Two for the Dough

  “What am I signing?”

  “Preliminary report.”

  “How did Kenny get the foot into my refrigerator?”

  “Broken bedroom window. You need an alarm system.”

  One of the uniforms left, carrying a large Styrofoam cooler.

  I swallowed down a wave of revulsion. “Is that it?” I asked.

  Morelli nodded. “I did a fast cleanup of your refrigerator. You'll probably want to do a more thorough job when you have time.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate the help.”

  “We went through the rest of the apartment,” he said. “Didn't find anything.”

  The second uniform left, followed by the suits and the crime scene men.

  “Now what?” I asked Morelli. “Not much point in staking out Sandeman's place.”

  “Now we watch Spiro.”

  “What about Roche?”

  “Roche will stay with the funeral home. We'll tag after Spiro.”

  We taped a big plastic garbage bag over the broken window, shut the lights off, and locked the apartment. There was a small crowd in the hall.

  “Well?” Mr. Wolesky asked. “What was this about? Nobody'll tell us nothing.”

  “It was just a broken window,” I said. “I thought it might have been something more serious, so I called the police.”

  “Were you robbed?”

  I shook my head no. “Nothing was taken.” So far as I knew, that was the truth.

  Mrs. Boyd didn't look like she was buying any of it. “What about the ice chest? I saw a policeman carry an ice chest out to his car.”

  “Beer,” Morelli said. “They were friends of mine. We're going to a party later.”

  We ducked down the stairs and trotted to the van. Morelli opened the driver's side door, and sick-dog odor poured out, forcing us to retreat.

  “Should have left the windows open,” I said to Morelli.

  “We'll let it sit for a minute,” he said. “It'll be fine.”

  After a few minutes we crept closer.

  “It still smells bad,” I said.

  Morelli stood fists on hips. “I don't have time to scrub it down. We'll try riding around with the windows open. Maybe we can blow it out.”

  Five minutes later, the smell hadn't faded.

  “That's it for me,” Morelli said. “I can't take this smell anymore. I'm trading up.”

  “You going home for your truck?”

  He made a left onto Skinner Street. “Can't. The guy I borrowed the van from has my truck.”

  “The undercover pig car?”

  “Being fixed.” He hooked onto Greenwood. “We'll use the Buick.”

  Suddenly I had a new appreciation for the Buick.

  Morelli pulled up behind Big Blue, and I had the door open and my foot to the pavement while the van was still rolling. I stood outside in the crisp air, breathing deep, flapping my arms and shaking my head to rid myself of any residual stench.

  We got into the Buick together and sat there for a moment appreciating the lack of odor.

  I rolled the engine over. “It's eleven o'clock. You want to go straight to Spiro's apartment, or do you want to try the funeral home?”

  “Funeral home. I spoke to Roche just before you got out of the shower, and Spiro was still in his office.”

  The lot was empty when I got to Stiva's. There were several cars on the street. None looked occupied. “Where's Roche?”

  “Apartment across the street. Over the deli.”

  “He can't see the back entrance from there.”

  “True, but the exterior lights work on motion sensors. If someone approaches the back door the lights will go on.”

  “I imagine Spiro can disengage that.”

  Morelli slouched in his seat. “There's no good vantage point for watching the back door. If Roche was sitting in the parking lot, he still couldn't see the back door.”

  Spiro's Lincoln was parked in the drive-through. The light was on in Spiro's office.

  I eased the Buick to the curb and cut the engine. “He's working late. Usually he's out of here by now.”

  “You have your cell phone with you?”

  I gave him the phone, and he tapped in a number.

  Someone responded on the other end, and Morelli asked if anyone was home. I didn't hear the response. Morelli ended the call and returned the phone.

  “Spiro's still there. Roche hasn't seen anyone go in since the doors closed at ten.”

  We were parked on a side street, beyond the reach of the streetlight. The side street was lined with modest row houses. Most were dark. The burg was an early-to-bed, early-to-rise community.

  Morelli and I sat there in comfortable silence for half an hour, watching the funeral home. Just a couple of old law enforcement partners doing their job.

  Twelve o'clock rolled around. Nothing had changed, and I was feeling antsy. “There's something wrong with this,” I said. “Spiro never stays this late. He likes money when it comes easy. He's not the conscientious type.”

  “Maybe he's waiting for someone.”

  I had my hand on the door handle. “I'm going to snoop around.”

  “NO!”

  “I want to see if the back sensors are working.”

  “You'll screw everything up. You'll spook Kenny if he's out there.”

  “Maybe Spiro shut the sensors off, and Kenny's already in the house.”

  “He's not.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  Morelli shrugged. “Gut instinct.”

