Hard Eight (21 page)

“Are you spending the night here again?”

“Yes. My apartment’s still sealed. I imagine I’ll get it back tomorrow.” Then what? An involuntary shiver sent my lower back into spasm. My couch had death cooties.

“I see you’re excited about returning,” Ranger said.

“I’ll figure it out. Thanks for helping me today.”

“I feel cheated,” Ranger said. “Usually when I’m with you a car explodes or a building burns down.”

“Sorry to disappoint.”

“Life is a bitch,” Ranger said. He reached out and grabbed me by my jacket sleeves, hauled me across the console, and kissed me.

“
Now
you kiss me?” I said. “What was the deal when we were alone in my apartment?”

“You had three glasses of wine, and you fell asleep.”

“Oh yeah. Now I remember.”

“And you went into a panic attack at the thought of sleeping with me.”

I was sprawled across the console, wedged behind the wheel, half sitting on Ranger’s lap. His lips brushed against mine when he spoke and his hands were warm against my T-shirt.

“You weren’t entirely responsible for the panic,” I told him. “It was a sort of disastrous day.”

“Babe, you have
a lot
of disastrous days.”

“You sound like Morelli.”

“Morelli is a good guy. And he loves you.”

“And you?”

Ranger smiled.

I was racked with another spine shiver.

The porch light went on, and Grandma peered out at us from the living room window.

“Saved by the grandma,” Ranger said, releasing me. “I’m going to wait for you to get in the house. I don’t want anyone kidnapping you on my watch.”

I opened the door and I jumped out. And I did a mental grimace because getting kidnapped and/or shot wasn’t entirely off the radar screen.

Grandma was waiting for me when I walked through the door. “Who’s the guy in the cool truck?”

“Ranger.”

“That man is so hot,” Grandma said. “If I was twenty years younger . . .”

“If you were twenty years younger you’d still be twenty years too old,” my father said.

Valerie was in the kitchen, helping my mother frost cupcakes. I got a glass of milk and a cupcake, and I sat at the table. “How’d work go today?” I asked Valerie.

“I didn’t get fired.”

“That’s great. Before you know it, he’ll be proposing marriage.”

“Do you think so?”

I slid her a sideways look. “I was joking.”

“It could happen,” Valerie said, dropping colored sprinkles on the cupcake.

“Valerie, you don’t want to marry the first guy who comes along.”

“Yes, I do. As long as he has a house with two bathrooms. I swear to God, I don’t care if he’s Jack the Ripper.”

“I’m thinking about getting a computer so I can have cybersex,” Grandma said. “Anybody know how that works?”

“You go into a chat room,” Valerie said. “And you meet someone. And then you type dirty suggestions to each other.”

“That sounds like fun,” Grandma said. “How does the
sex
part happen?”

“You sort of have to do the sex part yourself.”

“I knew it was too good to be true,” Grandma said. “There’s always a catch to everything.”

It was morning, I was last in line for the bathroom, and I was beginning to appreciate Valerie’s point of view. When faced with the choices of forever living with my parents, marrying Jack the Ripper, or going home to the cootie couch, I had to admit Jack the Ripper was looking pretty good. Okay, maybe not Jack the Ripper, but certainly Doug the Dullard could be tolerated.

I was dressed in my usual outfit of jeans and boots and a stretchy shirt. I had my hair brushed out in curls and my mascara on heavy. All my adult life I’ve hidden behind mascara. And if I’m
really
feeling insecure, I add eyeliner. Today was an eyeliner day. Plus, I painted my toenails. Bring out the heavy artillery, right? Morelli had called earlier and told me the crime scene tape was down. He’d made arrangements for a professional cleaning crew to go through the apartment, using full-strength Clorox wherever needed. He thought they’d be done around noon. For all I cared, they could be done around November.

I was in the kitchen, having a final cup of coffee before starting my day, and Mabel appeared at the back door.

“I just heard from Evelyn,” she said. “She called me, and she said everyone was fine. She’s staying with a friend, and she said not to worry.” She put her hand to her heart. “I feel so much better. And I felt better knowing you were looking for Evelyn. It gave me peace of mind. Thank you.”

“Did Evelyn say when she was coming home?”

“No. She said she wouldn’t be back for Steven’s funeral, though. I guess there are hard feelings.”

“Did she say where she was? Did she mention the friend’s name?”

