Janet Evanovich - Takedown Twenty

I settled on the black dress, tugged it over my hips, zipped it up, and checked in the mirror to make sure my boobs weren’t falling out too much. I shoved my feet into black spike-heel pumps and transferred essentials from my messenger bag to a small red evening clutch.

I was thinking if this was work-related I probably should take my gun, but the gun wouldn’t fit in the clutch, and truth is, I didn’t have any bullets anyway.

I felt a change in air pressure, got a hot flash, and Ranger knocked once and opened the door to my apartment. He was wearing a perfectly tailored black suit, and a black shirt open at the neck. He looked me up and down, and the corners of his mouth hinted at a smile. I assumed this meant he liked the dress.

We were silent in the hall and elevator, Ranger being only slightly more talkative than my hamster. We crossed the parking lot to his black Porsche 911 Turbo S, and he opened the door for me. It was a great car, but not the easiest to enter in a tight short skirt and heels. I grabbed my hem with both hands and managed to get in without my skirt riding up to my belly button. Not that it would matter entirely, since Ranger had already seen my belly button. Still, he hadn’t seen it lately, and I thought it was a good idea to keep it that way.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

He drove out of the lot and turned left. “We’re going to a viewing at the funeral home on Hamilton.”

“Is that the whole date?”

“Yes. Unless you want it to be more.”

“Why did you tell me to wear a sexy dress?”

“I wanted to have something to look at besides the deceased.”

“So I’m just eye candy?”

“The eye candy is a bonus. This is a viewing for Melvina Gillian. Does the name mean anything to you?”

“She was murdered. Her body was found in a Dumpster a couple weeks ago.”

“She was found ten days ago. She was kept on ice until now, pending the autopsy. Rangeman provides security for her son, Ruppert. He asked me to look into her death.”

“Aren’t the police investigating?”

“Yes, but Ruppert wanted a private investigation as well. I don’t usually do this sort of thing, but Ruppert is an important client.”

“Do you have any leads?”

“In the past eighteen months three women have been found in Dumpsters in Trenton. They were all robbed and strangled. They were all in their seventies. All lived alone, in different parts of the city. So far the police haven’t identified any suspects.”

“I knew one of the women. Lois Fratelli. She lived in the Burg a block over from my parents.”

“Did you go to her funeral?”

“No, but I went to the viewing with Grandma.”

“Anyone of interest there?”

“Not that I noticed. It was packed. There are a lot of Fratellis in Trenton, and there are always lots of people who come out for a murder.”

“Like your grandmother?”

“Grandma comes out to all the viewings. She gets extra dressed up for a murder.”

Ranger pulled into the small lot attached to the funeral home.

“You’ll never get a spot here,” I said. “This lot fills up at six o’clock for a murder.”

He beeped his horn and a black Rangeman SUV pulled out of a space. Ranger parked in the space, and the SUV drove away.

“So it sounds to me like I could have sent you to this viewing with your grandmother,” he said, cutting the engine, “and I could have taken a night off.”

“Yes, but then you would have missed seeing me in this dress.”

Ranger smiled. “True.”

“Why do you want me at this viewing?”

“I’m looking for a common thread. You know most of the people here. They talk to you. I want you to move around and see if you can find a connection between Melvina and Lois. Mutual friends, shared interests, a stranger who suddenly entered their life.”

I got out of the Porsche, tugged my dress down, and rearranged my breasts. “What will you be doing while I’m talking to people?”

“I’ll be watching you.”

The funeral home had originally been a large Victorian house with a wraparound porch. Over the years it had changed hands several times and extensions had been added. This evening, men were gathered in groups on the porch. The vestibule inside was filled with women milling around the tea and cookies, then quietly maneuvering their way into the crush of people already in the viewing room. The air was heavy with the smell of funeral flowers and too many overheated bodies.

“I’m two steps behind you,” Ranger said. “Do your thing.”

I wormed my way through the vestibule, talking to people, keeping my eyes open for murderers. I squeezed through the door to Slumber Room No. 2 and began to make my way forward toward the open casket. I spoke to Lily Kolakowski, Ann Rhinehart, Maureen Labbe, and Sheryl Stoley. Several moderately drunk men hit on me, none of them on the good side of ninety. None of them knew Melvina Gillian.

I worked the crowd to the first row of chairs facing the deceased and picked out Grandma Mazur.

“Well, for goodness sakes,” she said, spotting me. “If I’d known you were coming I would have saved you a seat. I was here when they opened the doors, and I got a real good one. You sit up front like this and you don’t miss a thing. I even filled my purse with cookies on the way through the lobby.” She tapped her finger to her forehead. “Always thinking.”

“Did you know Melvina?”

“No. Never met her, but she looks pretty good for having been thrown into a Dumpster. They do a real good job with makeup here. I was worried they might have a closed casket, and you know how I hate that, but they got her set up so she’s almost lifelike.”

I scanned the room for Ranger but couldn’t find him.

“You should go take a look,” Grandma said to me. “I especially like the shade of lipstick they got on her. I might need a lipstick like that.”

Viewings weren’t my favorite thing, and looking at dead people ranked even further down the list.

“I don’t want to jump the line,” I said.

“Nobody will mind. It’s almost closing time and there’s only stragglers left. All the people who really had their heart into it have gone through.” Grandma got up and nudged me over to the casket. “This here’s my granddaughter,” she said to the man standing to one side. “She just wants to pay some fast respects.”

I nodded to him, murmured my condolences, and stepped away. When Grandma and I turned back to her chair it was filled.

“Hey,” Grandma said to the woman sitting in her chair. “That’s my seat.”

“You got up,” the woman said.

“Don’t matter,” Grandma said. “I only got up to pay respects, and now I’m back, and I want my chair.”

“You’ve been hogging this chair all night,” the woman said. “It’s my turn now.”

“Oh yeah?” Grandma said. “How’d you like a punch in the nose?”

The woman glared at Grandma. “How’d you like to spend the night in jail on an assault charge?”

“I’m a poor, frail old lady,” Grandma said. “Nobody’s going to arrest me on your say-so. Besides, my niece here is almost engaged to a cop.”

“Did you know Melvina?” I asked the woman.

“I saw her at Bingo sometimes. Every Wednesday I go to Bingo at the Senior Center, and Melvina would almost always be there. She was a nice person, but she was blind as a bat. She couldn’t see a Bingo card if it was as big as a barn. Poor Lois Fratelli used to play Bingo there too. It’s like one by one all the Bingo players are ending up in a Dumpster.”

“The first one was Bitsy Muddle,” Grandma said. “She played Bingo at the firehouse on Thursdays. I sat next to her a couple times. She was a Bingo demon. Nobody could keep up with her. I don’t like to speak bad of the dead, but there were some who weren’t unhappy to learn she wouldn’t be at Bingo no more.”