Janet Evanovich: Plum Lovin'

"Sorry I made Albert faint at the table," I said to Valerie. "I thought he was sort of over the marriage phobia."

"It's hideous," Valerie said. "The man is never going to marry me. I didn't mind at first. I thought he just needed time. Now I don't know what he needs."

"He needs his head examined," Grandma said.

"He had it examined," Valerie said. "They didn't find anything."

We all pondered that for a moment.

"Anyway, it's important that we get married," Valerie said. "I'm pregnant again."

We were all dumbfounded.

"Is that good news?" Grandma asked.

"Yes. I want to have another baby with Albert," Valerie said. "I just wish I was married."

Okay, that was the deal-breaker. Albert Kloughn was going down. He was going to marry my sister. I was going to make it happen.

I scraped my chair back. "Gotta go. Things to do. People to see. Is it okay if I leave Bob here just a little longer?"

"He's not here forever, is he?" my mother asked.

"No! I'll be back for him. I promise."

I hurried out of the kitchen and drove the short distance to Jeanine's house. Her date was due to arrive any minute, and I thought it wouldn't hurt to do a last-minute courage check. I parked in front of her house, ran to the door, and rang the bell.

The door was thrown open, and Jeanine stood there buck naked. "Ta daaaah!" she sang out.

We locked eyes, and we both let out a shriek. I clapped my hands over my eyes, and Jeanine slammed the door shut. A minute later, the door reopened and Jeanine appeared, wrapped in a blanket.

"I thought you were Edward," she said.

"How much have you had to drink?"

"Enough. And you'll be happy to learn I watched the movie three more times and practiced moaning." Her eyes rolled back in her head. "Ohhhh," she moaned. "Oh yeah. Oh yeah." She opened her eyes and looked at me. "How was that?"

A door opened two doors down, and an elderly man looked out at us. He shook his head and muttered something about lesbians and retreated back into his house.

"That was pretty good," I said, "but you might want to adjust the volume."

"Do you think the naked greeting is too much? I figured I'd get it over and done, so we could make our six o'clock dinner reservation. I was afraid if I waited until after dinner I'd get nervous and throw up."

"Glad to see you've got it all figured out."

Jeanine took a deep breath and cracked her knuckles. "Maybe I need another drinky poo."

"Probably you've had enough drinky poos," I told her. "You don't want to get horizontal until your date shows up."

I jogged back to the Escape, slipped behind the wheel, and punched in Charlene Klinger's number.

"He called," she yelled into the phone. "He wants to take me to dinner. What do I do?"

"You go to dinner with him."

"It's not that simple. I don't know what to wear. And I need a babysitter. Where am I going to get a babysitter at this late notice?"

"I'm on my way" I told her, putting the car in gear. "Ill be there in a half hour."

Junior opened the front door and let me in.

"Where's your mom?" I asked.

"Upstairs. She's going nuts because she can't find anything to wear, and she got her hair stuck in a torture device."

I trooped upstairs and found Charlene in the bathroom with a curling iron in her hand.

"Stephanie Plum, full-service matchmaker, available for wardrobe consultation and babysitting," I told Charlene.

"Are you sure you can handle the kids?" she asked me.

"Piece of cake."

Truth is, I'd rather get run over by a truck than spend an hour with Charlene's kids, but I didn't know what else to do.

"I thought I'd wear this pants suit," she said. "What do you think?"

"The pants suit is good, but the shirt isn't sexy."

"Oh God, am I supposed to be sexy?"

I ran to her bedroom and sifted through the pile of clothes on her bed. I found a V-necked sweater that I thought had potential and brought it into the bathroom.

"Try this," I told her.

"I can't wear that. It's too low. I bought it by mistake."

I unbuttoned her out of the shirt and dropped the sweater over her head. I took a step back, and we both looked in the mirror.

Charlene had a lot of cleavage. "Perfect," I said. "Now you're a domestic goddess and a sex goddess."

Charlene looked down at her boobs. "I don't want to give him the wrong idea."

"And that would be, what?"

"I don't know. I'm not good at this. I never have a second date. Everyone always disappears halfway through the first date. What am I supposed to do on a second date? Should I… you know?"

"No! You don't you know until the third date. And then, only if you really like the guy. I've had years where I didn't you know at all."

Junior was watching. "Boy, you have a lot of skin," he said to his mother. "And your hair looks funny."

Charlene's attention moved from her boobs to her hair. "I got the curling iron caught in it, and some of it got singed off."

I finger-combed some conditioner into Charlene's singed hair and fluffed her out with a round brush and hair dryer.

"You must not be a Jersey native," I said to Charlene.

"I moved here five years ago from New Hampshire."

That would explain the hair.

I pulled some lip gloss and blush out of my bag and swiped some on Charlene. The doorbell rang, and Char-lene gripped the bathroom counter for support.

"Remember," I said to her, "you're a goddess."

"Goddess," she repeated.

"And you don't put out until the third date."

"Third date."

"Unless he gets carried away with your cleavage and asks you to marry him… then you could accelerate the process."

I walked Charlene down the stairs and helped her get into a coat. I told Gary Martin to behave himself and get Charlene home before her ten o'clock curfew. And I closed the door after them and turned to face her kids.

"I'm hungry," Ralph said.

The other three stared at me in sullen silence.

"What?" I said to them.

"We don't need a babysitter," Russell said.

"Fine. Pretend I'm something else. Pretend I'm a friend."

Russell looked me up and down.

"How old are you?" I asked him.

"Sixteen."

"I don't think so."

"He's twelve," Ralph said. "And he got a bone in school last week and got sent home."

"It's boner , dipshit," Ernie said.

Ralph stood on tiptoes and got into Ernie's face. "Don't call me dipshit."

"Dipshit, dipshit, dipshit."

I looked at my watch. I'd been on duty for three minutes and I'd lost control. This was going to be a long night.

"Everyone into the kitchen," I said. "I'm going to make dinner."

"What are you going to make?" Ralph wanted to know.

"Peanut butter sandwiches."

"I don't like peanut butter," Ralph said.

"Yeah, and that's not dinner. That's lunch," Ernie said. "We need to have meat and vegetables for dinner."

I took my phone out and dialed Pino's Pizza. "I need three large pies with peppers, olives, onions, and pepper-oni," I told them. "And I need it fast." I gave them the address and turned back to the kids. "Vegetables and meat, coming up."

"I'm going upstairs," Russell said.

Ernie followed. "Me, too."

Junior ran off to the back of the house and disappeared.

"You have to feed Kitty and Blackie and Fluffy and Tom and Fritz and Melvin. And you can't give Blackie any pizza because he's lactose internet."

"Do you mean lactose intolerant?"

"Yeah. He gets the squirts. He squirts all over everything."

I went to the kitchen, and I put some cat crunchies in a bowl for Kitty and some dog crunchies in a bowl for Blackie and some rabbit pellets in a bowl for Fluffy.

"Tom and Fritz and Melvin are the outside cats," Ralph said. "Mom can't catch them, so she just feeds 'em."