14 Fearless Fourteen (27 page)

It looks like a lot of the money survived. I don't think the lab
tech made it.“ ”What about Loretta?“ ”The lab tech told Dom she's
locked away in his basement.“ ”I've got his address,“ Morelli said.
”Spanner fed me the information on my way over. The tech's name is
Steve Fowler, and besides being a crime scene tech, he also did
some moonlighting as security at the bank ten years ago.“ I
followed Morelli and we wound through the Burg and took a left into
Morelli's neighborhood. He parked in front of a row house that
looked like all the other row houses on the street. Two stories.
Small front yard. Neat but unexceptional. No indication that a
killer lived inside. We all piled out of our cars and went to the
door. We all looked a little grim. We weren't sure what we'd find.
Amputation isn't pretty. And for that matter, we weren't convinced
Loretta was still alive. Morelli tried the door. Locked, of course.
He moved to a window. Also locked. He put his elbow to it, and it
shattered. He cleared some glass away, opened the window, and went
in. He opened the door for us and told everyone to stay in the
foyer. He drew his gun and moved to the cellar door. Dom and I were
silent, gnawing on our lower lips, barely breathing. A couple
minutes passed, and there were footsteps on the cellar stairs, and
next thing, Loretta was standing there in front of us. She was pale
and shaking and her hair was snarled. She was crying and laughing.
Borderline hysteria. We all stared at her feet and hands. No big
bandages. No sign of amputation. ”You have all your toes,“ I said
to her. She looked down at herself. ”Yeah,“ she said. ”What do you
mean?“ ”He said he chopped off two toes. I saw them.“ ”Not mine,“
Loretta said. I looked at Morelli, and Morelli shrugged. He hadn't
a clue who belonged to the toes. It was Six o'clock, and we were
all in front of the television eating meatball subs, tuned in to
the news. Mooner, Gary, Zook, Loretta, Dom, Morelli, Bob, and me.
Lula had declined in favor of a night with her big Honey Pot. The
party was thrown by Mooner with money he'd collected when the
Econoline exploded. Mooner'd given twenty thousand to Loretta and
Zook, ten thousand to the animal shelter so they could offer free
cat-spaying, and he'd bought a very used mellow yellow Corvette
with the remaining money. True, the money was slightly illegal, but
hell, this was Mooner we were talking about. Almost everything he
did was slightly illegal. Brenda's theme song came up, and we all
sat forward. Brenda popped onto the screen wearing a low scoop-neck
sweater and a tiny skirt. She had two black eyes and a Band-Aid on
her nose. ”Here I am with an exclusive on the
nine-million-dollar-mystery conclusion,“ Brenda said. ”You'll have
to excuse my appearance, as I was in a freak pizza accident.“ There
was film of the maroon Econoline going out of control, crashing
into the deli, and exploding. And then Brenda was on film with the
tissues up her nose. ”And here we have an interview with the man
who took down the vicious criminal responsible for murder, mayhem,
and kidnapping.“ The camera panned to Mooner, and everyone in
Morelli's living room yelled and whistled. ”Tell us exactly how you
did it,“ Brenda said, pointing the mic at Mooner. ”It was with my
potato rocket,“ Mooner said, looking into the camera. ”And my
munitions man, Gary, deserves some credit for giving me exactly the
right potato.“ The camera returned to Brenda. ”There you have it,“
she said. ”Another exclusive from Brenda. And, sadly for you, but
happily for me, this is my last piece of news on this station. I'm
going national with my own reality show.

And I'm cohosting the show with my very own stalker and psychic,
Gary.“ There was more whistling and cheering on our part, and Gary
took a bow. Dom stood and raised a bottle of beer. ”Now that all
this is over and Loretta's safe, I want to say, let bygones be
bygones, and I still think Morelli's a piece of shit for getting
Loretta pregnant and walking away, but I'm not gonna kill him like
I planned.“ Loretta looked up at Dom. ”What the heck are you
talking about? Morelli isn't Mario's father. Morelli was a jerk. I
wouldn't have anything to do with him.“ ”Then who's the father?“
Dom wanted to know. ”It was Lenny Garvis. I got pregnant the night
before he died. I didn't want to make a big deal about it. Mario
always knew, but I didn't tell anyone else.“ Lenny Garvis! He was
in Morelli's class. Two years ahead of me and mentally a few years
behind. I remembered his death. The idiot choked on a peanut butter
and banana sandwich. I mean, how could you possibly choke on a
peanut butter sandwich? Dom wasn't convinced. ”I saw you in the
garage with Morelli.“ ”That wasn't me,“ Loretta said. ”That was
Jenny Ragucci. She was such a slut.“ Morelli smiled. ”It could have
been Jenny Ragucci. That makes much more sense.

I had good luck with sluts.“ I looked over at him. ”All in the
past,“ Morelli said. ”I'm a cupcake man now.“ ”Whoa, dude,“ Mooner
said. ”That's so, like, cosmic."