“No. She was rushed. It sounded like she was calling from a store or a restaurant. There was a lot of noise in the background.”

“If she calls again, tell her I’d like to talk to her.”

“There isn’t anything wrong, is there? Now that Steven’s gone it seems like everything should be okay.”

“I’d like to talk to her about her landlord.”

“Are you interested in renting a house?”

“I might be.” And that was the truth.

The phone rang, and Grandma ran for it. “It’s for you,” she said, holding the phone out to me. “It’s Valerie.”

“I need help,” Valerie said. “You have to get over here in a hurry.” And she hung up.

“Gotta go,” I said. “Valerie’s got a problem.”

“She used to be so smart,” Grandma said. “And then she moved to California. Think all that California sun dried her brain up like a raisin.”

How bad could the problem be? I thought. More chicken soup in the computer? What would Kloughn care? He had no files to lose because he had no clients.

I pulled into the lot and parked nose first in front of
Kloughn’s office. I looked into the big plate glass windows but didn’t see Valerie. I got out of the car, and Valerie came running from the Laundromat side.

“Over here,” she said. “He’s in the Laundromat.”

“Who?”

“Albert!”

A row of turquoise plastic chairs lined the wall facing the dryers. Two old women sat side-by-side in the chairs, smoking, looking at Valerie. Taking it all in. No one else was in the room.

“Where?” I said. “I don’t see him.”

Valerie sucked in a sob and pointed to one of the large commercial dryers. “He’s in there.”

I looked more closely. She was right. Albert Kloughn was in the dryer. He was all scrunched up with his ass to the round porthole glass door, looking like Pooh stuck in the rabbit hole.

“Is he alive?” I asked.

“Yes! Of course he’s alive.” Valerie crept closer and knocked on the door. “At least, I
think
he’s alive.”

“What’s he doing in there?”

“The lady in the blue sweater thought she lost her wedding ring in the dryer. She said it was wedged into the back of the drum. So Albert went in to get it. But then somehow the door slammed shut, and we can’t get it to open.”

“Jeez. Why didn’t you call the fire department or the police?”

There was movement in the drum and a lot of muffled noise coming from Kloughn. The noise sounded like
no, no, no
.

“I think he’s embarrassed,” Valerie said. “I mean, how
would it look? Suppose somebody took a picture, and it got in the paper? No one would ever hire him, and I’d be out of a job.”

“No one hires him now,” I said. I tried the door. I tried pushing buttons. I looked for a safety latch. “I’m scoring a big zero here,” I said.

“There’s something wrong with that dryer,” the lady in the blue sweater said. “It’s always getting stuck like that. There’s something wrong with the lock. I wrote out a complaint about it last week, but nobody ever does nothing around here. The vending machine with the soap doesn’t work, either.”

“I really think we need help,” I said to Valerie. “I think we should call the police.”

There was more frantic movement and more of the
no, no, no
. And then there was something that sounded like a fart coming from inside the dryer.

Valerie and I took a step back.

“I think he’s nervous,” Valerie said.

Probably there was some sort of door release on the inside, but Kloughn was wedged in and couldn’t turn to face the latch.

I fished around in the bottom of my bag and found some change. I dropped a quarter into the slot, turned the heat down to low, and started the dryer tumbling.

Kloughn’s mumbling turned to shrieking, and Kloughn bounced around some, but for the most part he seemed fairly stable. After five minutes the dryer stopped tumbling. You don’t get a heck of a lot for a quarter these days.

The door opened easy as anything, and Valerie and I pulled Kloughn out and stood him up. His hair was all
fluffy. The kind of fluff you see on a baby robin. He was warm and smelled nice, like fresh ironing. His face was red, and his eyes were glassy.

“I think I farted,” he said.

“You know what?” the lady in the blue sweater said. “I found my ring. It wasn’t in the dryer after all. I put it in my pocket and forgot.”

“That’s nice,” Kloughn said, his eyes unfocused, a little drool at the corner of his mouth.

Valerie and I had him propped up by his armpits.

“We’re going to the office now,” I said to Kloughn. “Try walking.”

“Everything’s still spinning. I’m out of the machine, right? I’m just dizzy, light? I can still hear the motor. I’ve got the motor in my head.” Kloughn moved his legs like Frankenstein’s monster. “I can’t feel my feet,” he said. “My feet fell asleep.”

