Janet Evanovich - Motor Mouth

I pulled my gloves off and peeled myself out of the jumpsuit. Hooker snapped the leash on Beans and we locked up and loaded ourselves into the SUV. It was a couple blocks to a bunch of coffee houses and small restaurants on Calle Ocho. Hooker chose a restaurant that advertised breakfast and had a shaded parking lot attached. We cracked the window for Beans and told him to hang tight and promised to bring him a muffin.

It was a medium-size restaurant with booths against the wall and tables in the middle of the floor. No breakfast bar. Lots of signed photographs on the wall of people I didn’t recognize. Most of the booths were filled. The tables were empty. Hooker and I slid into one of the two empty booths, and Hooker studied the menu.

“Do you think the fact that Oscar was shot while naked and flying his colors would suggest angry husband?” I asked Hooker.

“It’s possible. What I don’t get is the shrink-wrap, hide him in the hauler, and ship him to Mexico thing. Wouldn’t it have been easier and safer to dump him in the ocean? Or turn him over to an undertaker for transport? Why would someone want to smuggle him across the border?”

The waitress brought coffee and gave Hooker the once-over. Even if you didn’t recognize Hooker, he was worth a second look. Hooker ordered eggs, sausage, a short stack of pancakes with extra syrup, home fries, a blueberry muffin for Beans, and juice. I stayed with my coffee. I figured I wasn’t going to look great in prison clothes. Best not to compound it by getting fat.

Hooker had his cell phone in his hand. “I have a friend who works for Huevo. He should be at the shop by now. I want to see what the guys know.”

Five minutes later, Hooker disconnected and the waitress showed up with his food. She gave him extra syrup, a complimentary second muffin, more juice, and she topped off his coffee.

“I’d like more coffee,” I said.

“Sure,” she said. “Let me get a fresh pot.” And she left.

I looked over at Hooker. “She’s not coming back.”

“Darlin’, you’ve gotta have more faith in people. Of course she’ll come back.”

“Yeah, she’ll come back when your coffee cup is empty.”

Hooker dug into his eggs. “Butch says everyone’s in shock over Oscar Huevo. He said a lot of people weren’t all that surprised to hear Huevo was shot, but everyone’s having a cow over the shrink-wrap and the biting thing. Butch said half the garage thinks it’s the work of a werewolf, and the other half thinks it’s a contract hit. And the half that thinks it’s a hit thinks it was bought by Huevo’s wife. Apparently Huevo was getting ready to trade up, and Mrs. Huevo was mucho unhappy with Mr. Huevo.”

I looked into my coffee cup. Empty. I looked for our waitress. Nowhere to be seen.

“Anything about the hauler?” I asked Hooker.

“No. Apparently word hasn’t gotten out that the hauler’s missing.”

I saw the waitress appear on the other side of the room but couldn’t catch her attention.

“NASCAR has to know,” I said to Hooker. “They track those haulers. They’d know when it went off their screen.”

Hooker shrugged. “Season’s over. Maybe they weren’t paying attention. Or maybe the driver called in and said the GPS was broken so NASCAR wouldn’t get involved.”

I clanked my teaspoon on my coffee cup and waved my hand at the waitress, but she had her back to me and didn’t turn around.

“Darlin’, that’s just so sad,” Hooker said, trading coffee cups with me.

I took a sip of coffee. “There are some worried people out there. They’re scrambling to find the hauler, and they’re going to want to find the idiots who stole it because those idiots know Huevo was stuffed into the locker.”

“Good thing we’re the only ones who know we’re the idiots,” Hooker said.

The waitress stopped at our table and filled Hooker’s empty cup. “Anything else, sweetheart?” she asked Hooker. “Everything okay with your breakfast?”

“Everything’s great,” Hooker said. “Thanks.”

She turned and sashayed off, and I gave Hooker a raised eyebrow.

“Sometimes it’s good to be me,” Hooker said, finishing his pancakes.

“So we’re sticking to our plan to check out the car and leave the hauler on the side of the road somewhere.”

“Yeah, except I don’t know what to do about Gobbles. No one knows we’re involved, so we can go home and get on with our lives. Gobbles has a major problem. Gobbles’s life expectancy isn’t good. I have no idea how to fix that.”

Hooker signaled for the check, and the waitress hustled over with it. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like another cup of coffee?” she asked Hooker.

“No,” Hooker said. “We’re good.”

“I hope she gets a melanoma,” I said to Hooker.

Hooker pulled out a wad of cash and left it on the table with the check. “Let’s roll. I need clothes. We’re going to take ten minutes out to shop.”

Miami weather is gorgeous in November, as long as there’s not a hurricane blowing through. It was shirt-sleeve, ride-with-the-top-down weather. Bright sun and no clouds.

The top didn’t go down on the SUV, but we opened the windows and tuned the radio to salsa music. We were relatively mellow, all things considered. Beans was happy with his muffin. Hooker took off in search of a mall, and Beans stuck his head out the driver’s-side back window and his tail out the window on the opposite side of the car. His soft, floppy Saint Bernard ears flapped in the wind, and his big loose Saint Bernard lips ruffled as they caught air. Hooker drove out of Little Havana and headed southwest.

Forty-five minutes later, Hooker had a bag of clothes. One-stop shopping for jeans, T-shirts, underwear, and socks, plus a canvas duffel bag. Life is simple when you’re a guy. We hit a drugstore and Hooker got a toothbrush, a razor, and deodorant.

“That’s it?” I asked him. “Don’t you need shampoo, body wash, shaving gel, toothpaste?”

“I thought I’d use yours. I’d use your razor, but it’s pink.”

“A Texas tough guy can’t shave with a pink razor?”

“Hell, no. I’d get kicked out of the club.”

“What club is that?” I asked him.

Hooker grinned at me. “I don’t know. I made that up. There isn’t any club. I’d just feel silly if I used a pink razor. I’d feel like I had to shave my legs.”

We returned to the warehouse, I zipped myself into the borrowed jumpsuit, and I got back to work attacking those areas where I would have hidden a wire and microprocessor. I cut through the roll bar and every other piece of the frame where it could possibly run. I searched through the entire wiring harness. I disassembled the tach. NASCAR had already cut into the ignition box, so I didn’t have to check that. I pulled the engine out with the help of an engine hoist, and started going over it inch by inch with a flashlight and my bare hand, skimming the surface with my fingertips.

“What are you looking for?” Hooker wanted to know.

“If Huevo found a way to go wireless, he could stick the microprocessor directly onto the engine block. These things are so small, he could make it look like a casting flaw.”

I very carefully explored two burrs in the surface. Neither proved to be anything. I found a third and eventually got it to lift off. I was pretty sure it was a chip, but it was too small to see any detail, and I’d partially mangled it trying to get it unstuck from the engine.

“Is that it?” Hooker asked.

“I’m not sure. It’s even smaller than I thought it would be, and it’s not in perfect shape. I need magnification to see it.” I dropped it into a plastic sandwich bag and sealed it. “If this isn’t it, then I’m stumped. I’ve looked everywhere I could think to look. I want to roll the second car out so I can check the engine for a similar chip.”