Lean Mean Thirteen

  I'd like to think I am good in an emergency, but the truth is, instinct takes over, and it doesn't always lead to intelligent action. The moment I smelled the smoke, I went completely spastic. My only thought was to get as far away as possible as fast as possible. I tumbled through the door, all flailing arms and frantic legs, and slid down five stairs before getting my footing. I was about to open the ground-floor door when there was a sound like a giant pilot light igniting. Phunnnnf!

  I opened the stairwell door to a wall of flame and more spastic horror. I slammed the door shut and ran back up the stairs. There were no windows in the storeroom, only windows in the torched office. I scrambled over broken glass into the office, opened a window on the outside wall, and looked down. I was at least thirty feet from the ground.

  So here was a choice. I could dive headfirst and splatter like Humpty Dumpty, or I could stay in the building and burn like the guy at the desk.

  Randy came running from the body shop. “Jump!” he yelled at me.

  “Its too far.”

  A second guy came running. “Holy shit,” he said. “What's she doing up there?”

  “Get the truck,” Randy said to the guy. “Hurry!”

  Flames were starting to lick up the side of the building, and the floor was hot under my feet. An eighteen-wheeler rolled out of the body shop, over the grass, and idled at the front of the warehouse.

  “He's going to drive it under you, and you need to jump fast before it catches fire,” Randy yelled at me.

  Okay, so it was a little Hollywood. Doesn't mean it wouldn't work. And it's not like I had a lot of options.

  I straddled the open window, the truck moved in, I swung my other leg over, sucked in some air, and jumped. I hit the metal roof feetfirst and lost my balance. I went to my hands and knees, looking for something to grip, clawing at air. I slid over the side of the trailer and grabbed a strut as the truck drove away from the building. I hung like that, flopping around and swearing, for just a couple of seconds before my fingers released and I crashed to the ground.

  I was spread-eagled on my back with all the air knocked out of me. I had cobweb vision. The truck engine chugged in my ear, and Randy bent over me. His face was inches from mine, the sun framing his Wild Man of Borneo hair in a glorious corona.

  I couldn't speak. The air hadn't yet returned to my lungs. “Un,” I said.

  “What should I do?” he asked. “Should I feel for broken bones? Maybe around your rib cage. Loosen your clothes.”

  “Unl”

  “It was worth a try,” he said. “A guys gotta try, right?”

  “I'm assuming I'm not dead.”

  “No. You're just a little scratched up and…”

  “And what?”

  “And nothing.”

  “You're looking at my hair. What's wrong with my hair?”

  “It's a little… singed.”

  I closed my eyes. “Shit.”

  “You're not gonna cry, are you? My girlfriend always cries if I say the wrong thing about her hair. I hate that.”

  I made an effort to get up, but I was in pain everywhere and not making much vertical progress. Finally, Randy got me under the armpits and dragged me to my feet.

  “I don't suppose you found the guy you were looking for,” Randy said.

  “Hard to tell.”

  “Are you waiting around for the police and the fire trucks?”

  “Do you think they will come?”

  “Not unless we call them.”

  Tm not inclined to do that."

  “Me either.”

  “Thanks for getting me out of there,” I said to Randy. “That was a really big truck.”

  “It's a double-decker car hauler. We use it to… uh, haul cars.”

  The warehouse was an inferno, completely engulfed in flames, the heat stinging my skin. Black smoke billowed about a quarter mile into the sky.

  “It's a decent fire,” Randy said, looking up at the smoke. “We might get some action on this one.”

  I limped to the Buick, managed to get behind the wheel, and did some slow breathing. I sat for a couple of minutes, collecting myself. A bay door to the body shop opened, and the car hauler rolled out. The shop had cleaned up for visitors.

  I got the Buick started and followed the hauler to Route One. Sirens screamed in the distance, but we were traveling away from them. When we reached Route One, the hauler went north and I went south. I took the Broad Street exit and drove back to my apartment. Rangers Porsche and my purse were still at my parents' house, but I wasn't going to retrieve them looking like this. I'd lost about an inch of hair, and the ends were scorched black and frizzed. I was cut and scraped and blistered and sore. I was going to take a shower and crawl into bed and stay there until my hair grew back.

  I stepped out of the elevator and slowly propelled myself down the hall, leaving smudges of soot and blood. Before the day was over, Dillon would be working on the carpet with his rug shampooer. Mental note: Get a six-pack for Dillon.

  I opened my door, trudged inside, and almost keeled over when I saw Ranger. He was sitting in my living room, in my only good chair, his elbows on the arms, his fingers steepled together in front of him. His face showed no emotion, but he was radiating anger. I could have popped corn on the invisible energy Ranger was throwing.

