Look Alive Twenty-Five (Stephanie Plum #25)(31)

We all stopped and had giant pretzels and ice cream and went to the second level. We passed by Mr. Alexander’s, Classy Nails, and a wig shop.

“There’s a novelty store here that has all kinds of good stuff,” Lula said. “They have about forty different kinds of vibrators. You could get Valerie one of those. What girl doesn’t want a vibrator?”

Somehow, I couldn’t see Valerie at the table, unwrapping a vibrator while my mother cut the birthday cake.

“There’s a bookstore here somewhere,” Lula said. “I’ve never been in it, but I saw it advertised. Maybe she would like a book.”

“She has four kids,” I said. “She hasn’t got time to read.”

“That’s a shame,” Lula said. “Everyone should read.”

“Do you read?”

“No. But I think about it sometimes. Problem is, I go to a bookstore and there’s so many books I get confused. So, I get coffee. I know what I’m doing when I order a coffee.”

Hal looked like his feet hurt, and he would be thankful for a lobotomy.

“We’ve been walking around for hours,” Lula said. “I’m out of ideas, and Hal and me need to get back to the deli.”

“Suppose it was your sister,” I said to Lula. “What would you get her?”

“That’s easy,” Lula said. “I’d get her one of them BeDazzler kits. They got them in that novelty store with the vibrators.”

Done and done. We stopped at the card store on the way out of the mall, and I got a big gift bag, some pink tissue paper, and a card. I stuffed the BeDazzler into the bag, signed the card, and I was ready to party.

I called Ranger and told him I’d be with Morelli for Valerie’s birthday dinner, so I was sending Hal back to the deli with Lula.

“I’m going to have to give Hal a combat bonus,” Ranger said. And he disconnected.





CHAPTER TWELVE


HAL WALKED ME to my parents’ front door, and in the absence of Morelli, turned me over to Grandma Mazur. Morelli arrived twenty minutes later.

“Am I late?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “I was early. Is there any new information on the shoe snatcher?”

“We have a medical report on Vinnie that suggests he was shot in the back with a dart gun. That’s probably how he was taken down.”

“Would a drug work that fast?”

“It could, depending on the drug used and the amount administered.”

“Anything else?”

“No. He doesn’t remember anything. We’ve canvassed both neighborhoods multiple times and haven’t found any witnesses. No one’s heard screaming or shots fired. If the bad guys are driving the victims away, they must be using a commonly seen car that’s completely unmemorable.”

“Vinnie is the odd man,” I said. “He’s the only one who was taken from a different location, and he’s the only one who was returned.”

“Maybe he wasn’t up to standards, and the aliens pressed the reject button.”

I could easily see this happening.

My parents’ dining room table normally seated six. Tonight, it had been expanded to seat nine plus a high chair. It was a small house with a small dining room that now had wall-to-wall table.

“It’s six o’clock,” my father said. “They’re late. They’re always late.”

The front door crashed open, and the girls rushed in. Angie the grade A student, Mary Alice who thought she was a horse, and two-year-old Lisa. Baby Bert was in a sling contraption that draped around Valerie’s shoulder.

“Lisa made poo-poo in her pants,” Mary Alice said. “She’s stinky.”

“That’s not an acceptable thing to say,” Valerie said. “ ‘Stinky’ is a hurtful adjective.”

“Well, she don’t smell like roses,” Grandma said. “I’m pretty sure she’s stinky.”

My father was already at his seat at the head of the table. “Where’s my ham? It’s after six.”

Albert Kloughn, Valerie’s husband and the father of two of her four kids, came in last with his arms filled with presents and the diaper bag slung over his shoulder. Kloughn is my height, has thinning sandy-colored hair, a face like a cherub, and a body like the Pillsbury Doughboy. He’s sweet but clueless. This is an especially bad combination for him, since he’s a lawyer.

My sister Valerie was the perfect child all through school. Her long hair was sleek and blond. Her grades were excellent. She was never caught smoking or sneaking out her bedroom window. And she actually liked to attend mass. I was the problem child. I broke my arm trying to fly off the garage roof, smoked my first and last joint at Girl Scout camp, and I could see no point in learning to multiply and divide when I had a calculator that did it for me.

Valerie’s hair is still sleek and blond, and so far, no one’s caught her smoking. Her perfection was slightly marred when she divorced her philandering first husband, but she’s still one up on me because she’s remarried now, and has given my mother grandchildren. The closest I come to grandchildren for my mother is a hamster.

Grandma took Lisa to the bathroom for cleanup, and everyone else worked at squeezing themselves around the table. I helped my mother bring the food out. Virginia-baked ham, red gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans, applesauce, and macaroni salad.