna blow your brains all over this motherfucker. Now get your fat ass out of the car."

The mind works in weird ways, and it's strange how something dumb can push a button. I was willing to overlook the use of the MF word, but getting called a fat ass really pissed me off.

"Fat ass?" I said, feeling my eyes narrow. "Excuse me? Fat ass?"

"I haven't got time for this shit," he said. And he rammed the car into gear, mashed the gas to the floor, and the Porsche jumped away from the curb.

He was driving with his left hand and holding the gun and shifting with his right. There was light traffic on Stark, and he was weaving around cars and running lights. He came up fast behind a Lincoln Navigator and hit the brake hard. He moved to shift, and I knocked the gun out of his hand. The gun hit the console and fell to the floor on the drivers side.

"Fuck," he said. "Fucking fuck. Fucking bitch."

He leaned forward and reached for the gun, and I punched him in the ear as hard as I could. His head bounced off the wheel, the wheel jerked hard to the left, and we cut across oncoming traffic. The Porsche jumped the curb, plowed through a stack of black plastic garbage bags, and crashed through the plate glass window of a small delicatessen that was closed for the night.

The front airbags inflated with a bang, and I was momentarily stunned. I fought my way through the bag, somehow got the door open, and rolled out onto the deli floor. I was on my hands and knees in the dark, and it was wet under my hand. Blood, I thought. Get outside and get help.

A leg came into my field of vision. Black cargo pants, black boots. Hands under my armpits, lifting me to my feet. And then I was face-to-face with Ranger.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I must be bleeding. The floor was wet and sticky."

He looked at my hand. "I don't see any blood on you." He put my hand to his mouth and touched his tongue to my palm, giving me a rush that went from my toes to the roots of my hair. "Dill," he said. He looked beyond me, to the crumpled hood of the Porsche.

"You crashed into the counter and smashed the pickle barrel."

"I'm sorry about your Porsche."

"I can replace the Porsche. I can't replace you. You need to be more careful."

"I was just sitting in your car!"

"Babe, you're a magnet for disaster."

Tank had the carjacker in cuffs. He shoved him across the floor to the door, the carjacker slid in the pickle juice and went down to one knee, and I heard Tank's boot connect with solid body. "Accident," Tank said. "Didn't see you down there in the dark." And then he yanked the carjacker to his feet and threw him into a wall. "Another accident," Tank said, grabbing the carjacker, jerking him to his feet again.

Ranger cut his eyes to Tank. "Stop playing with him."

Tank grinned at Ranger and dragged the carjacker out to the SUV.

We followed Tank out, and Ranger looked at me under the streetlight. "You're a mess," he said, picking noodles and wilted lettuce out of my hair. "You're covered in garbage again."

"We hit the bags on the curb on the way into the store. And I guess we dragged some of it with us. I probably rolled in it when I fell out of the car."

A smile hung at the corners of Rangers mouth. "I can always count on you to brighten my day."

A shiny black Ford truck angled to a stop in front of us, and one of Ranger's men got out and handed Ranger the keys. I could see a police car turn onto Stark, two blocks away.

"Tank and Hal and Woody can take care of this," Ranger said. "We can leave."

"You have a guy named Woody?"

Ranger opened the passenger-side door to the truck for me. "Do you want me to explain it?"

"Not necessary."

I was in the Saturn, parked next to Kan Klean. It was Sunday. It was the start of a new day, it was one minute to seven, and Morelli was on my cell.

"I'm in your lot," he said. "I stopped by to take you to work. Where are you? And where's your car?"

"I'm at Kan Klean. I drove."

"What happened to the boot?"

"I don't know. It disappeared."

There was a full sixty seconds of silence while I knew Morelli was doing deep breathing, working at not getting nuts. I looked at my watch, and my stomach clenched.

Mama Macaroni appeared at car side and stuck her face in my open window, her monster mole just inches from my face, her demon eyes narrowed, her thin lips drawn tight against her dentures.

"What you doing out here?" Mama yelled. "You think we pay for talking on the phone? We got work to do. You kids . . . you think you get money for doing nothing."

"Jesus," Morelli said. "What the hell is that?"

"Mama Macaroni."

"She has a voice like fingernails on a chalkboard."

I needed a pill really bad. It was noon and I had a fireball behind my right eye and Mama Macaroni screeching into my left ear.