  “Don't start,” I said to him.

  “Do you need a doctor?”

  “I need a shower.”

  His eyebrows raised ever so slightly.

  “No,” I said.

  I limped into the bathroom and whimpered when I saw my reflection in the mirror. I closed the door and dropped my clothes onto the floor. Lucky for me, the weather was still cool, and I'd been wearing a heavy sweatshirt and jeans. The clothes had saved most of my skin from the broken glass. I washed away the grime and a lot of the blood. I slapped some Band-Aids over the deeper gashes, got dressed in clean clothes, and went out to face Ranger.

  “You got home early,” I said.

  “I had to fly charter. Couldn't get on a commercial plane with my man.”

  “How did you know I wasn't visiting my mom?”

  Stephanie Plum 13 - Lean Mean Thirteen

  “Your visits are never that long. Hal got suspicious and called your cell and talked to your grandmother.” “I wanted to take a look at the warehouse, and I was afraid I'd be followed by a RangeMan caravan.”

  He didn't say anything to that. If you didn't know Ranger, you would think he looked relaxed in the chair, one long leg extended, one bent at the knee, arms on the upholstered armrests. If you knew him at all, you would be extremely wary.

  I sat across from him, on the couch, easing myself down. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes for a moment, struggling with composure, not wanting to burst into tears in front of Ranger. I opened my eyes and blew out a sigh because he was still there, watching me.

  “I assume you burned the warehouse down,” Ranger finally said.

  “It wasn't my bad. I think someone set a bomb, and I got caught.”

  “Anyone else in there?”

  "A dead guy. He was sitting behind a desk on the second floor. Looked like he'd been toasted with a flamethrower. I only know flamethrowers from movies and the six o'clock news, but that's what it looked like to me. The body was burned beyond recognition. It was awful. Both Dickie and Smullen are missing. I suppose it could have been one of them. No way to know for sure.

  “I was leaving when the building caught. I was in the stairwell. Something went phunnnnf and then there was fire everywhere. I had to go back up to the office and jump out the window. That's the short version.”

  “Did anyone see you there?”

  “No one we need to worry about.”

  “You should pass this on to Morelli so they know to look for the body.”

  “I'll pass it on, but trust me, there's no body left.”

  “What kind of shape are you in?” Ranger asked. “Are you functioning? We've still got Stewart Hansen on ice
at RangeMan. You can bring him in now, and no one will associate you with the cannabis farmhouse fire.”

  “He won't tell anyone?”

  “I don't think he'll remember,” Ranger said. “And if he does say something, I doubt anyone will believe him. We've been keeping him very happy.”

  “Do you have him drugged?”

  “Quality weed, Ella's cooking, and nonstop television on a fifty-inch plasma.” Ranger stood and pulled me to my feet. “Would you rather do this tomorrow?”

  “No. I'll be okay.”

  “You don't look okay. You've got blood soaking through your jeans.”

  I looked down at my leg. “I should have used a bigger Band-Aid.”

  “Do you need stitches?”

  “No. It's just a cut. I had to go through a smashed window to get out of the building.”

  “I'm going to ask you again. Do you need stitches?”

  I didn't know. I hoped not.

  “Let me see it,” Ranger said.

  I bit into my lower lip. This was embarrassing.

  “Babe, I've seen it all,” Ranger said.

  “Yes, but you haven't seen it lately.”

  “Has it changed?” he asked.

  That got me smiling. “No.”

  I popped the snap to my jeans and slid them down. I was wearing a lime green lace thong, which was a lot like wearing nothing.

  Ranger looked and smiled. “Pretty,” he said. Then his attention moved to the gash in my leg. “I know you don't want to hear this, but it'll heal faster and neater if you get some sutures in it.”

  We put a washcloth against the cut and wrapped my leg with surgical tape.

  “Do you have any other injuries that are this serious?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. “This was the worst.”

  We went to St. Frances emergency and had a minimal wait. The kids with colds and the after-lunch heart attack victims had all been cleared out. There'd been only one Sunday afternoon gang shooting, and he'd been D.O.A. And it was still early in the day for domestic violence.

  My leg was pumped full of local anesthesia and stitched. I got salve for the burns on my neck and face, and antiseptic ointment for my other scrapes and cuts.

  Louise Malinowski was working emergency. I'd gone to school with Louise. She was now divorced with two kids and back home living with her mom.

  “Who's the hot guy out there?” she asked, helping me get my jeans up over my numb leg and new stitches.

  “Carlos Manoso. He owns a security agency downtown.”

  “Is he married?”

