18 Explosive Eighteen (2 page)

Salvatore DeAngelo was the contractor Harry had hired to rebuild the bonds office after it burned to the ground. DeAngelo was better known as the contractor from hel since he did everything
his
way, d i d
nothing
without a bribe, and worked on DeAngelo Time, which had no relationship to an actual workweek.

“Wel , at least it’s nothing serious,” I said.

“Yeah, but it could be if DeAngelo gets bonded out before Vinnie and comes back and sets fire to Vinnie’s bus.”

“Do you think DeAngelo would do that?” I asked Connie.

“Hard to tel what DeAngelo would do. That’s why I didn’t want to leave until you got here to stand guard.” Connie handed me the key to the gun cabinet. “You might want to pick something out and keep it handy.”

“You want me to shoot him?”

“Only if you have to,” Connie said, clomping down the stairs to the coach door in her four-inch cork wedges. “I won’t be long. And the files on the table are for you. They’re the no-shows for court that came in while you were on vacation.”

Oh great, I was supposed to babysit a bus that might at any moment go up in flames. On the other hand, Vinnie was my cousin and employer. And without the bus, we’d be renting space from the adult bookstore or working out of Connie’s Hyundai. Al that stil didn’t mean I was wil ing to get toasted protecting Vinnie’s makeshift office.

I took the Failure to Appear files outside, hauled a lawn chair out of the storage compartment under the bus, and set the chair in the shade. This way, I could divert a Molotov cocktail and not get trapped inside a flaming inferno.

I sat in the chair and paged through the files.

Purse snatcher, armed robbery, domestic violence, a burglary suspect, credit card fraud, assault, a second armed robbery. I wanted to be back in Hawaii. I closed my eyes and sucked in some air, searching for the smel of the sea and instead catching exhaust fumes and a funky stench coming off the construction Dumpster.

A car eased to a stop behind my RAV4 and two men got out. One of them was Salvatore DeAngelo, a short, barrel-chested guy with a lot of wavy black hair going gray. He was wearing pleated dress slacks, a silky black short-sleeved shirt, and a thick gold chain that was stuck in a mat of chest hair that looked slightly singed … no doubt from Vinnie shooting a bunch of volts into him with his Taser.

DeAngelo sauntered over to me and stood hands in pants pockets, jiggling change. “Hey, cutie,” he said. “What’s up? Any special reason why you’re sitting outside? Like, are you looking for street business? ’Cause I might have some business for you, if you know what I mean.”

I was thinking Vinnie did the right thing when he Tasered DeAngelo.

“I’m just doing my job,” I said. “I’m supposed to shoot you if you firebomb the bus.”

“I don’t see no gun.”

“It’s hidden.”

“I bet,” he said. “Let me know if you change your mind about takin’ care of my business. And give me some credit here. I don’t firebomb buses in broad daylight. I do that shit at night when no one’s around.” DeAngelo turned away and walked into the half-finished bonds office building, and I returned to my files.

The subject of the last file in the stack was a surprise. Joyce Barnhardt. She’d al egedly stolen a necklace from a downtown jewelry store and had assaulted the owner when he’d tried to retrieve it.

Vinnie had bonded her out of jail, and she’d failed to show for court three days later.

I’d gone al through school with Joyce, and she’d made my life a misery. She was an obnoxious, sneaky, mean kid, and now she was an unscrupulous, self-serving, man-eating adult. From time to time, she’d tried her hand at working for Vinnie in various capacities, but none of the jobs stuck. Truth is, Joyce made her money through serial marriage, and last I looked, she was doing just fine.

Hard to believe she’d stolen a necklace. Easy to believe she’d assaulted the store owner.

TWO

LULA’S RED FIREBIRD rol ed to a stop in front of the bus, and Lula swung herself out from behind the wheel and walked over to me. Her hair was dyed pink and teased into a big puffbal that looked surprisingly good against her brown skin, and her body was minimal y contained by her orange spandex skirt and white scoop neck tank top. She’s a former ’ho who gave up her street corner to work for Vinnie as a file clerk.

