Top Secret Twenty-One: A Stephanie Plum Novel(51)

“Sounds like a plan.”

My mother was ironing when Lula and I walked into the kitchen.

“Hey, Mrs. P.,” Lula said. “How’s it going?”

“She’s ironing,” Grandma said. “That’s how it’s going. She’s been ironing for four hours.”

“I guess you’re needing some mental health time, eh?” Lula said to my mom. “I know how that is. And ironing is real calming. Although you might want to think about how you’re scorching that shirt you’re working on.”

“She’s been ironing the same shirt for forty-five minutes,” Grandma said. “She’s run out of clothes.”

“Maybe you want to switch her over to alcohol before she starts to smoke,” Lula said.

“It’s Bella,” Grandma said. “Even though she has no good proof that I was the one who pied her, she’s going all over telling everyone I did it.”

“Well, were you the one?” Lula asked Grandma.

“I don’t want to admit to anything, but I might have done it.”

“So what’s the problem?”

“Everyone’s scared she’ll put the eye on them, so we got disinvited to Amy Shute’s wedding shower, and I got a phone call that the Bingo game was all full tonight, and when your mother went to mass this morning, no one would sit on that side of the church with her.”

“Before you know it, everyone will forget about it,” I said.

“As long as you’re already getting the heat, I think you should hit her again,” Lula said. “I think you should TP her house.”

My mother looked up, wild-eyed, and took off after Lula with the iron. “That’s the devil talking!” she shouted.

The plug popped out of the wall, and Lula put the kitchen table between herself and my mom.

“Take it easy, Mrs. P.,” Lula said. “You’re gonna get your blood pressure up and you’ll burst a blood vessel. That happened to my Aunt Celia, only she was working at the time being a ’ho.”

“No kidding?” Grandma said. “I guess it can be hard work being a ’ho.”

“You’re all lunatics,” my mother said.

“I don’t mean to be disrespecting or nothing, but you’re the one who got the iron,” Lula said. “How about we get you a pill or something?”

“I didn’t realize I still had it in my hand,” my mother said, looking at the iron.

“Happens to me all the time,” Lula said, “but usually it’s a gun or a donut.”

“Do you want me to go get the blood pressure machine?” Grandma asked my mom. “I got one upstairs for when I watch Naked and Afraid.”

“Not necessary,” my mother said. “I just had a moment.” She put the iron back on the ironing board. “Ironing doesn’t do it for me anymore. Maybe I’ll take up knitting again.”

“I don’t know if you want to be handling knitting needles while you’re having another one of them moments,” Lula said. “How about baking cupcakes? That’s a real good activity.”

“And my daughter’s a real good cupcake maker,” Grandma said. “Did you girls come over for something special?”

“Nope,” I said. “We were in the neighborhood and thought we’d say hello.”

“Yeah, just stopped by to say hello,” Lula said.

Grandma walked us to the door. “Are you going after bad guys now?”

“Yep,” Lula said. “We’re going to make the city a safer place.”

I wasn’t sure rousting a homeless guy out of his cardboard box was all that noble, but it was my job, and I was going to do it … probably.

We got into the Buick, and I turned to Lula. “I didn’t think this was a good day to mooch lunch.”

“Hell,” Lula said. “I’m not even hungry no more. And that hardly ever happens.”

We roared off with the V8 guzzling gas at a furious rate. I drove through town on autopilot and turned up Stark. Buster lived in a manageable part of Stark, not the best and not the worst. Forest Kottel lived two blocks up in an area that was not the worst but getting there fast. It was open range for gangs, crazies, and drugged-out zombies. Geneva Street was the demarcation line for Lula and me. We didn’t stop the car beyond Geneva if we could possibly avoid it. No FTA was worth it.

We passed the pizza place, drove two more blocks, and didn’t see a cardboard box on the corner of Stark and Geneva. I left-turned onto Geneva, and half a block in we ran into a city of cardboard boxes, plastic tents, and patched-together one-man shanties that had been erected in the alley cutting the block.

“Used to be you had to get on a plane to see a slum of this quality,” Lula said. “This is better than the tent city they got going under the bridge abutment.”

I parked the Buick at the corner and shoved pepper spray into one pocket and my stun gun into another. I hung handcuffs from my waistband and slung my messenger bag across my chest. For the most part I’ve found that homeless people aren’t violent, but many of them are crazy and unpredictable, especially when they live this far up Stark.

“Do you have your gun with you?” I asked Lula.

“Hell, yeah.”