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Authors: Janet Evanovich

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BOOK: 14 Fearless Fourteen
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The bonds office door opened, and Lula swung her ass over to my
car and yanked the door open.

“What's up?” Lula said to the kid.

Zook didn't answer. Still pouting.

“I'm here to escort you out of the car,” Lula said, leaning in,
filling the doorframe with her red hair extensions and acres of
chocolate-colored boob barely contained in a low scoop neck
zebra-stripe sweater.

Zook focused on Lula's gold tooth with the diamond chip, and
below that what seemed like a quarter mile of cleavage, and his
eyes almost fell out of his head. “Cripes,” he said, kind of
croaky-voiced, shrinking back into his seat, fumbling to get out of
his seat belt.

“I got a way with men,” Lula said to me.

“He's not a man,” I told her. “He's just a kid.”

“Am too a man,” he said. “Want me to prove it?”

“No,” Lula and I said in unison.

“What's this?” Connie wanted to know when the three of us walked
into the bonds office.

“I need to leave Mario someplace for an hour while I hop over to
Rangeman.”

“I told you my name is Zook! And what's
Rangeman?”

“I work with a guy named Ranger, and Rangeman is the security
company he owns.”

“Are you the Zook that writes his name all over town?” Lula
asked him. “And what kind of name is that anyway?”

“It's my Minionfire name.”

“What's a Minionfire?”

“Are you kidding me? You don't know Minionfire? Minionfire's
only the world's most popular, most powerful, totally awesome,
badass difficult game. Don't tell me you've never heard of the
Nation of Minionfire?”

“In my neighborhood, we only got the nation of Bloods, Crips,
and Islam. Maybe a few Baptists, but they don't hardly count
anymore,” Lula said.

Zook took his laptop out of his backpack. “I can hook up here,
right?”

“Don't you have homework?” Connie asked him.

“I did my homework in detention. I gotta check on Moondog. He's
a griefer, and he's massing the wood elves.”

That caught Lula's attention. “Are these wood elves the same as
Santa's elves?”

“Wood elves are evil, and they can only be stopped by a
third-level Blybold Wizard like Zook.”

“You don't look like no Blybold Wizard,” Lula said. “You look
like a kid that's drilled too many holes in hisself. You keep doing
that, and stuff's gonna start leaking out.”

Zook's hand unconsciously went to his ear with the six
piercings. “Chicks dig it.”

“Yeah,” Lula said, “they probably all want to borrow your
earrings.”

“Getting back to the problem at hand,” I said, “I need to park
Mario, or Zook, or whoever the heck he is. Ranger wants to talk to
me about working a job for him.”

“Oh boy,” Lula said.

“A real job,” I told her.

“Sure,” Lula said. “I knew that. What kind of
job?”

“I don't know.”

“Oh boy,” Lula said.

Carlos M anoso is my age, but his life experience is worlds
away. He's of Cuban heritage and has family in Newark and Miami.
He's dark-skinned, dark-eyed, and his hair is dark brown and
currently cut too short for a pony-tail but long enough to fall
across his forehead when he's sleeping or otherwise occupied in
bed. He's got a lot of muscle in all the right places and a killer
smile that is rarely seen. His street name is Ranger, a leftover
from his time in Special Forces.

When I started working for Vincent Plum Bail Bonds, Ranger was
doing mostly bounty hunter work and was my mentor. He's now
co-owner of a security company with branches in Boston, Atlanta,
and Miami. He wears only black, he smells like Bulgari Green shower
gel, he's extremely private, and he eats healthy
food.

I'd be tempted to say he isn't a lot of fun, but he has his
moments. And on those rare occasions when we've been intimate...
WOW.

Rangeman Security is on a side street in center city Trenton.
It's housed in an inconspicuous seven-story brick building, the
name visible only on a small plaque above the door buzzer. The
seventh floor is Ranger's private apartment.

Two more floors are dedicated to housing Rangeman employees, one
floor is occupied by the property manager and his wife, Ella, the
fifth floor is control central, and the remaining two floors are
conference rooms, first-floor reception, and private offices. There
are two levels below ground and I've never gotten the personal
tour, but I imagine dungeons and armories and Ranger's personal
tailor toiling away.

I key-fobbed my way into the underground garage and parked next
to Ranger's black Porsche Turbo. I took the elevator to the fifth
floor, waved hello to the guys at the monitoring stations, and
walked across the room to Ranger's office. The door was open, and
Ranger was at his desk, talking on a headset.

