Janet Evanovich - Takedown Twenty

I took the two new files from Connie and stuffed them into my messenger bag.

“We did a four-hour stakeout on Uncle Sunny last night,” I said to Connie. “The only thing that came of it was a new handbag for Lula.”

“Jimmy Spit was selling Brahmins and he gave me a good price,” Lula said to Connie. “I always wanted a Brahmin, and this is from their new designer Atelier line. This here’s a pricey handbag.”

Lula hung the handbag from her shoulder and modeled it for Connie.

“I’ve never seen a Brahmin bag with rhinestones,” Connie said.

“That’s on account of these are crystals and they’re going in a new direction,” Lula said. “You can tell it’s a Brahmin by the little silver nameplate on it says ‘Brahmin.’ ”

Connie looked at the nameplate. “It doesn’t say ‘Brahmin.’ It says ‘Brakmin.’ ”

“Hunh,” Lula said, glancing down at the bag. “Must be a misspelling. Things like that happen, and it don’t matter anyways, because it’s a excellent bag, and it goes with my shoes.”

“Maybe you need to talk to Uncle Sunny’s neighbors,” Connie said to me. “And his relatives. Isn’t he related to Morelli?”

“He’s Joe’s godfather,” I told her. “And he’s Grandma Bella’s nephew.”

“Oops,” Connie said. “That could be sticky.”

Joe’s Grandma Bella emigrated from Sicily a lot of years ago, but she still speaks with a heavy accent, she still dresses in black like an extra in The Godfather , and she puts curses on people who she feels have disrespected her. Probably the curses aren’t real and people get boils and have their hair fall out purely by coincidence, still the woman scares the bejeezus out of me.

“It’s not just Bella,” I said. “Everyone loves Uncle Sunny. No one will rat on him.”

“Worse than that,” Lula said. “We asked at the Tip Top Deli if they knew where he was hiding, and they told us we should be ashamed to be going after Uncle Sunny. And then they wouldn’t serve us lunch. And they told us never to come back. And that don’t make me happy since I formerly considered their egg salad to be a important feature in my diet.”

“I don’t suppose you heard anything on the police band about a giraffe galloping down Sixteenth Street last night?” I asked Connie.

“No,” she replied. “Was I supposed to?”

“We think we might have seen one,” Lula said.

Connie raised an eyebrow.

“At least it seemed like it was a giraffe last night,” Lula said. “But then when I woke up this morning I had doubts.”

I chugged down my coffee, wolfed my donut, and turned to Lula. “I’m going back to Uncle Sunny’s apartment building to talk to his neighbors. Are you riding along?”

“Only if I get to drive. Your radio is busted, and I need tunes.”

THREE

UNCLE SUNNY LIVED on the second floor of a four-story brownstone walk-up on the corner of Fifteenth and Morgan. Mindy’s Nail Salon occupied the first floor and served as a front for a variety of semi-illegal activities, such as loan sharking, flesh peddling, and bookmaking—at least in Trenton they were semi-illegal. When Uncle Sunny was in residence this laundry list of illicit activities expanded to include whacking and property owner’s insurance enforcement. On the surface it might seem like Sunny lived in modest surroundings, but the truth was, he owned the building. In fact, Sunny owned the entire block. And his real estate holdings didn’t stop there.

“I don’t get it,” Lula said, parking at the curb. “What’s so special about this guy? Why’s everybody love him?”

“He’s charming,” I said. “He’s sixty-two years old, five-foot-six, and he sings Sinatra songs at weddings. He flirts with old ladies. He wears a red bow tie to funerals. On Thanksgiving and Christmas he helps out in the St. Ralph’s soup kitchen. He’s very generous with tips. And he’s a member of the Sunucchi–Morelli family, which makes up half the Burg and sticks together no matter how much they hate one another.”

And I’m pretty sure he also occasionally kills people, sets fire to businesses, and fornicates with other men’s wives. None of this is especially noteworthy in Trenton, however, and it for sure can’t compete with a red bow tie or the ability to croon Sinatra.

Sinatra is still big in the Burg, a working-class neighborhood in Trenton. I grew up in the Burg, and my parents, my sister and her family, and my grandmother still live there. The bonds office is just outside the Burg. St. Francis Hospital is located in the Burg. Plus there are four bakeries, twelve restaurants, five pizza parlors, a funeral home, three Italian social clubs, and there’s a bar on every corner.

We stood on the sidewalk, looking up at the second-floor windows.

“I don’t see nothing happening up there,” Lula said.

Meantime, a balding, overweight, fiftyish man went into the nail salon and was shown into the back room.

“I bet he’s gonna get the special,” Lula said. “You come in before noon and you get a pedicure and a BJ for half price. Mindy wanted me to work for her back when I was a ’ho, but I declined. I didn’t want to have to deal with the whole pedicure thing. I don’t do feet. A girl’s gotta draw a line somewhere, you see what I’m saying?”

I punched Sunny’s number into my cellphone and listened to it ring. No answer. I marched into the building with Lula a step behind me. We took the stairs to the second floor and found Sunny’s apartment. Easy to do since there were only two apartments on the floor. I knocked on the door and waited. Nothing. I knocked again.

“Maybe he’s dead,” Lula said. “He could be stretched out on the floor toes up. Probably we should go in and see.”

I tried the door. Locked.

“I’d bust it in, but I got heels on,” Lula said. “It wouldn’t be ladylike.”

I went across the hall and rang the bell. “Go away,” someone yelled from inside the apartment.

“I want to talk to you,” I yelled back.

The door was wrenched open, and a woman glared out at me. “What?”

“I’m looking for Uncle Sunny,” I said.

“And?”

“I thought you might know where he is.”

“What do I look like, his mother? Do I look like I keep track of Uncle Sunny? And anyways, what do you want with him? Are you the police?”

“Bond enforcement,” I told her.

“Hey, Jake!” the woman yelled.

A big, slobbering black dog padded into view and stood behind the woman.

“Kill!” the woman said.

The dog lunged at us, Lula and I jumped back, and the dog clamped onto Lula’s purse and ripped it from her shoulder.

“That’s my new bag!” Lula said. “It’s almost a Brahmin.”

The dog shook the bag until it was dead, then he eyed Lula.

“Uh-oh,” Lula said. “I don’t like the way he’s looking at me. I’d shoot him, but he got my gun.” She cut her eyes to me. “You got a gun?”

I was slowly inching my way toward the stairs. “No,” I whispered. “No gun.” Not that it mattered, because I couldn’t shoot a dog even if its eyes were glowing red and its head was rotating.

The dog made a move toward us, and Lula and I turned tail and ran. Lula missed a step, crashed into me, and we rolled ass over teakettle down the stairs, landing in a heap on the foyer floor.

“Lucky I ended on top of you, or I might have hurt myself,” Lula said.

I hauled myself up and limped out the door. This wasn’t the first time Lula and I had crash-landed at the bottom of a flight of stairs. A window opened on the second floor, Lula’s purse sailed out, and the window slammed shut.

Lula retrieved the mangled bag. “At least I got my gun back,” she said. “Now what are we going to do? You want to go for breakfast? I wouldn’t mind having one of them breakfast sandwiches.”