  I cracked my knuckles.

  “You're lacking some critical attributes of a good bounty hunter,” Morelli said.

  “Like what?”

  “Patience. Look at you. You're all tied up in knots.”

  He applied pressure at the base of my neck with his thumb and inched his way up to my hairline. My eyes drooped closed, and my breathing slowed.

  “Feel good?” Morelli asked.

  “Mmmmm.”

  He worked my shoulders with both hands. “You need to relax.”

  “If I relax any more I'll melt and slide off the seat.”

  His hands stilled. “I like the melting part.”

  I turned my face toward him, and our eyes held.

  “No,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I've already seen the movie, and I hate the ending.”

  “Maybe it'll have a different ending this time.”

  “Maybe it won't.”

  His thumb traced over the pulse in my neck, and when he spoke his voice was low and cat's-tongue rough. “How about the middle of the movie? Did you like the middle?”

  The middle of the movie had smoked. “I've seen better middles.” Morelli's face creased into a wide grin. “Liar.”

  “Besides, we're supposed to be watching for Spiro and Kenny.”

  “Don't worry about it. Roche is watching. If he sees anything he'll call my pager.”

  Was this what I wanted? Sex in a Buick with Joe Morelli? No! Maybe.

  “I think I might be getting a cold,” I said. “This might not be a good time.”

  Morelli made chicken sounds.

  My eyes rolled to the top of my head. “That is so juvenile. That is just the response I'd expect from you.”

  “No it's not,” Morelli said. “You expected action.” He leaned forward and kissed me. “How's this? Is this a better response?”

  “Umm . . .”

  He kissed me again, and I thought, well, what the hell—if he wants to get a cold, that's his problem, right? And maybe I wasn't getting a cold, anyway. Maybe I had been mistaken.

  Morelli pushed my shirt aside and slipped the straps of my bra over my shoulders.

  I felt a shiver ripple through me and chose to believe the shiver was from the cool air . . . as opposed to a premonition of doom. “So you're sure Roche will page you if he sees Kenny?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” Morelli said, lowering his mouth to my breast. “Nothing to worry abo
ut.”

  Nothing to worry about! He had his hand in my pants, and he was telling me I had nothing to worry about!

  My eyes rolled to the top of my head again. What was my problem? I was an adult. I had needs. What was so wrong about satisfying those needs once in a while? Here I had a chance for a real quality orgasm. And it wasn't as if I had false expectations. I wasn't some dumb sixteen-year-old expecting a marriage proposal. All I expected was a goddamn orgasm. And I sure as hell deserved one. I hadn't had a social orgasm since Reagan was president.

  I did a fast check of the windows. Totally fogged. That was good. Okay, I said to myself. Go for it. I kicked my shoes off, and stripped of everything but my black string bikinis.

  “Now you,” I said to Morelli. “I want to see you.”

  It took less than ten seconds for him to get undressed, five seconds of which he used up on guns and cuffs.

  I snapped my mouth closed and surreptitiously checked for drool. Morelli was even more amazing than I'd remembered. And I'd remembered him as being freaking outstanding.

  He hooked a finger under my bikini string, and in one fluid movement removed my panties. He tried to mount me, and hit his head on the steering wheel. “Been a long time since I've done this in a car,” he said.

  We scrambled to the back and fell together, Morelli in an unbuttoned washed denim shirt and white sweat socks, and me in a fresh rush of uncertainty.

  “Spiro could kill the lights, and Kenny could sneak in the back door,” I said.

  Morelli kissed my shoulder. “Roche would know if Kenny was in the house.”

  “How would Roche know?”

  Morelli sighed. “Roche would know because he's wired the house.”

  I pushed away. “You didn't tell me! How long has the house been wired?”

  “You aren't going to make a big deal of this, are you?”

  “What else haven't you told me?”

  “That's it. I swear.”

  I didn't believe it for a second. He was wearing his cop face. I thought back to dinner, and how he'd miraculously appeared. “How did you know my mother was cooking lamb?”

  “I smelled it when you opened the door.”

  “Bullshit!” I grabbed my purse from the front seat and dumped the contents between us. Hairbrush, hair spray, lipstick, pepper spray, travel pack of tissues, stun gun, gum, sunglasses . . . black plastic transformer. Fuck.

  I snatched at the bug. “You son of a bitch! You wired my pocketbook!”

  “It was for your own good. I was worried about you.”

  “That's despicable! That's an invasion of privacy! How dare you do this without asking me first!” And it was also a lie. He was afraid I'd get a bead on Kenny and not cut him in. I rolled the window down and threw the transformer out into the street.