His eyes went to me, he wrapped up his conversation and removed
the headset.

“Babe,” he said.

Babe covered a lot of ground with Ranger. It could be good, bad,
amused, or filled with desire. Today it was hello.

I sat in the chair across from his desk. “What's
up?”

“I need a date,” Ranger said.

“Is date synonymous with sex?”

“No. It's synonymous with business, but I could throw some sex
in as a bonus if you're interested.”

This got a smile from me. I wasn't interested for a bunch of
complicated reasons, not the least of which was Joe Morelli. Still,
it was nice to know the offer was on the table. “What's the
business?”

“I've been asked to provide security for Brenda.”

“The Brenda? The singer?”

“Yes. She'll be in town for three days doing a concert, some
media, and a charity fund-raiser. I'm supposed to keep her dry and
drug-free and out of harm's way. If I assign one of my men to her,
she'll eat him alive and spit him out in front of the press. So I'm
taking the watch, and I need someone riding
shotgun.”

“What about Tank?”

Tank is Ranger's next in command, and he's the guy Ranger trusts
to watch his back. Tank's called Tank because that's what he is.
He's seven feet of muscle packed into a six-foot, four-inch,
no-neck body. Tank is also Lula's current boyfriend.

“Brenda's management team has requested security be invisible at
public functions, and it's hard to hide Tank,” Ranger said. “Tank
and Hal will work shifts standing guard at Brenda's hotel. When
she's at large, we'll take over. She can pass us off as traveling
companions, and you can go into the ladies' room with her and make
sure she doesn't test-drive mushrooms.”

“Doesn't she have her own bodyguard?”

“He slipped and broke his ankle getting off the plane last
night. They've shipped him back to California.”

“I'm surprised you're taking this on.”

“I'm doing it as a favor for Lew Pepper, the concert promoter.”
Ranger passed a sheet of paper to me. “This is Brenda's public
appearance schedule. We need to be at her hotel a half hour ahead.
And we're on call. If she leaves her room, we're
there.”

I looked at the schedule and chewed on my lower lip. Morelli
wasn't going to be happy to have me spending this much time with
Ranger. And Brenda was a car crash. Like Cher and Madonna, she
didn't use a last name. Just Brenda. She was sixty-one years old.
She'd been married eight times. She could crack walnuts with her
ass muscles. And she was rumored to be mean as a snake. I couldn't
remember her last album, but I knew she had a cabaret act going.
Baby-sitting Brenda had “nightmare” written all over
it.

“Babe,” Ranger said, reading my thoughts. “I don't ask a lot of
favors.”

I blew out a sigh, folded the paper, and put it in my jeans
pocket. “Looks like the fund-raiser is tonight. Meet and greet at
five-thirty. I'll meet you in her hotel lobby at
five.”

Zook was IN the land of Minionfire when I rolled into the bonds
office. Connie was working on the computer at her desk, and Lula
was packing up, getting ready to leave. “I gotta get home and
beautify,” Lula said. “Tank's coming over tonight. This here's the
third time this week I'll see him. I think this is getting serious.
I wouldn't be surprised if he was gonna pop the
question.”

“What question are you thinking about?” Connie
asked.

“The big question. The M question. He probably would already
have asked the M question, except he's so shy. I been thinking I
might help him along with it. Make it easy on him. Maybe I need to
get him liquored up first, so he's nice and relaxed. And maybe I'll
stop at the jewelry district on the way home and get an engagement
ring, so he don't have to do a lot of shopping. You know how men
hate shopping.”

“How're we doing with Loretta's bond?” I asked
Connie.

Connie slid a glance at Zook, bent over his laptop, and then
looked back at me. The silent communication was no luck so far.
Hard to get someone to post a couple thousand dollars in bond when
the last person to post bond for Loretta ended up forfeiting their
money.

Lula had her bag on her shoulder and her car keys in her hand.
“What'd Ranger want with you?”

“He's running security for Brenda for the next three days, and
he wants me to ride shotgun.”

