Джанет Иванович - Twisted Twenty-Six

“You made a good choice on those extensions,” Lula said. “It’s dark as a witch’s bum in the Mole Hole, and your extensions are gonna catch whatever light they got there. You’ll probably be the only one who can tell the potato salad from the mac and cheese. Everyone else is gonna have to use the flashlight app on their smartphone.”

I rolled my eyes up as if I could see the top of my head. “They look pretty though, right?”

“Hell, yeah. And they’ll be the shit tomorrow when you gotta wear black. Black isn’t a happy color, if you get what I’m sayin’. You gotta sparkle black up. If you haven’t got a lot of diamonds, then aluminum foil is the next best thing. Or if it’s all black leather you could break it up with chains.”

“My extensions are aluminum foil?”

“I can’t say for sure, but they look like foil and that’s what counts.”

“Can I wash them?”

“Yeah,” Lula said, “but you might not want to use real high heat with the hair dryer.”

“Are you coming to the funeral tomorrow?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.”

I watched Lula drive away, I waved to the Rangeman guys, and I climbed into the Buick. It was Friday night. Lula had a date. I had the Rangeman guys. I wondered if they’d want to go to dinner. And later we could all watch a movie. I checked them out in my rearview mirror. Dinner and a movie might be awkward. They’d have to clear it first with Ranger. And then they’d be overly polite and afraid to talk to me. And when they went off their shift Ranger would grill them. Okay, dinner with the Rangeman guys was a bad idea. That left my parents and Grandma. An equally bad idea. My mother would take one look at my blue hair and go straight to the liquor cupboard. Better to spring it on her tomorrow when she’s distracted by the funeral. Ordinarily I’d be seeing Morelli on a Friday night, but he was off to Atlantic City with his cousin Mooch. Annual poker tournament. They always lost, but they went every year anyway.

I drove home on autopilot, parked, and took the stairs to the second floor. I walked the hall and stopped at my door. It was partially open. My heart stuttered in my chest. I took a couple steps back and called Rangeman. Three minutes later, my Rangeman escorts were in my apartment, guns drawn, doing a security check while I waited in the hall.

One of the guys came out to get me. “It’s clear,” he said, “but it’s a mess.”

I stepped inside and looked around. Drawers had been dumped out, cushions thrown onto the floor and slashed, linens torn off the bed, cereal boxes emptied. The lid was off Rex’s cage, and his soup can sleeping den had been emptied onto the kitchen counter. Rex wasn’t in his soup can or his cage. I had several moments of breathless panic until I saw Rex peeking out from behind my brown bear cookie jar.

I scooped Rex up, told him I loved him, and gently set him back into his cage. I replaced his soup can and gave him a corn chip from the food spread across the counter.

Ranger called. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“Someone tossed my apartment.”

“Was there much damage?”

“Rex is safe. The rest is just stuff.”

“Babe,” Ranger said and disconnected.

I declined the offer of cleanup help from the Rangeman guys. They had good intentions, but I doubted their domestic skills. Not that mine were all that wonderful, but I wanted to do my own cleanup. I wanted to put my handprint on everything that had been disturbed. I wanted to put things back where they were before my apartment was violated. My household possessions weren’t expensive and I didn’t even like half of them, but they were mine . They shared my life . . . such as it was.

I called my mom and asked if everything was okay there.

“As okay as it could get,” my mother said. “We ate one of the casseroles for dinner. Noodles and some kind of ground meat. I’ll be glad to get all of this out of the house. It doesn’t feel right.”

“How’s Grandma doing?”

“Better than I am.”

“Is she going out tonight?”

“No. Old Mr. Jameson is laid out at Stiva’s tonight, and she said hardly anyone is going to the viewing. I guess everyone is gearing up for Jimmy’s funeral.”

“Make sure you keep your doors locked,” I said. “Grandma kind of has a target on her back right now.”

Not that a locked door had done me any good.

I said good night to my mom and browsed through the kitchen debris for dinner, settling on a peanut butter and pickle sandwich.

I vacuumed up the cereal and washed the counters. I returned the cushions to the couch, placing them slashed side down so they couldn’t be seen. I slid drawers back into the dresser in my bedroom, folded the clothes that had been thrown around the room, and returned them to their appropriate places. I made my bed with fresh linens and crawled in.

I shut the light off, but I couldn’t sleep. My door was more secure now that the bolt was thrown, but I still didn’t feel safe. And knowing that someone had pawed through my stuff was creepy. I turned the light back on and checked my phone messages and email. I got up and looked in on Rex to make sure he was okay. He was running on his wheel, and he stopped and blinked at me when I flipped the kitchen light on.

“Hey, little guy,” I said. “I guess you had a pretty exciting day. Big adventure for you, getting dumped out of your can and everything.” I filled his food cup with fresh hamster crunchies, shut the light off, and padded barefoot into the living room. I curled up on the couch, channel surfed, and finally settled on House Hunters International . A couple from Houston was looking for a place in Oslo, and the woman was obsessed with getting an apartment with a bathtub. I gave up on the woman and her bathtub search, and I did more channel surfing. I’m not sure when I fell asleep, but one of the morning shows was on and the sun was shining when I woke up on the couch.

CHAPTER SEVEN

SATURDAYS ARE ALMOST always workdays . . . depending on how bad I need money. If I’m having a good month and my rent is paid, I might go to the shore, but that doesn’t happen often. This Saturday was different. This Saturday was going to be hideous. Besides the funeral thing, I was going to have to convince the people who ransacked my apartment that Grandma had no knowledge of the keys.

I staggered to the bathroom and stood in the shower until I was moderately awake. I made a halfway serious effort at drying my hair, being careful not to melt my electric blue extensions. In the end, I concluded that the styling effort wasn’t entirely successful, and this would be another ponytail day.

I have a black suit that I use for funerals and the occasional job at Rangeman. Tailored jacket. Knee-length pencil skirt. I coupled it with a short-sleeved, scoop neck white sweater and plain black pumps. I looked in the mirror and thought about applying mascara but decided it would take too much energy. Ditto coffee and breakfast. I could get it at my parents’ house.

Rex was still asleep in his cage when I entered the kitchen. No doubt exhausted from running on his wheel all night. I had a pang of anxiety about leaving him alone. It wasn’t a big deal to have my cushions slashed. The threat of having Rex hurt or worse was a very big deal. I squelched the anxiety by reminding myself that my apartment had already been searched, and it wasn’t likely that it would be searched again.

A new Rangeman crew was in my parking lot when I walked to my car. I waved at them and they waved back. I would rather they sat in my apartment and watched over Rex, but I didn’t think the idea would fly with Ranger.

—

It was a couple minutes after eight o’clock when I pulled into my parents’ driveway. The church service was at nine o’clock, and Stiva’s big black limo was already at the curb. I took a deep breath and went inside. My father was in his chair in the living room, and the television was droning on in front of him. He was wearing his gray suit and a facial expression that could best be described as just shoot me .