Janet Evanovich: Twelve Sharp

'Well?' Lula asked.

'He didn't feel like talking. And he's angry.'

A shiny black Hummer with tinted windows and bling wheel covers rolled down the street and stopped in front of Johnson's house.

'Uh-oh,' Lula said. 'Company.'

The Hummer sat there for a moment and then opened fire on Johnson's house. Multiple weapons. At least one was automatic, firing continuous rounds. Windows blew out and the house was drilled with shots. Gunfire was returned from the house, and I saw the nose of a rocket launcher poke out a front window. Obviously the Hummer saw it too because it laid rubber taking off.

'Maybe this isn't a good time,' I said to Lula.

'I told you to go for the pervert.'

Melvin Pickle worked in a shoe store. The store was part of the mall that attached to the multiplex where he'd been caught shaking hands with the devil. I didn't have a lot of enthusiasm for this capture, since I had some sympathetic feelings for Pickle. If I had to work in a shoe store all day I might go to the multiplex to whack off once in a while too.

'Not only is this going to be an easy catch,' Lula said, parking at the food court entrance, 'but we can get pizza and go shopping.'

A half hour later, we were full of pizza and had taken a couple new perfumes out for a test drive. We'd moseyed down the mall and were standing in front of Pickle's shoe store, scoping out the employees. I had a photo of Pickle that had come with his bond agreement.

That's him,' Lula said, looking into the store. 'That's him on his knees, trying to sell that dumb woman those ugly-ass shoes.'

According to Pickle's paperwork he'd just turned forty. He had sandy-colored hair that looked like it had been cut in boot camp. His skin was pale, his eyes hidden behind round-rimmed glasses, his mouth accented by a big herpes sore. He was five-foot-seven and had an average build gone soft. His slacks and dress shirt were just short of shabby. He didn't look like he cared a whole lot if the woman bought the shoes.

I moved my cuffs from my shoulder bag to my jeans pocket. 'I can manage this,' I said to Lula. 'You stay here in case he bolts.'

'I don't think he looks like a bolter,' Lula said. 'I think he looks more like the walking dead.'

I agreed with Lula. Pickle looked like he was two steps away from putting a bullet in his brain. I moved behind him and waited for him to stand.

'I love this shoe,' the woman said. 'But I need a size nine.'

'I don't have a size nine,' Pickle said.

'Are you sure?'

'Yeah.'

'Maybe you should go back and look again.'

Pickle sucked air for a couple beats and nodded. 'Sure,' he said.

He stood and turned and bumped into me.

'You're going to leave, aren't you?' I said. 'I bet you're going to go out the back door and go home and never come back.'

'It's a recurring fantasy,' he said.

I glanced at my watch. It was twelve-thirty. 'Have you had lunch?' I asked him.

'No.'

'Take your lunch now and come with me, and I'll buy you a piece of pizza.'

'There's something wrong with this picture,' Pickle said. 'Are you one of those religious nuts who wants to save me?'

'No. I'm not a religious nut.' I held my hand out. 'Stephanie Plum.'

He automatically shook my hand. 'Melvin Pickle.'

'I work for Vincent Plum Bail Bonds,' I said. 'You missed a court date, and you need to reschedule.'

'Sure,' he said.

'Now.'

'I can't go now. I gotta work.'

'You can take your lunch break.'

'I had plans for lunch.'

Probably going to see a movie. I was still holding his hand, and with my other hand I clapped a bracelet on him.

He looked down at the cuff. 'What's this? You can't do this. People will ask questions. And then what will I tell them? I'll have to tell them I'm a pervert!'

Two women looked over at him and raised their eyebrows.

'No one will care,' I said. I turned to the women. 'You don't care, right?'

'Right,' they murmured and hurried out of the store.

'Just walk out into the mall quietly with me,' I said. 'I'll take you to court and get you rebonded.'

Actually Vinnie would rebond him. Vinnie and Connie could write bond. Lula and I did the capture thing.

'Darn,' Pickle said. 'Darn it all.'

And he took off with the cuff dangling from his wrist. Lula stepped in front of him, but he had momentum and knocked her on her ass. He faltered for a moment, got his footing and ran off, into the mall. I was ten steps behind him. I stumbled over Lula, scrambled to my feet, and kept going. I chased him through the mall and up an escalator.

A hotel with an open atrium was attached to one end of the mall. Pickle ran into the hotel and barreled through the fire door into the stairwell. I chased him up five flights of stairs and thought my lungs were going to explode. He exited the stairwell, and I dragged myself, gasping, to the door.

There were seven floors in the hotel. All rooms opened to a hallway that overlooked the hotel atrium. We were on the sixth floor. I staggered out of the stairwell and saw that Pickle had made it halfway around the atrium and was straddling the balcony railing.

'Don't come near me,' he yelled. 'I'll jump.'

'Fine with me,' I said. 'I get my money dead or alive.'

Pickle looked depressed at that fact. Or maybe Pickle just always looked depressed.

'You're in pretty good shape,' I said, still winded. 'How do you stay in such good shape?'

'My car got repossessed. I walk everywhere. And all day long I'm up and down with the shoes. At the end of the day my knees are killing me.'

I was talking to him, creeping closer. 'Why don't you get a different job? One that's easier on your knees.'

'Are you kidding me? I'm lucky to have this job. Look at me. I'm a loser. And now everybody's going to know I'm a pervert. I'm a pervert loser. And I have a big herpes. I'm a pervert loser with a herpes!'

'You need to get a grip. You don't have to be a pervert loser if you don't want to be.'

He sat on the railing and swung both legs over. 'Easy for you to say You aren't named Melvin Pickle. And I bet you were a baton twirler in high school. You probably had friends. You probably date.'

'I don't exactly date, but I sort of have a boyfriend.'

'What does sort of mean?'

'It means that he looks like my boyfriend, but I don't say it out loud.'

'Why not?' Pickle wanted to know.

'It feels weird. I'm not sure why.' Okay, I knew why, but I wasn't going to say that out loud either. I had feelings for two men, and I didn't know how to choose between them. 'And I wish you wouldn't sit like that. It's creeping me out.'

'Are you afraid I'll fall? I thought you didn't care. Remember dead or alive?'

My cell phone was ringing in my bag.

'For crying out loud, answer it,' Pickle said. 'Don't worry about me, I'm only going to kill myself.'

I did an exaggerated eye roll and answered the phone.

'Hey,' Lula said. 'Where are you? I been looking all over.'

'I'm in the hotel at the end of the mall.'

'I'm right outside of that hotel. What are you doing there? Do you have Pickle?'

'I don't exactly have Pickle. We're on the sixth floor, and he's thinking about jumping off the balcony.'

I looked over the railing and saw Lula walk into the atrium. She looked up, and I waved at her.

'I see you,' Lula said. 'Tell Pickle he's gonna make a big mess if he jumps. This floor's marble, and his head's gonna crack open like a fresh egg, and there's gonna be brains and blood all over the place.'

I disconnected and relayed the message to Pickle.

'I have a plan,' he said. 'I'm going to jump feet first. That way my head won't make such an impact when I land.'