Look Alive Twenty-Five (Stephanie Plum #25)(45)

Twenty minutes later I was showered, dressed in clean clothes, and had a tote bag filled with enough overnight essentials for a couple days. I told Rex to be nice to Mrs. Delgado even though she had five cats, I locked my apartment, and I steered Luis to the stairs.

“Next stop is the bail bonds office on Hamilton Avenue,” I told Luis.

Traffic was light, and the weather was perfect. There was still a chill in the air, but by noon it be would in the high seventies. I was feeling good in my fleece sweatshirt, sitting in the immaculate Rangeman SUV.

“This is going to be a good day,” I said to Luis. “I have a feeling. Everything is going to go right today.”

“Yes, ma’am, Stephanie, ma’am,” he said.

Luis parked at the curb in front of the office and followed me in. Connie was at her desk, and Lula was at the coffee machine.

“Well, look at who we got here,” Lula said to Luis. “Hello, cutie. What’s your name?”

“Luis, ma’am.”

“I’m not no ‘ma’am,’ but I appreciate the respect,” Lula said.

“Yes, ma’am,” Luis said.

Lula shook her head. “He’s a hunk of love, but I’m guessing he’s dumb as a box of rocks.”

“This is Lula, and this is Connie,” I said to Luis. “You can call them Lula and Connie.”

“We got donuts on Connie’s desk if you want some,” Lula said. “The good ones are all gone, so we’d appreciate if you’d eat the lame ones that are left.”

“Ranger doesn’t like us to eat donuts,” Luis said.

“Hunh,” Lula said. “You do everything Ranger tells you to do?”

“Yes,” Luis said.

Vinnie’s office door banged open, and Vinnie looked out at us.

“It’s about time you showed up,” Vinnie said to me. “Where’s Waggle? Just because I got kidnapped don’t mean you can stop working.”

“Excuse me?” I said, eyes narrowed.

“Yeah, excuse us,” Lula said. “We’ve been working at your dumb-ass deli. And on top of that we went after Waggle, and I got shot in the hair. You got some nerve accusing us of not working.”

“Just get Waggle,” Vinnie said. “I got Harry up my ass.”

“Least it’s something you enjoy,” Lula said.

Vinnie growled and slammed and locked his door.

“We have a couple hours,” I said to Lula. “I guess we could try to find Waggle.”

“I’m game,” Lula said, hanging her bag on her shoulder. “But I couldn’t help notice you said we could try to find Waggle. That don’t show a lot of confidence. That’s a different attitude to ‘Let’s go get the sonnovabitch.’ I got a more aggressive frame of mind, being that I need to avenge my hairdo getting ruined.”

“You’re right,” I said. “Let’s go get the sonnovabitch. First stop is the deli so I can open the door. Second stop is Food Stuff. Hopefully Russel Frick is working.”

Luis drove us to the deli, and I hopped out and gave the key to Stretch.

“You are now the official keeper of the key,” I said.

“I don’t want the key,” he said. “The key would imply manager, and managers have a short shelf life here.”

“I think that’s over. I haven’t been snatched and Ranger wasn’t snatched. Besides, you don’t have to take the garbage out. You’re just in charge of locking and unlocking the door.”

“Do I get more money?”

“No.”

“Then what’s the point?”

“Fine! Great! I’ll give you five dollars extra every day you take charge of the key.”

“Done,” Stretch said.

I gave him the key, returned to the SUV, and Luis drove Lula and me to Food Stuff. We marched into the store and immediately spotted Frick.

“There he is,” Lula said. “He’s bagging, just like always. I’ll get a cart, and we can pick up a few things and get in line.”

“That’s not necessary,” I said. “We don’t need to shop. We just want to talk to him.”

“I still think we should buy something,” Lula said. “A rotisserie chicken or something.”

Luis was looking around as if at any moment disaster would strike.

“It’s Food Stuff,” I said to Luis. “You can relax.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, standing at attention, hand on his sidearm.

I went to the checkout to talk to Frick, and Lula went off to look at the chickens.

Frick stepped aside when he saw me. “I heard you had problems apprehending Victor,” he said.

“It wasn’t an ideal environment to make a capture.”

“It’s not an ideal environment for anything. You play bad music, and you could get shot. I didn’t see you Friday night. I thought for sure you’d be back.”

“I had other things going on,” I said.

“But now you’re looking for Waggle.”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t got anything to tell you,” Frick said. “He went home with a girl named Jillian. She’s a regular. He’s probably moved on to someone else by now. I don’t usually see him between gigs. Once in a while I run into him at Skoogie’s office when we need to pick up a check. We don’t make anything from Snake Pit, but Skoogie schedules private events. Mostly fraternity parties.”