“You looking to get some sun sitting out here?” she asked. “Didn’t you get enough of that in Hawaii?”

I told her about Vinnie and DeAngelo, and how I was guarding the bus.

“It’s a hunk of junk anyways,” Lula said.

“What’s up for today?” I asked her. “Are you filing?”

“Hel no, I’m not getting stuck in the death trap bus.

I’l go catch bad guys with you.” She looked down at the files in my lap. “Who we gonna do first? Anything fun come in?”

“Joyce Barnhardt.”

“Say what?”

“She shoplifted a necklace and assaulted the store owner.”

“I hate Joyce Barnhardt,” Lula said. “She’s mean.

She told me I was fat. Can you imagine?” It wasn’t exactly that Lula was fat. It was more that she was too short for her weight. Or maybe it was that there was an excess of Lula and not ever enough fabric.

“I thought we’d save Joyce for last,” I told Lula. “I’m not looking forward to knocking on her door.” Connie’s Hyundai cruised down the street, made a U-turn, and parked behind the bus. Connie and Vinnie got out and walked over to me.

“Is DeAngelo here?” Vinnie asked.

“Yes,” I told him. “He’s inside the building.” Vinnie growled, doing his best imitation of a crazed badger backed into a corner, claws out.

“Cripes,” Lula said.

“It’s okay to go into the bus,” I said to Vinnie.

“DeAngelo only blows things up at night.” We al stood looking at the bus for a moment, not sure we believed that to be true.

“What the hel ,” Vinnie final y said. “My life’s in the crapper anyway.”

And he disappeared inside the bus.

“What’s with Joyce?” I asked Connie. “Did she real y steal a necklace?”

Connie shrugged. “Don’t know, but it’s gotten weird. Frank Korda, the store owner who pressed charges, is missing.”

“When did he go missing?” I asked.

“Later that same day. The nail salon across the street remembers the closed sign in the front door around four in the afternoon. His wife said he never came home.”

“And Joyce?”

“Vinnie bonded Joyce out right after she was arrested. She was scheduled for court three days later, and she never showed.”

“I bet Joyce snatched him,” Lula said. “She’d do something like that. I bet she got him in chains in her cel ar.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time Joyce put a man in chains,” Connie said, “but I don’t think she’s got him in her cel ar. She isn’t answering her phone. And I drove past her house last night. It was dark.”

“Holy cow,” Lula said, staring at my left hand. “You got a white ring on your finger where you didn’t get a tan. I didn’t notice that last night on the way home from the airport. What the heck did you do in Hawaii? And where’s the ring now?”

I made an effort not to grimace. “It’s complicated.”

“Yeah,” Lula said. “That’s what you said last night.

You just kept saying it was
complicated
.” Connie examined my left hand. “Did you get married while you were in Hawaii?”

“Not exactly.”

“How could you not exactly get married?” Lula wanted to know. “Either you get married or you don’t get married.”

I flapped my arms around and squinched my eyes shut. “I don’t want to talk about it, okay? It’s
complicated
!”

“S’cuse me,” Lula said. “I was just sayin’. You don’t want to talk about it? Fine. Don’t talk about it. Just

’cause we’re best friends don’t mean nothin’. We’re like sisters, but hey, don’t bother me if you don’t want to tel me something.”

“Good,” I said, “because I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Hunh,” Lula said.

Vinnie yel ed at Connie from inside the bus. “The phone’s ringing. Get the friggin’ phone!”

“
You
get the phone,” Connie yel ed back.

“I don’t do phones,” Vinnie said.

Connie made an Italian hand gesture at the bus.

“Idiot.”

“I suppose we should do something,” Lula said after Connie left to get the phone. “What else have you got there?”

I shuffled through my stack of skips. “Two armed robberies.”

“Pass on them. They always shoot at us.”

“Domestic violence.”

“Too depressing,” Lula said. “What else you got?”

“A purse snatcher and credit card fraud.”

“I’m liking credit card fraud. They never have a lot of fight in them. They’re always just sneaky little weasels. They just sit in the house al day shopping on the Internet. What’s this moron’s name?”

“Lahonka Goudge.”

