THIRTY-ONE
I TOOK LULA across town and parked opposite Buster’s building.
“It isn’t even eleven o’clock and already there’s a line here,” Lula said. “Ordinarily I don’t do lines, but this is different. I bet I could eat a whole pie. What kind are you going to get?”
“I’m going to skip the pizza. I just had a peanut butter sandwich. I’ll wait here with the critters.”
Lula got into line, and I relaxed in Ranger’s Mercedes. Vlatko was out of the picture. Ranger was safe. I was wearing my own underwear. Life was good.
A Camaro with tinted windows parked on the other side of the street, two doors down from Buster. The driver got out, walked to Buster’s door, unlocked the door with a key, and let himself in. The man was stocky. Black hair, dark skin. T-shirt and jeans. Hoodie over the T-shirt. Odd, since it was almost eighty degrees. My first thought was that he was hiding a gun. My second thought was that I needed a new life because lately I thought everybody was packing a gun, and I was usually right.
Lula hustled out of the pizza place with a big pizza box.
“Fresh out of the oven,” Lula said. “I had to pay extra for it because they said they were in a position where they had to pay extra for the herbs. Not that I care, because you know how important herbs are in pizza.”
She opened the lid and I looked at the pizza. It was spectacular.
“Maybe just one piece,” I said.
“Help yourself.”
I took a bite and sighed. “Yum.”
“You can say that again. This here’s my favorite pizza place of all time. It’s got something special about it. It must be those herbs.”
I looked at the pizza. Basil leaves, oregano, something else.
“You see these green things?” I asked Lula. “What are they?”
“Herbs.”
“Yes, but what kind?”
“I’m not actually up on my herbs,” Lula said.
I suspected it was weed. Anything this good had to be illegal. I picked them off my piece.
The dogs were restless in the back of the SUV.
“I’m going to walk the pack,” I said.
“You need help?”
“I’ll be fine. Briggs has been working with them, and they’re much better on the leash. Stay here and enjoy the pizza.”
I walked one block toward State Street and turned the corner. I knew there was an empty lot with some scraggly grass halfway down the block. I got to the lot and commanded the dogs to tinkle. They didn’t look immediately motivated, so I walked them around a little on the grass and got most of them emptied out. I came back to the Mercedes and found a note on Lula’s seat.
Got tired of sitting here so I took the last two pieces of pizza to Buster. Maybe I can get him to adopt a dog. Bring the dogs up when you get back.
Crap.
I looked up at Buster’s windows and called Lula. No answer. I didn’t trust Buster, and I had no idea what was going on with the hoodie guy. He didn’t look any different from the rest of the men on the street, but truth is, those guys were sort of scary-looking.
I crossed the street and pushed the intercom buzzer. No answer. I pushed it again.
“Yes,” someone said. Not Buster.
“Is Buster there?”
“No. Come back later.”
The intercom went dead.
I leaned on the button.
“What?”
“Is Lula there?” I asked.
“Who?”
“Lula.”
There was some static and muffled talking. And the door buzzed open. I stepped inside, took Morelli’s gun out of my messenger bag, and crept up the stairs, feeling like an idiot. I had eight Chihuahuas and a gun in my hand. Could it get any more ridiculous?
I stopped at the head of the stairs and listened. Dead silence. I stepped into the apartment and my heart flipped. Buster was sitting on a chair from the dining table with his arms handcuffed behind his back. Lula was out cold on the floor, twitching. The hoodie guy had a gun trained on me.
“What’s going on?” I said, trying hard to control my voice so I didn’t sound like Minnie Mouse.
“Put the gun down,” the hoodie guy said.
“Nope.”
“I’ll shoot you.”
“Maybe I’ll shoot you first,” I said. “Who are you anyway?”
“Miguel.”
“What happened to Lula?”
“Stun gun,” Miguel said. “I think she knocked herself out when she went down. She got no muscle coordination. What’s with the dogs?”
“We thought Buster might want to adopt one.”
“Buster’s not going to be in shape to take care of a dog. You don’t pay up to your creditors, you die. That’s our message. We give him girls and drugs, and we expect payment. That’s fair, right?”
The Chihuahuas were in a pack, pressed against my ankles, shaking bad enough for their eyes to pop out of their heads and roll across the floor.
“Yeah,” I said, “that’s fair, but he can’t pay you if he’s dead.”
“Our accountant writes it off as a bad debt and we move on,” Miguel said. “You can only spend so much time on these losers. Time is money.”
“Okay,” I said. “So how about if I drag Lula out of here and let you get on with your business transaction.”
“No can do that. It wouldn’t be good for my health to leave witnesses like this. I’m going to have to kill all of you. Good thing I got a lot of bullets.”
He clearly thought this last statement was hilarious, and he totally cracked himself up.
“Wha,” Lula said, the twitches turning to thrashing. “Whaaaa’s happening?”
“I might have to shoot her first,” Miguel said.
Lula’s eyes slid half open. “Jesus?”
“No. I’m Miguel,” he said.
Lula pushed herself up to a sitting position. “I’m all tingly.”
“Stun gun,” I said.
“Oh yeah, now I remember. That asshole stun-gunned me.”
She got to her feet, tugged her ultrashort spandex skirt down over her ass, adjusted the girls, and glared at Miguel.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?” Lula said. “Didn’t your mama teach you anything? You got no manners. And where’s the rest of my pizza?”
