18 Explosive Eighteen (18 page)

• • •

Joyce was stil watching television when we walked in.

“You’re late,” she said. “I’m starving. Where’s my chicken salad? Where’s my wine?”

“It’s in the fridge,” I said. “Help yourself.”

“Are you sure this is Joyce?” Lula said. “She don’t look like tramp. She look more like bag lady.”

“Get out of my way, fatso,” Joyce said to Lula, brushing her aside to get to the fridge.

Lula glared at her. “Say what?”

Joyce opened the fridge door and I stepped behind her.
Zzzzzzzt
. Joyce crashed to the floor.

“You don’t mind if I kick her, do you?” Lula said.

“Yes, I mind. I don’t want to deliver her with unexplainable bruises.”

I was about to cuff Joyce, and Connie cal ed.

“I don’t know if this is good news or bad news,” Connie said, “but the charges have been dropped against Joyce. The court’s returning the bond.”

“I just stun-gunned her.”

“Good for you,” Connie said.

I disconnected the phone and passed the message on to Lula.

“Does this mean I can kick her since we’re not bringing her in?” Lula asked.

“No!”

“What are we gonna do with her?”

“We’re going to get her out of my apartment.” We dragged Joyce and her belongings into the hal , I locked my door, and Lula and I went back to the truck.

“I feel much better,” I said to Lula. “It would have been satisfying to take her to jail, but at least she’s out of my space.”

“Yeah, now al you gotta do is get rid of her cooties. You want to buy some bleach today, and maybe you can get some of that holy water to sprinkle around.”

“I’l add it to my shopping list.”

“She had a good idea with the chicken salad,” Lula said. “We should stop at Giovichinni’s and get some. I’m gonna eat healthier and set a good example now that I got my honey pot.” I motored down Hamilton and slowed when I passed the bonds office construction site.

“They’re making good progress,” Lula said. “They got windows in now, and they’re putting on the brick front. Too bad Vinnie gonna be dead when they final y finish.”

There was room for me to pul the truck to the curb in front of Giovichinni’s. Lula and I got out and went straight to the deli counter. I got a chicken club sandwich, and Lula got a large-size tub of chicken salad, a large-size tub of coleslaw, and a large-size tub of rice pudding.

Gina Giovichinni was at the register when we checked out.

“Omigod,” she said, looking at my black-and-green eye. “I heard Morel i beat you, but I didn’t believe it until now.”

“He didn’t beat me,” I said. “I fel in a parking garage.”

“He pushed you, right?” Gina said.

“No!”

I grabbed my sandwich, went through the store’s front door, and stopped short. Buggy was sitting in the back of my truck.

“It’s my apple dumpling!” Lula said. “Are you hungry?” she asked him.

Buggy eyed the bag. “Yuh,” Buggy said.

Lula handed him her food and ran back to Giovichinni’s to get more. I got behind the wheel, locked the doors, and ate my sandwich. I unlocked the doors when Lula returned and relocked them as soon as she was settled. I was afraid the apple dumpling would yank me out of my truck and drive away.

“Now what?” Lula clicked her seat belt in place.

“I think our luck has changed. We captured Buggy.

We got Joyce out of my apartment. I say we go get Lahonka.”

“Wham,” Lula said. “And double wham!” She turned and looked out the back window at Buggy.

“We should take him with us.”

“What?”

“If you take him back to that empty house, there’s no tel ing what could go on. He’s such a bad boy.” I checked the bad boy out in the mirror. He had a glob of rice pudding on his shirt. “I thought he was an apple dumpling.”

“You could be a apple dumpling and a bad boy al at the same time,” Lula said. “They could go together. That’s what makes him so appealing. He looks like a acorn squash, but he’s real complex. I like that in a man. And besides, I don’t have any more Snickers bars. I don’t know how we’re gonna get him out of the truck.”

Good point. I put the truck in gear and drove to Lahonka’s apartment. Lula and I got out, and Lula told the acorn squash to wait in the truck.

“Nuh-ah,” Buggy said, throwing a leg over the side.