  “Shit,” Morelli said. “That thing's worth four hundred dollars.” He opened the door and went out to retrieve it.

  I pulled the door closed and locked it. Damn him anyway. I should have known better than to try to work with a Morelli. I climbed over the seat and slid behind the wheel.

  Morelli tried the passenger side door, but it was locked. All the doors were locked, and they were going to stay that way. He could freeze his stupid dick off for all I cared. Serve him right. I revved the engine and took off, leaving him standing in the middle of the street in his shirt and socks, with his woody hanging half-mast.

  I got a block down Hamilton and reconsidered. Probably it wasn't a good idea to leave a cop standing naked in the middle of the street. What would happen if a bad guy came along? Morelli probably couldn't even run in his condition. Okay, I thought, I'll help him out. I made a U-turn and retraced to the side street. Morelli was right where I'd left him. Hands on hips, looking disgusted.

  I slowed, rolled my window down, and tossed him his gun. “Just in case,” I said. Then I floored it and roared away.

  Stephanie Plum 2 - Two For The Dough

  14

  I quietly crept up the stairs and breathed a long sigh of relief when I was safely locked in my bedroom. I didn't want to explain my I've-been-making-out-in-a-Buick-rat's-nest hair to my mother. Nor did I want her to glean through X-ray vision that my panties were stuffed into my jacket pocket. I undressed with the lights off, slunk into bed, and pulled the covers up to my chin.

  I awoke with two regrets. The first was that I'd left the stakeout and had no idea if Kenny had been caught. The second was that I'd missed my window of opportunity to use the bathroom, and once again, I was last in line.

  I lay in bed, listening to people shuffle in and out of the bathroom . . . first my mother, then my father, then my grandmother. When Grandma Mazur creaked down the stairs, I wrapped myself in the pink quilted robe I'd gotten for my sixteenth birthday and padded to the bathroom. The window over the tub was closed against the cold, and the air inside was thick with the scent of shaving cream and Listerine.

  I took a fast shower, towel-dried my hair, and dressed in jeans and a Rutgers sweatshirt. I had no special plans for the day, other than to keep an eye on Grandma Mazur and to keep tabs on Spiro. Of course, that was working on the assumption that Kenny hadn't gotten himself caught last night.

  I followed my nose to coffee brewing in the kitchen and found Morelli eating breakfast at the kitchen table. From the look of his plate he'd just finished bacon and eggs and toast. He slouched back at the sight of me, coffee cup in hand. His expression was speculative.

  “Morning,” he said, voice even, eyes not giving up any secrets.

  I poured coffee into a mug. “Morning.” Noncommittal. “What's new?”

  “Nothing. Your paycheck is still out there.”

  “You come by to tell me that?”

  “I came by to get my wallet. I think I left it in your car last night.”

  “Right.” Along with various articles of clothing.

  I took a slurp of coffee and set the cup on the counter. “I'll get your wallet.”

  Morelli stood. “Thank you for breakfast,” he said to my mother. “It was wonderful.”

  My mother beamed. “Any time. Always nice to have Stephanie's friends here.”

  He followed me out and waited while I unlocked the car and scooped his clothes together.

  “Were you telling the truth about Kenny?” I asked. “He didn't show up last night?”

  “Spiro stayed until a little after two. Sounded like he was playing computer games. That was all Roche picked up on the bug. No phone calls. No Kenny.”

  “Spiro was waiting for something that never happened.”

  “Looks like it.”

  The tan wreck of a cop car was parked behind my Buick. “I see you got your car back,” I said to Morelli. It had all the same dents and scrapes, and the bumper was still in the backseat. “I thought you said it was being fixed.”

  “It was,” Morelli said. “They fixed the lights.” He glanced over at the house and then back at me. “Your mother is standing at the door, watching us.”

  “Yep.”

  “If she wasn't standing there, I'd grab you and shake you until the fillings fell out of your teeth.”

  “Police brutality.”

  “It has nothing to do with being a cop. It has to do with being Italian.”

  I handed him his shoes. “I'd really like to be in on the takedown.”

  “I'll do the best I can to include you.”

  We locked eyes. Did I believe him? No.

  Morelli fished car keys out of his pocket. “You'd better think of a good story to tell your mother. She's going to want to know why my clothes were in your car.”

  “She won't think anything of it. I've got men's clothes in my car all the time.”

  Morelli grinned.

  “What were those clothes?” my mother asked when I came into the house. “Pants and shoes?”

  “You don't want to know.”

  “I want to know,” Grandma Mazur said. “I bet it's a pip of a story.”

  “How's your hand?” I as
ked her. “Does it hurt?”