Janet Evanovich - Finger Lickin’ Fifteen

“You’re my assistant.”

“Maybe I don’t want to be the assistant. Maybe I want to be the apprehension agent.”

“You have to talk to Vinnie about that. Your name has to be on the documentation.”

“We could write me in. I got a pen.”

“Good grief.”

“How about if I just say hello.”

“Fine. Terrific. Say hello.”

I knocked on the back door, and Ernie answered in his underwear.

“Hello,” Lula said.

Ernie looked like he’d just rolled out of bed. His thinning sandy blond hair was every which way on his head. “What’s up?” he asked.

“You missed your court date,” I said. “You need to go downtown with me and reschedule.”

“Sure,” he said. “Wait in the front room while I get dressed.”

We followed him through the kitchen that was circa 1942, down a hall with peeling, faded wallpaper, and into the living room. The living room floor was bare, scarred wood. The furniture was minimal. A lumpy secondhand couch. Two folding chairs with the funeral home’s name engraved on the back. A rickety end table had been placed between the two folding chairs. No lamps. No television.

“I’ll be right back,” Ernie said, heading for the stairs. “Make yourself comfortable.”

Lula looked around. “How are we supposed to get comfortable?”

“You could sit down,” I told her.

Lula sat on one of the folding chairs, and it collapsed under her weight.

“Fuck,” she said, spread-eagle on the floor with the chair smashed under her. “I bet I broke a bone.”

“Which bone did you break?”

“I don’t know. Pick one. They all feel broke.”

Lula struggled to her feet and felt around, testing out her bones. Ernie was still upstairs, getting dressed, but I didn’t hear him walking overhead.

I went to the bottom of the stairs and called. “Ernie?”

Nothing. I climbed the stairs and called his name again. Silence. Four rooms, plus a bathroom, led off the center hall. One room was empty. One room was filled with bizarre junk. Store mannequins with broken arms, gallon cans of cooking oil, stacks of bundled newspapers, boxes of firecrackers and rockets, gallon cans of red paint, a wooden crate of rusted nails, a birdcage, a bike that looked like it had been run over by a truck, and God only knows what else. The third room housed a sixty-inch plasma television, an elaborate computer station, and a movie house popcorn machine. A new leather La-Z-Boy recliner sat in the middle of the room and faced the television. The fourth room was his bedroom. A sleeping bag and pillow had been thrown onto the floor of the fourth room. Clothes were scattered around in no special order. Some looked clean and some looked like they’d been worn a lot.

The window was open in the bedroom, and two large hooks wrapped over the windowsill. I crossed the room to the window and looked down. Rope ladder. The sort you might stash in a room as a fire precaution.

I ran downstairs and headed for the kitchen. “He’s gone.”

Lula and I reached the back door just as an engine caught in the garage, and a baby diarrhea green VW bug chugged out to the alley. We ran for the Escort, jumped in, and took off. I could see the bug two blocks away. Ernie turned right and I floored it, bouncing along the pot-holed service road. I turned right and caught a flash of green a block away. I was gaining on him.

“Do you smell something?” Lula asked.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, but it’s not good.”

I was concentrating on driving and not on smelling. Ernie was going in circles. He was driving a four-block grid.

“It’s like a cat was burning,” Lula said. “I never actually smelled a cat burning, but if I did, it would smell like this. And do you think it’s getting smokey in here?”

“Smokey?”

“Yow!” Lula said. “Your backseat is on fire. I mean, it’s a inferno. Let me out of this car. Pull over. I wasn’t meant to be extra crispy.”

I screeched to a stop, and Lula and I scrambled out of the car. The fire raced along the upholstery and shot out the windows. Flames licked from the undercarriage and Vrooosh! The car was a fireball. I looked up the street and saw the pea green VW lurking at the corner. The car idled for a few moments and sedately drove away.

“How long do you think it’s gonna take the fire trucks to get here?” Lula wanted to know.

“Not long. I hear sirens.”

“This is gonna be embarrassing. This is the second thing we burned up this week.”

I dialed Ranger. “Did I wake you?” I asked.

“No. I’m up and functioning. I just got a report that the GPS unit we attached to your car stopped working.”

“You know how when you toast a marshmallow it catches fire and gets all black and melted?”

“Yeah.”

“That would be my car.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, but I’m stranded,” I told him.

“I’ll send Tank.”

____________________

I WATCHED THE fire truck disappear down the street, followed by the last remaining cop car. What was left of my Escort was on a flatbed.

“Where do you want me to take this?” the flatbed guy asked me.

“Dump it in the river.”

“You got it,” he said. And he climbed into the cab and rumbled away.

“Guess you gotta be careful when you’re going after someone who likes fire,” Lula said.

I had a shiny new black Porsche Cayenne waiting for me. Tank had dropped it off, made sure I didn’t need help, and returned to Rangeman. The car was one of several in Ranger’s personal fleet. It was immaculate inside, with no trace of Ranger other than a secret drawer under the driver’s seat. The drawer held a loaded gun. All cars in Ranger’s personal fleet had guns hidden under the seat.

I remoted the car open, and Lula and I got in.

“Now what?” Lula said.

“Lunch.”

“I like that idea. And I think we should take something to Larry on account of he’s still working on your kitchen.”

“It sounds like things went okay last night.”

“One thing you learn when you’re a ’ho is there’s all kinds in this world. Bein’ a ’ho is a broadening experience. It’s not just all hand jobs, you know. It’s listenin’ to people sometimes and tryin’ to figure out how to make them happy. That’s why I was a good ’ho. I didn’t charge by the hour.”

“And Larry fits in there somewhere.”

“Yeah. He’s a real interesting person. He was a professional wrestler. His professional name was Lady Death, but he was one of them niche market wrestlers, and his feelings got hurt when the fans didn’t like him in his pink outfits. So he quit, and he got a job as a fireman. Turns out he’s a hottie, too. He likes wearing ladies’ clothes, but he isn’t gay.”

We decided Larry was probably tired of chicken, so we got ham and cheese and hot pepper subs and brought them back to my apartment.

“Boy, that’s great of you to bring me lunch,” Larry said. “I’m starving.”

He was still wearing the Dolly Parton number. It had a fitted bodice with spaghetti straps and a swirly chiffon skirt, and there was a lot of chest hair and back hair sticking out of the top of the dress. There was also a lot of armpit hair, leg hair, and knuckle hair. He’d accessorized the dress with heels and rubber gloves.

“I know this looks funny,” he said, “but I like to feel pretty when I clean.”

“Go for it,” I told him. And I meant it. I didn’t care what he was wearing as long as I was getting barbecue sauce removed from my walls.

My cell phone buzzed, and I recognized Morelli’s number.

“I’m trying to find Lula,” he said. “I called the office, and they said she was with you.”

“Why didn’t you just call her cell?”