“Lahonka Goudge? What kind of name is that?

That gotta be wrong. That’s a terrible name.”

“It’s what it says here. She lives in public housing.” Forty minutes later, we were in Lula’s car, motoring through the projects and searching for Lahonka’s apartment. It was midmorning and the streets were quiet. Kids were in school and day care, hookers were sleeping, and the drug dealers were congregating in parks and playgrounds.

“There it is,” I said to Lula. “She’s in 3145A. It’s the ground-floor apartment with the kids’ toys in the yard.”

Lula parked, and we walked to the door, picking our way around bikes, dol s, soccer bal s, and big plastic trucks. I raised my hand to knock, the door opened, and a woman looked out at us. She was my height, shaped like a pear, dressed in tan spandex pants and a poison-green tank top. Her hair was standing straight out from her head like it had been spray-starched and ironed, and she had huge hoop earrings hanging from her earlobes.

“What do you want?” the woman said. “And I don’t need any. Do I look like I need something? I don’t think so. And don’t touch none of my kids’ shit or I’l turn the dog out on you.”

And she slammed the door shut.

“She got a personality like a Lahonka,” Lula said.

“She even looks like a Lahonka.”

I banged on the door, and the door got yanked open.

“What?” the woman said. “I already told you I don’t want nothin’. I got a business goin’ here. I’m a workin’ woman, and I’m not buying any cookies, moisturizer, laundry soap, or jewelry. Maybe if you had some quality weed, but you don’t smel like weed pushers.”

She tried to slam the door shut again, but I had my foot in it. “Lahonka Goudge?” I asked.

“Yeah, so what?”

“Bond enforcement. You missed a court date and we need to reschedule you.”

“I don’t think so,” she said. “You got the wrong Lahonka. And anyways, even if I was the right Lahonka, I wouldn’t be going with you, on account of I got stuff to do. I got a pack of kids who need new sneakers, and you’re cutting into my prime earning time. I got eBay auctions goin’ on, and I’m making timely purchases elsewhere.”

Lula put her weight against the door and pushed it open. “We don’t got al day,” she said. “We got a whole batch of idiots to bring in, and I got a lunch date with a Deluxe Mr. Clucky Burger.”

“Oh yeah?” Lahonka said. “Wel , Clucky Burger this.”

And she gave Lula a two-handed shove that knocked her back two feet into me. I lost my balance, and we both went ass-first to the ground. The front door slammed shut, security bolts slid into place, and Lahonka pul ed the shade down on her front window.

“Probably, she’s not gonna open her door to you again,” Lula said.

I agreed. It was unlikely.

Lula hauled herself up and adjusted her girls. “Is it too early for lunch?”

I looked at my watch. “It’s almost one o’clock in Greenland.”

• • •

“That Lahonka took me by surprise,” Lula said, finishing off her second Clucky Burger. “I wasn’t on my game.”

We were eating in Lula’s car because there was a critical time limit to hanging out in Cluck-in-a-Bucket.

Minuscule globules of fry fat floated in the air like fairy dust, and exposure lasting longer than six minutes left you smel ing like Clucky Extra Crispy al day. It wasn’t an entirely bad smel , but it tended to attract packs of hungry dogs and big beefy men, neither of which I was currently interested in.

I pul ed a file out of my bag. “Maybe we want to try the purse snatcher next.”

“I don’t think that’s a good plan,” Lula said. “Purse snatchers are runners. That’s what makes them good purse snatchers. And I just had two Clucky Burgers. I’l get a cramp if I gotta chase after some skinny, baggy-pants idiot now. Don’t we have a bad guy who lives by the mal ? Macy’s is having a shoe sale.”

I checked the addresses. No one lived by the mal .

“I might need a nap after al that chicken,” Lula said.

A nap sounded like a good idea. I hadn’t gotten much sleep on the plane ride home. For that matter, I hadn’t gotten much sleep the whole time I was in Hawaii, what with al the nighttime activity. And tonight I was seeing Morel i, and I suspected that wouldn’t lead to a lot of sleep. Morel i and I had things to discuss.