"The pink tag's for dry cleaning and the green tag's for laundry," Mama shrieked at me. "You mixing them up. You make a mess of everything. You ruin our business. We gonna be out on the street."

The tinkle bell attached to the front door jangled, and I looked up to see Lula walk in.

"Hey, girlfriend," Lula said to me. "What's shakin'? What's hangin'? What's the word?"

Lula's hair was gold today and styled in ringlets, like Shirley Temple at age five. Lula was wearing black high-heeled ankle boots, a tight orange spandex skirt that came to about three inches below her ass, and a matching orange top that was stretched tight across her boobs and belly. And Lula's belly was about as big as her boobs.

"What word?" Mama Macaroni asked. "Wadda you mean word? Who is this big orange person?"

"This is my friend Lula," I said.

"You friend? No. No friends. Wadda you think, this is a party?"

"Hey, chill," Lula said to Mama. "I came to pick up my dry cleaning. I'm a legitimate customer."

I had the merry-go-round in motion, looking for Lula's cleaning. The motor whirred, and plastic-sleeved, hangered orders swished by me, carried along on an overhead system of tracks.

"I'll take Vinnie's and Connie's too," Lula said.

Mama was off her stool. "You no take anything until I say so. Let me see the slip. Where's the slip?"

I had Lula's cleaning in hand and Mama stepped in front of me. "What's this on the slip? What's this discount?"

"You said I got a discount," I told her, trying hard not to stare at the mole, not having a lot of luck at it.

"You get a discount. This big pumpkin don't get no discount."

"Hey, hold on here," Lula said, lower lip stuck out, hands on hips. "Who you calling a pumpkin?"

"I'm calling you a pumpkin," Mama Macaroni said. "Look at you. You a big fat pumpkin. And you don't get no pumpkin discount." Mama turned on me. "You try to pull a fast one. Give everybody a discount. Like we run a charity here. A charity for pumpkins. Maybe you get the kickback. You think you make some money on the side."

"I don't like to disrespect old people," Lula said. "And you're about as old as they get. You're as old as dirt, but that don't mean you can insult my friend. I don't put up with that. I don't take that bus. You see what I'm saying?"

The pain was radiating out from my eye into all parts of my head, and little men in pointy hats and spiky shoes were running around in my stomach. I had to get Lula out of the store. If Mama Macaroni called Lula a pumpkin one more time, Lula was going to squash Mama Macaroni, and Mama Macaroni was going to be Mama Pancake.

I shoved Lula's clothes at her, but Mama got to them first. "Gimme those clothes," Mama said. "She can't have them until she pays full price. Maybe I don't give them to her at all. Maybe I keep them for evidence that you steal from us."

"Well okay, now that I think about it, probably you're fired," Lula said.

"It was a nasty job anyway. You had to look at that mole all day. And I'm sorry, that's no normal mole."

"It's the mole from hell."

"Friggin' A," Lula said. "And you shouldn't worry about getting another job. You could get a better job than that. You could even get a job here. Look at the sign by the register. It says they're hiring. And there'd be advantages to working here. I bet you get free chicken and fries." Lula went back to the counter. "We want to see the manager," she said. "My friend's interested in having a job here. I'm not interested myself because I'm a kick-ass bounty hunter, but Stephanie over there just got unemployed."

I had Lula by the arm, and I was trying to drag her away from the counter.

"No!" I whispered to Lula. "I don't want to work here. I'd have to wear one of those awful uniforms."

"Yeah, but you wouldn't ruin any of your real clothes that way," Lula said.

"Probably you get a lot of grease stains here. And I don't think the uniform's so bad. Besides, your skinny little ass makes everything look good."

"The hat!"

"Okay, I see what you're saying about the hat. Suppose the hat had an accident? Suppose the hat fell into the french fry machine first thing? I bet it would take days to get a new hat."

A little guy came up behind me. He was half a head shorter than me, and he looked like a chubby pink pig in pants. His cheeks were round and pink. His hands were pink sausages. His belly jiggled when he moved. His mouth was round and his lips were pink . . . and best not to think about the pig part the mouth most resembled, but it could be found under the curly pig tail.

"I'm the manager," he said. "Milton Mann."

"This here's Stephanie Plum," Lula said. "She's looking for a job."

"Minimum wage," Mann said. "We need someone for the three-to-eleven shift."

"How about food?" Lula wanted to know. "Does she eat free? And what about takeout?"