“He’s your responsibility,” I said to Lula. “I don’t want him taking my keys, my messenger bag, or my truck.”

I marched up to Lahonka’s door and banged on it.

Lula and Buggy were right behind me.

“That door has a Band-Aid on it,” Buggy said.

“It’s covering the hole I made when I shot it,” Lula said.

“Go away,” Lahonka yel ed from inside. “I hate you.”

“She’s not nice,” Buggy said.

“She’s a felon,” Lula told him. “We need to arrest her.”

Buggy pushed us aside, gave the door a head butt, and the door came off its hinges.

“What the hel ?” Lahonka said.

She had her foot wrapped in a big bandage, and she was standing on crutches.

“What’s wrong with her foot?” Buggy wanted to know.

“I shot it,” Lula said.

“Har!” Buggy said. “Good one.” He looked at Lula.

“Do you want her in the truck?”

“Yeah,” Lula said. “We have to take her to the police station.”

“The police station isn’t so bad,” Buggy said.

“They gave me a cheeseburger.”

He grabbed Lahonka and tucked her under his arm like she was a rag dol , while I scrambled to get her crutches.

“I’m just about gonna faint on account of my honey pie is so strong,” Lula said. “I’d never say anyone was fat due to that bein’ hurtful, but let’s face it, Lahonka’s a sandbag. I carry a certain amount of weight, but mine’s perfectly distributed. My big beautiful bubble butt balances out my oversized boobs. Lahonka here got al her weight sunk into one of them low-slung behinds. It gotta be hard to get someone like Lahonka off the ground.”

“You got a lot of nerve sayin’ those things about me!” Lahonka yel ed at Lula. “You’re not nothin’ but a big ’ho.”

“Am not,” Lula said, hands on hips. “I gave up bein’ a ’ho.”

“I like ’hos,” Buggy said. “It’s like goin’ to Cluck-in-a-Bucket. You order something and that’s what you get.”

“Sugar, it’s like that with a girlfriend, too,” Lula said.

“Hunh,” Lahonka said. “Not with me. You get what I want to give you, and then you better say
thank you
.” Not with me, either, I thought. My new policy was nobody gets
anything
!

Buggy carted Lahonka to the truck and dumped her into the back.

“We need to cuff her, Sweetums,” Lula said, handing Buggy cuffs.

Lahonka was spitting and clawing and swearing, and Buggy was having a hard time catching a wrist.

“You don’t hold stil for me, and I’m going to kick you in your foot,” Buggy said.

Lahonka went stil for a beat, digesting the threat, and Buggy sat on her and cuffed her.

“Good job,” Lula said to Buggy. “Don’t let her escape. She’s sneaky.”

Buggy looked at Lula. “Do you have any more of them Snickers?”

“No,” Lula said, “but we’l get more as soon as we drop Lahonka off.”

“You aren’t gonna leave me back here with King Kong, are you?” Lahonka said. “He got his fat ass on me, and I can’t breathe. Isn’t it enough you shot up my foot? I’m just a poor workin’ woman. I got kids to support.”

I drove to the municipal building and parked in the lot. I didn’t need police assistance. I could get Buggy to cart Lahonka across the street if she refused to walk. Lula and I got out and went to the back of the truck.

No Lahonka.

“I could have sworn Lahonka was here when we took off,” Lula said.

Buggy was sitting with his back against the rear window. “She got out at the last light.”

“You were supposed to make sure she didn’t escape,” I said to him.

“Yeah, but she said she was a mama, and she was cryin’. So I let her go.”

“That’s so sweet,” Lula said to Buggy. “You’re a man with a good heart.”

“It’s not sweet!” I said. “Lahonka Goudge is a con artist and a felon. She steals people’s identities. And Mr. Potato Head here just let her go.”

“Do I get my Snickers now?” Buggy asked.

“You get nothing,” I said. “
NOTHING
.” Buggy squinched his face up. “You promised.”

“The deal was you’d get Snickers after we delivered Lahonka. Did we deliver Lahonka?” I asked him. “No, we did not. So you get nothing.