Morelli lived halfway between my apartment at the edge of
Trenton proper and my parents' house in the Burg. It was a modest
two-story row house on a quiet street in a stable blue-collar
neighborhood. Living room, dining room, kitchen, and powder room on
the first floor. Three small bedrooms and bath upstairs. So far as
I know, he'd never eaten in the dining room. Morelli ate breakfast
at the small table in the kitchen, lunch at the sink, and dinner in
front of the television in the living room. There was a single-car
garage at the back of the property, accessible by a rutted alley,
but Morelli almost always parked his SUV at the curb in front of
the house. The backyard was narrow and strictly utilitarian, only
used by Morelli's dog, Bob.

I parked and looked over at Zook. “You know Joe Morelli,
right?”

“Wrong.”

“You're related.”

“That's what I hear.” Zook studied the house. “I thought it
would be bigger. It's all my uncle talks about since he got out of
prison. He said it was supposed to go to him, but Morelli swindled
him out of it.”

“Hard to believe of Morelli,” I said.

“I thought he was supposed to be the big, bad, tough cop and
lady-killer. What's he want with this dorkopolis?”

In the beginning, I struggled with that one, too. I saw Morelli
in a cool condo with a big-screen television and a kick-ass sound
system and maybe a pinball machine in his living room. Turns out
Morelli was tired of sailing that ship. Morelli went into Rose's
house with an open mind, and the house and Morelli took stock of
each other and adapted. The house gave up some of its stuffiness,
and Morelli dialed down his wild side.

I pulled the key from the ignition, got out of the car, and
walked to the front door with Zook trailing after
me.

“This is so lame,” Zook said, dragging his feet. “I can't
believe my mother tried to rob a stupid booze
shack.”

I didn't know what to say to him. I didn't want to make out like
armed robbery was okay, but at the same time, I didn't want to be
gloom and doom. “Sometimes good people do dumb things,” I said. “If
you hang in there with your mom, it'll all work out... eventually.
Step back when I open the door, or Morelli's dog will knock you
over.”

I unlocked the door, and there was a woof and the sound of dog
feet galloping toward us from the kitchen. Bob appeared, ears
flapping, tongue out, slobber flying in all directions. He hurtled
past us, leaped off the small porch, went straight to the nearest
tree, and lifted his leg.

Zook went wide-eyed. “What kind of dog is he?”

“We're not sure, but we think he's mostly Golden Retriever. His
name is Bob.”

Bob peed for what seemed like half an hour and trotted back into
the house. I closed the door after him and checked the time. Four
o'clock. Morelli's shift ended at four. It would take him thirty
minutes to drive home. I had to be dressed and at the hotel by
five. The hotel was thirty minutes from my apartment at this time
of night. It wasn't going to work.

Zook looked around Morelli's living room. “Can I go wireless
here?”

“I don't know. Morelli's computer is upstairs in his office, but
I've seen him work down here as well.”

Zook pulled his laptop out of his backpack. “I'll figure it
out.”

“That's great, because I have to go. Morelli should be home any
minute now. I'm going to trust you to stay here and wait for him
and not get into trouble.”

“Sure,” Zook said.

I called Morelli on his cell. “Where are you?”

“I just turned onto Hamilton.”

“We're at your house. Unfortunately, I have a job at five, and I
have to go home first to change, so I'm going to leave Zook here
alone for a few minutes.”

“Who's Zook?”

“You'll see. And just a suggestion, but you might want to put
the Kojak light on the top of your car and step on the
gas.”

CHAPTER TWO

I live IN a one-bedroom, one-bath unit on the second floor of a
no-frills, three-story, redbrick apartment building. There's a
small lobby with a small unreliable elevator. The front entrance
looks out on a busy street filled with small businesses. The rear
exit backs up to a tenant parking lot. My bedroom and living room
windows look out at the parking lot. Lucky me, because this is the
quiet side, except at five a.m. on Mondays and Thursdays, when the
Dumpster gets emptied. I share my apartment with a hamster named
Rex.

I rocked to a stop in the lot, bolted from the car, bypassed the
elevator, and took the stairs two at a time. I ran down the hall
and rammed my key into my front door. I yelled hello to Rex on my
way to the bedroom. No time for extended
pleasantries.

Ten minutes later, I was out the door in black heels and my
little black suit with a white tank top under the jacket. I'd
spruced up my makeup and fluffed out my hair, and I'd dropped my
Smith & Wesson into my purse. The gun wasn't loaded, and I
didn't have time to hunt for bullets, but if I had to whack someone
in the head with my purse, it was nicely weighted.

BOOK: 14 Fearless Fourteen
12.88Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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