Smokin Seventeen

TWENTY-TWO

MERLIN’S CAR WAS PARKED in the lot to his apartment building.

“We got some good news, and we got some bad news, and it’s all the same news,” Lula said. “Looks like Merlin’s home. Now what?”

“We go talk to him.”

“Say what?”

I cut the engine and grabbed my shoulder bag. “We aren’t having any luck wrestling him to the ground, so I thought I’d talk to him.”

I crossed the lot with Lula trailing after me. We took the stairs to Merlin’s apartment, and I knocked on the door.

Merlin answered on the second knock. He was naked again, and he had a boner.

Lula checked Merlin out. “Must be that time of day.”

“I was hoping we could talk,” I said to Merlin.

“Now?”

“Yes.”

He gestured to his wanger. “I don’t suppose you could help me out with this.”

“No,” I said. “Not even a little.”

He looked at Lula. “How about you?”

“I don’t do that no more,” Lula said. “I gotta be in love now. In the meantime I’d appreciate it if you’d put it away on account of it’s distracting waving around like that.”

Merlin looked down at himself. “It kind of has a mind of its own.”

“Well take it into the bathroom and talk to it,” Lula said. “It’s not like we got all day.”

Merlin sighed and shuffled off to the bathroom.

“Sometimes it’s good to have an ex-hooker for a partner,” I said to Lula.

“You bet your ass. How are the panties working for you? You feel any twinges lookin’ at Merlin’s big boy?”

“No. Did you?”

“I felt something, but I’m not sure what it was. It’s kinda like lookin’ at a train wreck. Horrible but fascinating all at the same time.”

There was a lot of grunting coming from the bathroom. “Oh yeah,” Merlin said, behind the closed door. “Give it to me. Do it. Do it.” Slap! “Do it again, bitch.” Slap! And then more grunting. “Unh, unh, unh.”

I shifted foot to foot and gripped my purse strap. “I’m feeling uncomfortable.”

“Yeah,” Lula said. “I can’t tell if he’s whackin’ off or he needs more fiber in his diet.”

“That’s it. I’m out of here.” I whirled around and bolted for the door. “I’ll talk to him on the phone. I’ll send him an email.”

We hustled out of the building, rammed ourselves into the Escort, and I laid rubber out of the lot.

“I either need something to eat, or I’ve gotta take a shower,” Lula said. “That wasn’t an uplifting experience.”

• • •

I made an emergency run at a Dunkin’ Donuts drive-thru. We got twelve donuts divided up into two bags, so we wouldn’t fight over them, and we sat in the parking lot, and we ate our doughnuts.

“Okay, I feel better,” Lula said.

“Me, too, except I might throw up.”

“You’re out of shape. You don’t eat enough doughnuts. I feel fine because I’m in condition. I could put just about anything in my body, and it only says oh boy, here we go again.”

A text message from Dave buzzed onto my phone. DID YOU GET MY SURPRISE? MORE TO COME.

Oh joy.

“Bad news?” Lula asked.

“I think Dave is turning into a stalker.” If it wasn’t for Juki Beck and the note I would have thought Dave was a more serious problem. As it was, he got back-burnered as a minor irritation. I powered my window down to get some air. “I’ve been thinking about Boris Belman.”

“The bear guy?”

“He can’t remember shooting the bartender. And he said it wasn’t his gun. He didn’t know where the gun came from.”

“This is our problem, why?”

“The only way I could get Belmen to show up for court was to promise I’d take care of the bear if he got convicted.”

“People in your apartment building aren’t gonna be happy about you having a bear. Probably you could shave him and dress him up in clothes except you might get arrested when he drops his pants to poop in the parking lot.”

“If I could prove Belmen didn’t shoot the bartender I’d be off the hook.”

“Proving people innocent isn’t our specialty,” Lula said.

I’d hate to list our specialties. Wreck cars, eat doughnuts, create mayhem.

I pulled Belmen’s file out of my bag and read through the police report. “The shooting took place at Bumpers Bar and Grill on Broad.”

“I’ve been there,” Lula said. “That’s a real nice bar. They got crab cake sliders and about seven hundred kinds of beer. I was there once with Tank when we were seeing each other.”

I drove the length of Stark and turned onto Broad. Bumpers was a couple blocks down, set into an area of mostly office buildings. I parked half a block away, and Lula and I got out of the car. Something compelled me to look across the street, and standing there, staring at me, was the ghost of Jimmy Alpha.

Alpha was the manager of a boxer named Benito Ramirez. I’d killed Alpha in self-defense a bunch of years ago. I was a novice bounty hunter, way over my head in bad guys, and in a moment of sheer terror and blind panic I’d managed to shoot Alpha before he shot me.

And now here he was glaring at me from across the street. He made a sign with his fingers to his eyes, letting me know he saw me and recognized me. And then he walked away and disappeared around the corner.

“Did you see him?” I asked Lula.

“Who?”

“It was a man who looked like Jimmy Alpha.”

“You killed Alpha.”

“I did. But this man looked like him.”