Fortune and Glory (Stephanie Plum #27)(20)

I knew the cop in the second car. He gave me a short wave, and I tried not to cringe when I returned the wave. This was going to get back to Morelli.

The Rangeman number buzzed on my cell phone.

“Babe,” Ranger said. “Your car is in a red zone.”

“The Margo sort of got blown up, but I’m okay,” I said.

“Good to know,” Ranger said. And he disconnected.

“That was a hideous experience,” Lula said. “And I think I might have a knife stuck in my hair.”

I pulled the knife out and handed it over to her.

“Am I bleeding?” she asked.

“Not that I can see,” I said.

Lula felt her hair. “I got a lot of product in my hair today. I was going for a certain look.”

A big chunk of Lula’s hair fell off her head and floated down to the ground.

“Damn,” Lula said. “I hate when that happens.”





CHAPTER TEN


Connie looked up when we walked in. “Oh boy,” she said, eyeing Lula’s hair.

“We had an incident,” Lula said. “Are there any of those donuts left? I lost mine.”

Connie moved the donut box to the edge of her desk. “Help yourself.”

“If you don’t mind, I’m gonna take the box and go home,” Lula said. “I’ve had an upsetting day.”

Lula left and I slouched in the chair in front of Connie’s desk. “This was bad,” I said. “We blew up the Margo. I guess technically Lou Salgusta blew it up.”

“When you say you blew it up… exactly what does that mean?”

“Explosion. Smoke. Fire. Big crater where the Margo used to be.”

“Wow. And Salgusta?”

“Don’t know. I’m hoping for the worst.”

“Was anyone hurt?”

“No. Not seriously. A bunch of people got a contact high from the weed burning and one of the customers slipped going down the stairs and cracked his head.”

Connie’s attention shifted to the door. “Uh oh,” she said. “Morelli’s here, and he doesn’t look happy.”

I’d been dreading this. The Margo fiasco wasn’t going to help smooth things over with us. If anything, it was going to reinforce his position that I was a nut case. Morelli started out as a wild kid and turned into a more or less sane adult. I started out as a more or less normal kid and lately I’ve become a walking disaster.

I gave up a sigh and turned in my seat. “Hey,” I said to Morelli.

He crooked his finger at me. “I’d like to see you outside.”

I did an eye-roll at Connie and joined Morelli on the sidewalk. If you dressed Morelli up in a suit, he looked like a gangster. If he was undercover and required to wear khakis, he looked ridiculous. Today he was wearing his usual outfit of black running shoes, dark jeans, a blue button-down shirt, and a black blazer. Today he was hot cop. He was lean and muscled, with black wavy hair, a constant five o’clock shadow, and testosterone to spare. His father was an abusive, womanizing drunk. His grandmother is batshit crazy. Morelli is none of those things. Morelli is a good cop, and until recently he’d been a good boyfriend.

“I just came from what’s left of the Margo,” Morelli said. “I was told I missed you by a couple minutes.”

I leaned into him a little. “You smell smoky,” I said.

“I smell like burnt weed. Do you want to explain this to me?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Do it anyway,” Morelli said.

“I was pretty sure that Charlie Shine’s car was parked by the Margo, so…”

Morelli went to his eyes-narrowed cop face. Never a good sign.

“If you want me to keep going, you’re going to have to get rid of the scary cop face,” I said.

“Not gonna happen,” Morelli said. “Keep going anyway.”

I went to my own eyes-narrowed, don’t-mess-with-me face. “Fine,” I said. “Whatever. Lula and I went to the Margo to check things out. We opened the basement door and heard someone singing the Hi Ho Hi Ho song.”

“What’s the Hi Ho Hi Ho song?”

“The Seven Dwarfs song.”

I sang the song for him and he cracked a smile. When Morelli smiled it was like puppies and fresh-baked, warm chocolate chip cookies. His brown eyes got soft and dark, and I wanted to snuggle into him. The snuggle was usually followed by the desire to undress him. All things considered, this wasn’t appropriate at the present time and place, so I kept my distance and told myself to get a grip.

“We went down to investigate, and it turned out it was Lou Salgusta singing,” I said. “He got carried away when he saw Lula and me and accidentally set about six bales of weed on fire. The bales were next to some crates labeled EXPLOSIVES, and that was the end of the Margo.”

“You’re lucky it wasn’t the end of you.”

“We were already on our way out when the first explosion went off. Are you assigned to investigate the fire?”

“I’m investigating a homicide that took place at the Margo last week. I wanted to make sure the two incidents were unrelated.”

“And?”

“Now that I’ve spoken to you, I don’t see a connection,” Morelli said.