Janet Evanovich - Motor Mouth

Hooker looked at his watch. “Four o’clock,” he said. “Let’s get the hauler out of here and wrap this up. I’m dead on my feet, excuse the expression.”

“Do you need help backing out of the warehouse?” I asked him.

“I’m cool. Kill the lights.”

“You won’t be able to see the door.”

“I have eyes like a cat.”

I shut the lights off in the warehouse and stood to the side, watching Hooker move the hauler. He misjudged the door by about six inches and bashed in the left-rear corner of the trailer.

“Maybe you’re right about the lights,” Hooker said, taking the truck forward.

I switched the lights on and Hooker made another try, this time succeeding in getting everything out the door and into the street. He pulled forward and sat there at idle. I made sure the warehouse was locked, and then I ran to the SUV and fell in line behind Hooker. Any halfway intelligent person would have had heart palpitations and a sick stomach at this point. I was too tired to be weirded out. I had a backache and very little going on in my head. I followed after Hooker on autopilot, just wanting it all to be over.

Hooker drove out of Little Havana and took Route 95, heading north to the interstate that stretched, dark and endless, in front of him. Trucks sporadically cruised by in the blackness, only headlights and running lights visible, moving in caravans, looking like highway ghost trains.

After ten miles Hooker pulled off the interstate, found a strip mall, and parked the truck. I parked behind him, and jumped out of the SUV with the motor still running. I peeled the aluminum wrap off the GPS, gave Hooker a weary thumbs-up, and we climbed into the SUV and hauled ass back to the highway.

I was behind the wheel, and Hooker was eyes closed, slumped in the seat next to me.

“Are we the good guys or the bad guys?” he asked me.

“That’s a tough one. We started out as the good guys. We rescued Gobbles. After that it goes into the gray zone.”

“At least it’s done, and we got rid of all the evidence without getting caught. We were careful. We used gloves. We wiped everything down. We compacted the cars. No one will tie us to any of this.”

I pulled into a space behind Felicia’s house, and Hooker and I staggered across the small yard, through the door, and up the stairs to our guest room. Hooker flopped onto the bed and I flopped on top of him.

“I’m too tired to get undressed,” I said. “I can barely breathe.”

“I’ve got you beat,” Hooker said. “I’m too tired to get you undressed.”

I was tangled together with Hooker when I woke up, our legs intertwined, my nose tucked under his chin. He was still asleep, his breathing deep and regular. I looked at my watch. It was almost nine.

“Hey,” I said to Hooker. “Wake up. It’s almost nine and Beans should go out to tinkle.”

Hooker half-opened an eye. “Okay. Just give me a minute.”

“Don’t you dare close your eyes,” I said. “I know you. You’re going to close your eyes and instantly fall asleep again. And Beans should have gone out an hour ago.”

“He’s not complaining,” Hooker said.

I looked around the room. “That’s because he isn’t here.”

“Maybe Felicia came to get him.”

A tiny, horrible tendril of panic curled in my stomach. “Hooker, do you remember Beans coming into the house with us?”

Hooker opened both eyes. “No.”

“Do you remember him being in the SUV with us?”

“No.”

Our eyes locked. “Did you ever take him out of the hauler?” I asked Hooker. “He was sleeping in the lounge. You locked him in when Felicia came to help us.”

“Don’t tell me I left him in the hauler,” Hooker said, hands over his eyes. “I’m still sleeping and this is a nightmare, right? Jesus, pinch me or something.”

I bit into my lower lip. “I’m going to throw up.”

“ Shit ,” Hooker said, on his feet, hunting down his shoes. “I don’t fucking believe this. We were so careful not to leave prints, and then we leave the dog.”

I had the SUV keys in my hand and my other hand on the doorknob. “Maybe we can get to him before Huevo’s people.”

I drove because Hooker couldn’t afford to lose his license by doing a hundred on the interstate. I took the off-ramp on two wheels and laid four feet of rubber when I jumped on the brakes in the strip-mall lot where we’d parked the Huevo hauler.

The SUV rocked to a stop, and Hooker and I sat in frozen silence. No hauler.

Hooker cut his eyes to me. “You aren’t going to cry, are you?”

I blinked tears away. “No. Are you?”

“I hope not. I’d feel like a real pussy.”

“We need to get Beans back.”

“Yeah, and Beans isn’t our only problem. We just told the Huevo team we stole their hauler and made off with their cars. And we told the guy who killed Oscar Huevo that we found Huevo wrapped up like a Christmas ham.”

“You’re in big trouble,” I said. “They’re going to come looking for you. Good thing I’m not involved.”

“I’m going to tell them it was all your idea.”

I smiled over at Hooker. He might be a jerk when it came to fidelity, but he’d protect me with his last breath. “What do we do now?”

“They might not be too far in front of us. We could cruise north and try to catch them. They might not even know Beans is in the lounge. Maybe we could sneak in and get Beans when they stop for lunch.”

I wheeled the car out of the lot and was turning toward the interstate entrance when Hooker’s cell phone rang.

“Yeah?” Hooker said. “Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.” And he disconnected.

“Who was that?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t give me his name. He said I was a rotten bastard for abandoning my dog. That I didn’t deserve to have a great dog like Beans. And that he was going to kill me.” Hooker slouched in his seat. “I can’t believe I left Beans in the hauler.”

“We were exhausted. We just weren’t thinking.”

“That’s no excuse. This is Beans we’re talking about. Beans is…family. He’s special. And he’s kind of dumb. How’s he going to get by without me?”

“Well, at least the killer likes Beans; that’s a good thing, right?”

“Of course he likes Beans. How could anyone not like Beans? I tell you, this is war. No more Mr. Nice Guy. I’m getting my damn dog back. I’m going to find this Beans snatcher, and I’m going to get medieval on his ass. Oscar Huevo won’t be the only one with bullet holes and tooth marks in him. This piece-of-shit Beans snatcher is going down.”

“You’re sounding a little on the edge here,” I said to Hooker. “We need to get Beans back, but maybe you want to chill. You wouldn’t want to do anything rash, right?”

“When have I ever done anything rash?” Hooker yelled, cords standing out in his neck. “Do I look like I’m going to do something rash?”

“Yeah. Your face is real red, and your eyes are crazy man. How about we think this out over breakfast. And maybe I can find a diner that has a defibrillator just in case you have a heart attack.”

“I’m not hungry,” Hooker said. “I just want my goddamn dog back.”

“Sure. I know that, but we need a plan. And you could think better if your eyes weren’t so popped out of their sockets, right?”

“Are my eyes popped out of their sockets?”

“If they popped out any more, they’d be rolling around on the floor.”

I pulled into the first diner I saw, and I got Hooker settled into a booth. Hooker ordered a ham-and-cheese omelet, bacon, pancakes, home fries, juice, coffee, and a side of biscuits with white gravy. Good thing he was too upset to be hungry, otherwise he might have cleaned out the kitchen and the diner would have had to close.