The Chihuahuas had stopped vibrating and were at rigid attention, focused on Miguel, their tiny lips pulled back in a snarl.
“Move to the wall,” Miguel said to Lula. “Hands on your head.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
“I’ll shoot cutie pie here.”
“Why you gonna shoot her and not me?” Lula asked.
“She’s got a gun.”
I was still holding the gun on him, and I was feeling freaked. Not only was I totally incompetent with a gun, but I had the gun in one hand and a fistful of leashes attached to Chihuahuas in the other. I dropped the leashes to have better control if I had to shoot, and the Chihuahuas flattened themselves to the floor and stalked Miguel.
“That’s friggin’ creepy,” he said.
“You better believe it,” Lula said. “Those aren’t any ordinary feral Chihuahuas. Those are minions. Those are trained killer Chihuahuas.”
“Maybe I need to shoot them,” he said.
Lula went into angry rhinoceros stance. “Kill!” she said to the Chihuahuas.
The dogs lunged at Miguel and sank their tiny Chihuahua teeth into his pant legs and held on.
“What the fuck?” Miguel said, trying to shake the dogs off, swinging his gun at them.
I caught movement from my peripheral vision, and Morelli stepped into the room.
“Police,” Morelli said. “Drop your weapon.”
Miguel turned on Morelli and fired. Morelli and I fired back, and Miguel dropped to the floor.
“Are you okay?” I asked Morelli.
“I swear I felt that bullet skim my ear, but yeah, I’m okay.”
Miguel was on the ground, bleeding from a single chest wound. The Chihuahuas were crowded in a corner, vibrating again. A second cop appeared and went to Miguel, cuffing him, checking on the gunshot wound, calling for backup and an EMT.
“Where the heck did you come from?” I asked Morelli.
“I’ve had Buster’s apartment under video surveillance. Mike saw you go in with the dogs and called me. It was dumb luck that I was already on Stark.”
“We both fired, but I only see one gunshot wound.”
“You took out Buster’s toaster. You need to spend more time on the practice range.”
“This is just a shame, what with him doing all this bleeding,” Lula said. “This looks like a brand-new rug.”
I had the little kitchen table set when Morelli strolled into his house at 5:30. He wrapped his arms around me and kissed me, and lifted the lid on the casserole warming on the stove.
“Beef stew,” he said. “Did you make this?”
“Nope. Your mom brought it over.”
He got a beer from the fridge and chugged some.
“I’m dying to hear more about Buster.”
“Yeah, sorry I couldn’t get free to call you. Turns out all the poker players were in business together. Pepper would send his trucks down, and girls and pot would come back along with the salsa. Scootch, Siglowski, Poletti, Ritt, and Buster all had their hands in it. When Poletti got arrested and things went sour, there was a lot of money owed the Mexicans. They sent an enforcer, Miguel, up to collect, and he systematically shot the players when they didn’t pay.”
“Why didn’t they just pay him?”
“The money wasn’t there. It wasn’t liquid. Briggs had talked Poletti and Pepper into long-term investments and land deals. The Mexicans wanted cash.”
“Briggs said Poletti had a ton of money stashed somewhere.”
“Not stashed. Invested in a chicken processing plant in Nogales. The plant was a total rust bucket infested with salmonella.”
“How’s Miguel?”
“He’ll live.”
“What’s going to happen to Buster and Pepper?”
“I don’t know. That’s for the feds to sort out.”
Morelli got a dish and spooned out some stew.
“This is nice. I like coming home to you and stew.”
“Maybe we should enlarge our family. What would you think about adopting an attack Chihuahua?”
“By the time I questioned Briggs late this afternoon, there were only two dogs that hadn’t been adopted. And he wanted to keep those two. And he said to tell you he got the job. He’s the new weatherman on the evening news. Some cable station. I didn’t get all the details. Might have been the local Fox affiliate.”
“Briggs is going to be on television? He’s only three feet tall. How is he going to reach Chicago on the blue screen when he does the weather?”
“I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s going to be worth watching.”
Morelli finished his dinner and pushed back from the table.
“Briggs said it was his dream job to be on television, and it was number twelve on his bucket list.”
“What’s with this bucket list thing? Suddenly everyone has a bucket list.”
“Don’t you have a bucket list?” Morelli asked.
“No. Do you?”
“Yeah.”
“Can I see it?”
“It’s not written down.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“Most of it involves you,” Morelli said.
“Oh boy.”
Morelli got a pad and a pen from the counter and returned to the table. “I’ll write it out for you, but if you read it, you have to do it.”
“No way! What kind of bucket list is this?”
“It’s my bedroom bucket list.”
I wasn’t surprised that Morelli would have a bedroom bucket list, but I was surprised that there was anything left to put on it.
He slid the pad over to me so I could read the list.
I looked down and grimaced. “I’m definitely not doing this first thing.”
“How about if you’re asleep?”
“No!”
“Drunk?”
“Under no circumstances.”
“I figured,” Morelli said, “but it was worth a shot.”
“And you’re going to have to explain that second thing. I’ve never heard of the Romanian Slippery Unicorn.”
Morelli grinned. “Clear the table and take your clothes off. I’ll get the egg timer and a spoon, and I’ll demonstrate.”
“You’re making this up.”
“Does it matter?”
“What’s the spoon for?”
“The Marshmallow Fluff.”
I kicked my shoes off and stripped my shirt over my head. Morelli and Marshmallow Fluff. My kind of dessert.