Game On: Tempting Twenty-Eight (Stephanie Plum #28)(11)

Lula and I walked toward the back of the house and pushed through a gate to a fenced-in yard that was bordered with overgrown hedges and shrubs. Lula pointed to a small shed near the back door. There were a couple of trash cans by the shed, plus a clump of ugly bushes, a kid’s Big Wheel bike, and a scooter.

Lula advanced to the shed, and when she was four feet away, Krick jumped out and trained a hose on her. Lula freaked out, tripped on the scooter, and went down. I fought my way through the water spray and tackled Krick. We were locked together, rolling around on the ground with water shooting out everywhere. Lula pounced on us and pinned Krick long enough for me to cuff him. I shut the water off and yanked Krick to his feet.

“What the heck were you thinking?” Lula said to Krick.

“I was thinking I didn’t want to go to jail,” Krick said.

“We would have bonded you out again,” Lula said. “And it’s not like you even committed a real crime. You aren’t going to get sent up the river for ten years because you dropped your drawers. And even if you do get a couple days, it’s not a big deal. Martha Stewart did time, and she came out looking real good. Now there’s a woman I admire. She knows how to accessorize, and she has excellent advice on home goods. Her laundry basket recommendations are all quality items.”

“I guess I panicked,” Krick said.

I marched Krick out of the yard to my car and settled him into the backseat. Lula and I were soaking wet and caked with mud.

Lula put her hand to her head. “What about my hair?” she said. “Do I have Sandra Bullock hair?”

“You never had Sandra Bullock hair. You look like someone with brown hair who got drenched and almost drowned.”

“That’s probably not a good look,” Lula said. “I’m thinking I’m done for the day.”

“Yep. Me, too. We’ll drop Krick off at the cop shop and go back to the office so you can get your car.”





CHAPTER FIVE


I didn’t see any sign of Diesel when I returned to my apartment. This was turning out to be a good day. I’d made a capture and Diesel had obviously found another place to live. I tossed my wet clothes into my laundry basket. Martha Stewart hadn’t personally recommended the basket to me, but it was cheap and plastic, so it met my needs.

I jumped into the shower and by 5:30 PM my hair was dry and brushed into waves as opposed to the usual curls and frizz. I was wearing clean jeans and a scoop-neck fitted T-shirt. My messenger bag was hung on my shoulder, I had a beach towel under my arm in case my car seat was still wet, and my laundry basket was balanced on my hip. Yet another advantage of the weekly visit to my parents’ house was the use of their washer and dryer.

My parents live in the Burg, a small community of modest houses and mostly hardworking Americans that’s stuck onto the larger city of Trenton. While many parts of the country are struggling with changing ideologies, the Burg continues to march to the beat of its own drum, thumbing its nose at political correctness. The Burg is awash in immigrant origins and Jersey attitude. The inhabitants are God-fearing busybodies who settle arguments with neighbors the old-fashioned way—with a bag of flaming dog poop on the offender’s front porch.

My grandma Mazur was at the front door when I drove up and parked. Grandma moved in with my mom and dad when Grandpa went upstairs to live with Jesus. She’s still alive because we took my father’s gun away from him and he’s too squeamish to butcher Grandma with the carving knife.

Grandma and Lula use the miracle of spandex to good advantage. Lula uses it to contain an abundance of flesh and Grandma uses it to shore up body parts that have begun to sag. In Grandma’s case, that’s almost all body parts. She was wearing a zebra-striped spandex top, black spandex Pilates pants, and white sneakers. Her hair was cut short and had returned to its natural shade of gray, after a trial period of red.

She held the door open for me so I could squeeze through with my laundry basket. “Don’t you look nice,” Grandma said. “I like the ponytail but it’s good to see your hair down and wavy like this. You have such pretty hair. It comes from our Hungarian side of the family. That and a good metabolism. All the women on our side keep a good figure to old age.”

Okay, to be honest, Grandma has a body like a plucked soup chicken, but she isn’t fat, and she makes the best of what she has. I mean, at the end of the day, isn’t that what we all strive for in life?

My dad is retired from the post office and now drives a cab part-time. He was currently in his chair in the living room watching television with his eyes closed. We tiptoed past him and took the laundry into the kitchen.

“Look who’s here!” Grandma said to my mom.

Grandma said this like it was something extraordinary. I’d been coming home for dinner almost every Friday night since I graduated from college and moved out of the house, but to Grandma it was special. And this made it special to me. It was nice to be wanted somewhere after a day of chasing down losers who dreaded seeing me at their door. Even though I’d brought my family countless hours of embarrassment and disappointment, they still loved me. Amazing, right?

My mom was at the counter, mashing potatoes. Tonight’s dinner would be pot roast and gravy, mashed potatoes, red cabbage, and green beans. Only the vegetable varied on Friday nights. Sometimes the green beans were changed out for cooked carrots or peas. Because Morelli was present, dessert would be his favorite chocolate cake.