We half dragged, half pushed him back to the office and sat him in a chair.

“That was just like a ride,” he said. “Did you see me going around in there? Like a fun house, right? Like an amusement park. I ride all those rides. I’m used to that sort of thing. I sit right up front.”

“Really?”

“Well, no. But I think about it.”

“Isn’t he cute,” Valerie said. And she kissed him on top of his fluffy head.

“Gosh,” Kloughn said, smiling wide. “Gee.”

I declined on an offer of lunch from Kloughn, choosing instead to go to the bonds office.

“Anything new?” I asked Connie. “I’m all out of FTAs.”

“What about Bender?”

“I wouldn’t want to cut in on Vinnie.”

“Vinnie doesn’t want him, either,” Connie said.

“It isn’t that,” Vinnie yelled from his inner office. “I’ve got things to do. Important things.”

“Yeah,” Lula said, “he’s gotta slap his Johnson around.”

“You better get that guy,” Vinnie yelled at me. “I’m not going to be happy if I’m out Bender’s bond.”

“I think there’s something going on with Bender,” Lula said. “He’s one of them lucky drunks. It’s like he’s got a direct line to God. God protects the weak and the helpless, you know.”

“God isn’t protecting Bender,” Vinnie yelled. “Bender is still out there because I have a couple of useless boobs on my payroll.”

“Okay, fine,” I said. “We’ll go get Bender.”

“We?” Lula asked.

“Yeah, you and me.”

“Been there, done that,” Lula said. “I’m telling you, he’s under God’s protection. And I’m not sticking my nose into God’s business.”

“I’ll buy you lunch.”

“I’ll get my bag,” Lula said.

“One thing,” I said to Connie. “I need some cuffs.”

“No more cuffs,” Vinnie yelled. “What do you think, cuffs grow on trees?”

“I can’t bring him in without cuffs.”

“Improvise.”

“Hey,” Lula said, looking out the big plate glass front window, “check out the car that just stopped by Stephanie’s car. It’s got a big rabbit and a big bear in it. And the bear is driving.”

We all stared out the window.

“Uh-oh,” Lula said, “did that rabbit just throw something at Stephanie’s car?”

There was a loud
barooooom
, the CR-V jumped several feet into the air and burst into flames.

“Guess it was a bomb,” Lula said.

Vinnie came running out of his office. “Holy shit,” he said. “What was that?” He stopped and gaped at the fireball in front of his office.

“It’s just another one of Stephanie’s cars got blown up,” Lula said. “It got bombed by a big rabbit.”

“Don’t you hate when that happens,” Vinnie said. And he went back into his office.

Lula and Connie and I migrated out to the sidewalk and watched the car burn. A couple blue-and-whites screamed onto the scene, followed by the EMT truck and finally two fire trucks.

Carl Costanza got out of one of the blue-and-whites. “Anyone hurt?”

“No.”

“Good,” he said, his face creasing into a grin. “Then I can enjoy this. I missed the spiders and the guy on the couch.”

Costanza’s partner, Big Dog, ambled over. “Way to go, Steph,” he said. “We were all wondering when you’d trash another car. Can’t hardly remember the last explosion.”

Costanza bobbed his head in agreement. “It’s been months,” he said.

I saw Morelli angle in behind a fire truck. He got out of his truck and walked over.

“Christ,” he said, looking at what was fast becoming a charred hunk of scrap metal.

“It was Steph’s car,” Lula told him. “It was firebombed by a big rabbit.”

Morelli set his mouth to grim and glanced over at me. “Is that true?”

“Lula saw it.”

“I don’t suppose you’d reconsider taking a vacation,” Morelli said to me. “Maybe go to Florida for a month or two.”

“I’ll think about it,” I said to Morelli. “As soon as I bring Andy Bender in.”

Morelli was still tuned to grim.

“I could bring him in easier if I had a pair of cuffs,” I said.

Morelli reached under his sweater and pulled out a pair of cuffs. He handed them to me wordlessly, his expression unchanged.

“Kiss those cuffs good-bye,” Lula mumbled behind me.

_______

Generally speaking, a red Trans Am is not a good choice for a surveillance car. Fortunately, with Lula’s newly bleached canary yellow hair and my extra-heavy-on-the-mascara eyes we looked like businesswomen who belonged in a red Trans Am, on the street in front of Bender’s house.