Game On: Tempting Twenty-Eight (Stephanie Plum #28)(64)

“I’ll talk to them,” Tank said.

I looked around.

“The Porsche is gone,” I said.

“Probably just spare parts by now,” Ranger said. “No self-respecting Demon would let a Porsche go to waste.”

“Do you think a fire truck is on the way?” I asked Ranger.

“Not a chance,” Ranger said.

I took a picture of what remained of the Bronco for insurance purposes.

Ranger picked a chunk of chili out of my hair. “Food fight?” he asked.

“A hiccup in an apprehension.”

“I’ll take you home,” Ranger said. “Tank will do cleanup here. Jorge just arrived. He can take Vinnie home.”

“Sounds good.”

We walked back to Ranger’s car and he opened the door for me. “Your place or mine?”

“My place,” I said. “I need to break the bad news to Diesel.”



* * *




Diesel was sprawled on the couch, watching television, when I walked in.

“Good thing there’s sports,” he said. “Everything else on television is worthless.”

“I have bad news.”

“Worse than my television announcement?”

I showed him the picture of his car.

“What is it?” Diesel asked.

“Your car.”

Diesel sat up and looked at the picture again. “You should have used low light mode. All I can see is a bonfire.”

“That’s your car.”

“The bonfire?”

“Yep.”

“Has it ever occurred to you that you should be using public transportation?”

“Vinnie spotted Oswald turning onto Stark Street. I was on his bumper when he parked and ran into an alley. Long story short is I left the Bronco temporarily parked in gang territory and somebody fired about fifty rounds into it, and it caught on fire.”

“And then you took its picture?”

“I thought you might need it for insurance purposes. There’s also a police report.”

“What happened to Oswald?”

“Disappeared,” I said.

Diesel stood and stretched. His T-shirt rode up, exposing his toned abs, and I might have attacked him if I didn’t have chili in my hair. Thank goodness for chili.

“You smell good,” Diesel said. “You smell like a chili dog. It’s making me hungry.” He walked past me, into the kitchen. “Do you want something? Beer? Leftover whatever it is we’ve got in the fridge?”

“No thanks,” I said. “I’m going to take a shower and go to bed.”

“Ana came in and did some tidying up while you were gone. She’s got fresh sheets on the bed. Just in case you’re feeling domestic. That’s a chore you can cross off your list.”

No wonder he was taking a nap on the couch when I came home, I thought. Ana probably exhausted him. At least she had the courtesy to change the linens.





CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR


Diesel was already at his computer when I shuffled into the kitchen for morning coffee.

“This isn’t normal,” I said. “You’re supposed to still be asleep. You never wake up before me.”

“It occurred to me while you were in the shower last night that Oswald would need a way to get home. He probably conducted whatever business he was doing in the alley, found out he didn’t have a car, and walked away from the scene. The logical thing for him to do would be to look for a car to steal but in that part of Trenton that might be a problem. Cars have wheel locks and alarms. So, he might walk a couple blocks into a safer neighborhood where he could get picked up by Uber.”

“Smart thinking,” I said.

“It gets better. I had Melvin hack into the Uber computer, and he texted me an hour ago with the information. Uber did a pickup four blocks from Stark Street at the right time and took the customer to an address on East State Street. The customer was Oliver Welk. Oliver Welk is one of Oswald’s known aliases.”

“So, we’re back to State Street.”

“Your dad’s cab pickups and drop-offs, the sightings, and the Uber drop-off are all within a four-block area and all on State Street. Ground zero is the intersection of East State and South Broad. I have the map up on my screen. It’s strange. He keeps coming back to this area, but he seems to camp out in other unoccupied spaces like his rental apartment and his victims’ homes.”

“Maybe he feels safer moving around.”

“In the beginning of the week you saw Oswald leaving an office building on State Street. We never circled back to that building,” Diesel said. “We should check it out.”

I poured my coffee into a to-go mug, grabbed a frozen waffle, and hung my messenger bag on my shoulder.

“It’s fifty degrees and drizzling,” Diesel said.

I snagged a sweatshirt from the hooks by the door. “I’m ready.”

We got to the parking lot and the only transportation option was the borrowed Buick. Diesel drove so I could enjoy my breakfast.

“I’ve driven tanks that cornered better than this car,” Diesel said.

“Where did you drive tanks?”

“Afghanistan.”