  “He’s as unmarried as a man can get.”

  Ranger watched me buckle myself in. We'd left the Buick in my lot and taken his Porsche turbo. It was black and new and fast, just like all his other cars, but even more so.

  “Where do all these new black cars come from?” I asked him.

  “I have a deal. I provide services for cars.”

  “What sort of services?”

  “Whatever is required.” He put the car in gear and pulled away from the hospital. “I'm going to take you to your parents' house so you can get your purse, and I want you to call Morelli.”

  Not something I was looking forward to. This wasn't going to make Morelli happy.

  “What?” Morelli said when he answered the phone. Not sounding especially mellow.

  “How's it going?”

  “It's going not fast enough. What's up?”

  “Did you hear about the fire at the warehouse on Stark?”

  “No. I don't hear about anything. I'm locked away, babysitting a moron, and I'm looking at an episode of Raymond that I've seen forty-two times.”

  “Dickie and his partners owned a warehouse on Stark and-”

  “Oh, Christ,” Morelli said. “Don't tell me.”

  “It burned down… just now.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Ranger took me to get stitches.”

  There was silence on the other end, and I imagined Morelli was staring down at his shoe with his lips pressed tightly together.

  “Anyway, I'm fine,” I told him. “I just got cut on some glass when I had to break a window to get out. Is it okay to talk on your cell phone like this? I mean, no one can listen, can they?”

  “Everyone can listen,” Morelli said. “Don't let that stop you. Is this conversation going to get worse?”

  “If you're going to give me attitude about this, I'm not going to talk to you.”

  I looked over at Ranger, caught him smiling, and punched him in the arm.

  “No one saw me,” I said to Morelli. “I left before the fire trucks arrived. And it wasn't my fault. I'm pretty sure someone set a bomb. The thing is, there was a guy sitting behind a desk on the second floor, and I think he'd been toasted with a flamethrower. I doubt there's much left of him after the second fire, but Ranger wanted me to tell you.”

  This created a lot more silence.

  “Hello?” I said.

  “Give me a moment,” Morelli said. “I've almost got myself under control.” “How much longer are you going to be on this assignment?” I asked Morelli. “At least two more days. Let me talk to Ranger.”

  I gave Ranger my phone. “Morelli wants to talk to you.”

  'To,“ Ranger said. He did some listening, and he cut his eyes to me. ”Understood,“ he said to Morelli. ”Don't expect miracles. She's an accident waiting to happen.“ Ranger disconnected and handed the phone back to me. ”I'm in charge of your well-being."

  “Morelli should mind his own business.”

  “That's exactly what he's doing. You're a couple. You are his business.”

  “I don't feel like his business. I feel like my own business.”

  “No shit,” Ranger said.

  What was worse, I was caught off guard by the couple status. “Do you think Morelli and I are a couple?”

  “He has his clothes in your closet.”

  “Only socks and underwear.”

  Ranger parked in my parents' driveway and turned to face me. “You want to be careful what you tell me. My moral code stops short of 'Do not covet someone else's woman.' You've been holding me at arm's length, and I respect that, but I'll move in if I feel that barrier relax.”

  I already knew this, but having it said out loud was disconcerting. I didn't want to make more of it than was necessary, so I tried being playful. “Are you telling me socks and underwear are borderline in terms of couple qualifications?”

  “I'm telling you to be careful.”

  When Ranger issued a warning, he didn't do playful.

  “That's just great,” I said. “I'm so not good at being careful.”

  “I've noticed,” Ranger said.

  My grandmother opened the front door and waved.

  Ranger and I waved back, and I eased myself out of the car and went to retrieve my bag.

  “Is that blood on your pants leg?” my grandmother asked when I stepped into the foyer.

  “Kitchen accident,” I said. “Its fine. Gotta go. Just came in to get my bag. I'll bring the Buick back later.”

  I hurried to the Porsche and angled in.

  “Barnhardt is two houses down and across the street,” Ranger said. “She was here when we drove up. She must have spotted the Cayenne.”

  Ranger rolled out of the driveway and down the street. Joyce rolled with us, staying a couple car lengths back.

  “I'm taking you home with me,” Ranger said. “I have to catch up on paperwork and meet with Tank, and I don't want to worry about you. You can spend the night and turn Hansen in when the court opens in the morning.”

  “I can't spend the night at RangeMan.”

  “Morelli said I should keep you safe.”

  “Yes, but no one's after me. I've just had some unfortunate luck.”

  “Babe, you've destroyed a car, burned down two buildings, stapled a guy's nuts, and you have sixteen stitches in your leg. Take a night off. Have a glass of wine, watch some television, and go to
bed early.”