There are consequences to al actions.”

“Nuh-ah. I do lots of things without them consequences.”

“Not in my truck,” I told him. “There are consequences in my truck.”

“That’s a good policy,” Lula said. “Just think where we’d be if we didn’t pay attention to consequences.

Like, there’s consequences if you don’t got bul ets in your gun. And there’s consequences if you eat bad potato salad. And there’s consequences if you’re not taking precautions with your sweetie pie.” I had a flash of panic recal ing a smal inadvertent lapse in my birth-control program in Hawaii.

“Are you okay?” Lula asked me. “You got real pale just now, and you’re sort of sweating.”

“I was thinking about consequences.”

“Yeah, they freak me out, too,” Lula said.

EIGHTEEN

I OFF-LOADED LULA AND BUGGY at the bonds office so Lula could get her car. Slasher and Lancer were stil parked there, both of them sound asleep.

Vinnie’s car and Connie’s car were gone, and the office was closed. Everyone left early on Saturday.

“I’m going to take you home in my Firebird,” Lula said to Buggy.

Buggy’s eyes got wide. “I want to drive.”

“Of course you do,” Lula said, “but this here’s a finely tuned machine.”

“Yuh.”

“Wel , okay, since you’re so adorable,” Lula said.

And she handed him her key.

“Get in fast, before he takes off without you,” I said to Lula.

“He wouldn’t do that,” Lula said. “He’s my big honey.”

The big honey rammed himself behind the wheel and took off.

“Hey!” Lula said. “Wait for me.”

“Get in the truck,” I told her. “I’l catch him.” Three blocks later, Buggy was stopped in traffic.

Lula jumped out, ran to the Firebird, wrenched the passenger-side door open, and got in. Mission accomplished, as far as I was concerned.

I stopped at the supermarket and got a couple bags of groceries. Bread, milk, juice, peanut butter, olives, bag of chips, a frozen pizza, Vienna Fingers cookies, a bucket of assorted fried chicken parts, strawberry Pop-Tarts. I made one more stop and got a six-pack of beer and a bottle of red wine. I was going to have a feast tonight. I was going to have fried chicken, beer, and Vienna Fingers. Tomorrow, I’d have pizza and wine. No men. No Joyce. No Apple Dumpling. Just me and Rex and the TV.

I lugged the bags up to my apartment, set them on the kitchen counter, and a chil ran down my spine.

The television was on. I grabbed the Glock and peeked into the living room. It was Joyce. “What the heck?”

“That was real y shitty,” Joyce said. “You dumped me out in the hal . If I had any other place to go, I’d be there.”

“How did you get back into my apartment?”

“I had to climb up the stupid fire escape again. It’s getting old.” She came into the kitchen and looked at the food I was unpacking. “Where’s my chicken salad and wine?”

“I didn’t get chicken salad. I didn’t think you’d be here. But here’s the good news. The charges have been dropped against you.”

“Big deal. The charges were bogus. I was never worried about the charges.”

“What
are
you worried about?”

“There’s nothing green here,” Joyce said.

“Olives.”

“Olives are a fruit. Look at this mess. You haven’t got a single vegetable.”

“There’s tomato sauce on the pizza.”

“Another fruit.”

As if my life wasn’t enough in the toilet, Joyce Barnhardt was now smarter and obviously ate better than me.

“You didn’t answer my question,” I said. “What are you worried about?”

Joyce selected a mystery piece from the fried chicken bucket. “You ever hear of the Pink Panthers?”

“The movies?”

“No, the organization. Interpol has assigned the name Pink Panthers to an international jewel thief network. Interpol took the name from the movies.”

“The movies are great.”

“Focus,” Joyce said. “We’re talking about the network. Frank Korda was part of the network. I know it’s hard to believe that there’s this nebbish guy in Trenton associated with the Pink Panthers. I mean, the Pink Panthers are
big
. They’re
HUGE
!

They stole a $27 mil ion diamond necklace one time from a store in Tokyo. Anyway, somehow Korda connected with these guys.”