I pulled a bottle of aspirin out of the cabinet and sat it on the table next to his plate before taking a seat next to him.
“Long day, huh?” I said. “The whole election announcement and Celia acting like, well, Celia. Then I guess you caught a bad one this afternoon.”
He took a bite of the sandwich and nodded.
“Hot Rod?” I asked.
“How the heck did you know that? The only people at the shop were cops, and I asked everyone to keep their mouths shut.”
“One of the Sinful Ladies has a niece who works at the hospital. She said Hot Rod was unconscious and had been hit pretty hard. We’re hoping he’s going to be okay. Have you heard anything?”
“I talked to the nurse in charge on my way over here. He’s stable but there’s no change.”
“That sucks. I don’t get it. Why would someone want to hurt Hot Rod? I mean, he’s sorta crazy but seemed harmless. He’s into his cars, and I didn’t get the impression he was into anything else.”
“You know I can’t talk about an open investigation,” Carter said. “And I need the three of you to stay out of this. I’m pretty sure whoever popped Hot Rod thought they’d killed him. Whatever is going on, this perp is not playing around.”
“Did they steal cars?”
Carter gave me the look. The “I refuse to talk about it” look.
“At least tell me if they got the DeLorean.”
Carter’s mouth opened a bit and he stared at me, clearly dismayed. “Do not tell me you were considering buying that car.”
“Okay. I won’t tell you.”
“Seriously?”
“Well, they look cool and even though it’s old, Hot Rod said by the time he was done with it, Enzo Ferrari would be jealous.”
“Enzo Ferrari is dead.”
I nodded. “I know. It was going to be that good.”
Carter shook his head. “As much as I hate to admit it, the DeLorean is still there, but it doesn’t look like Hot Rod has started working on it yet.”
“Then we’ll just have to hope he gets better and can get back to doing what he loves.”
“Something we can both agree on.”
Carter switched the conversation to Celia and her never-dull brand of crazy, and we chatted about her and the takedown by fish guy until he finished eating. As soon as he polished off the last of the cookies, he rose from the table and stretched.
“I hate to eat and run,” he said, “but I’m beat and I’ve got to get started early tomorrow.”
“Of course,” I said, and followed him to the front door.
He turned around and wrapped his arms around me, kissing me soundly. I relaxed into his rock-hard chest and thought about just how good he looked when his shirt was off. The rest of him wasn’t too shabby, either.
He broke off the kiss and opened the door. “I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know how things look for rescheduling our grilling.”
“No worries. I never run out of people supplying me with food. Just catch the guy who did that to Hot Rod.”
“Bet on it.”
I closed the door and pulled the dead bolt, then headed into the kitchen to put the dishes in the dishwasher. I hadn’t expected Carter to cough up any dirt on the case, but I figured that I’d still get some information out of him, even if he hadn’t intended for me to. In this case, the information I’d gained wasn’t what I’d wanted to hear. I’d hoped someone had conked Hot Rod just to get him out of the way long enough to steal a car. But the force of the blow had Carter believing the intent was to kill Hot Rod, not just disable. That was a whole different ball game.
It made no sense to kill someone over grand theft auto. That meant turning a non–death penalty crime into a death penalty crime, and Louisiana wasn’t scared to hand out lethal injections if they thought the crime was suitably horrific. Hot Rod had some cool stuff in his shop, but I hadn’t seen anything worth killing over.
There had to be something else going on. I’d believed Ida Belle before when she said something didn’t add up. Now I felt the same way, which wasn’t good for Ida Belle, me, or Carter, because I was about to do what I’d just sworn I wouldn’t do.
I was going to stick my nose in it.
I woke up early the next morning after a long night of tossing and turning and a couple of really odd dreams. In one of them, I’d been a real librarian and Celia was in the library insisting that I’d stolen the book she wanted to borrow. Every time I went to the shelf to retrieve the book, it was gone. It was like being in some awful loop of horror from which there was no escape.
I’d also had a dream about facing down Ahmad. In that one, no matter how many times I squeezed the trigger of my pistol, the gun wouldn’t fire. I’d had that dream on several occasions, and it never failed to unnerve me. Living undercover in Sinful didn’t exactly allow for me to keep in top assassin shape. Sure, I could go to the range and fire off some rounds, but it wasn’t nearly the same as the military training I went through with the CIA when I was in between missions.
I headed downstairs to put on some coffee and fix breakfast. While I was frying eggs, I sent Ida Belle and Gertie a text asking them to come over as soon as they could. I had just polished off my eggs and toast when I heard a key in the front door, and Ida Belle called out a second later as the front door squeaked open.
“In the kitchen,” I said.
They walked in, Gertie shaking her head.
“The fact that you’re in the kitchen doesn’t really need saying, you know,” Gertie said.
“Are you trying to tell me I’m fat?” I asked.
Ida Belle gave me a critical look. “You are starting to lose a little tone in your arms and shoulders. You should add some push-ups after your morning run.”
“What morning run?” Gertie asked. “Half the time, we’re sitting right here stuffing our faces in the morning and lately, she’s spending the other half sneaking out of Carter’s house before daylight.” Gertie winked at me.
“I’ll have you know,” I said, completely ignoring the wink, “that I have only gained five pounds since I’ve been here, and given what I’ve eaten, that’s a miracle.”
“It’s probably from all the running you’ve done from people shooting at you,” Ida Belle said. “I mean, a lot of it was anaerobic, but you had some longer bursts in there that probably burned off a pot roast or two.”
“Are you kidding me?” I asked. “Just trying to figure out what the heck is wrong with Celia has probably burned more calories than I consume in any given day. But anyway, I didn’t call you over here to assess my weight, muscle tone, or dietary and exercise habits.”
“Or your predawn activities,” Gertie said.
“Or those. I called you over here to talk about Hot Rod. Have you heard anything else about his condition?”
Ida Belle nodded. “He’s been in and out of consciousness all night, but he’s only in for short amounts of time and doesn’t seem to know what’s going on. According to my source, Deputy Breaux was at the hospital all night, but Hot Rod was never lucid enough for him to get any information out of him.”