Now or Never (Stephanie Plum #31)

Chapter Twenty-One

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Bob did his usual happy dance when he saw us. He got some hugs and a bunch of good boy s, and Morelli hooked him up to a leash. Sometimes Morelli takes Bob to the park to run, but mostly Bob gets walked around a couple blocks. Today was a “couple blocks” day.

“Are there any new developments on Zoran?” I asked Morelli.

“Toxicology came back from the woman in the laundromat. She had GHB in her system. And Ecstasy. She was probably drugged before being attacked. And the big thing is that we might have DNA from last night. The victim had a couple strands of hair and some skin cells under her nails. The blow to her head didn’t kill her. At some point, she must have put up a fight.”

“Did you find a match?”

“Not yet.”

“Are you going into Zoran’s house?”

“Jimmy’s working on it. We have your statement putting Zoran at the crime, so the search warrant should go through. Right now it’s sitting on a desk, waiting its turn.”

“It would be easier and faster if someone prowled through his garbage outside the house and found his hairbrush or whatever,” I said.

“There was no garbage outside his house,” Morelli said. “We looked.”

“Yes, but there might be later today.”

“I didn’t hear you say that.”

Bob did everything he had to do, and we returned to Morelli’s house. We went into the kitchen and stared into his refrigerator.

“Omigod,” I said. “Is that your mom’s lasagna?”

“Yeah, looks like it. She comes over and leaves stuff when I’m at work.”

Morelli had his mom, and I had Herbert.

“Your mom makes the world’s best lasagna,” I said. “I’m voting on lasagna for lunch.”

We pulled the lasagna out along with extra red sauce and grated cheese. We plated it, nuked it, and took it to Morelli’s kitchen table. His mom had also brought salad greens, but we left them for another day.

“How’s it going with the sorting your life out?” Morelli asked me.

I forked in some lasagna. “Honestly, I haven’t had time to think about it. It would help if you guys could get Zoran off the street.”

“We’re working on it.”

A half hour later I was back at the office. I was still in the sparkly tank top, but Lula had stopped off at her apartment and exchanged my T-shirt for a silky poison-green shirt with a low V-neck.

“You can keep the tank top,” Lula said, handing me my T-shirt. “You finally got a gun with bullets in it, now you need to get some glam in your wardrobe.”

“Thanks. This will be my first step toward more glam.”

“We were watching the new Hoodie video when you walked in,” Lula said. “It’s a good one. Hoodie hijacked a soft-serve truck. Ice cream sundaes for everyone. And then there was a short video of him breakdancing. It wasn’t terrible but it wasn’t good, either. And it had to be hard on account of he had one of those whole-head rubber masks on.”

I moved behind Connie, and she ran the videos for me. The ice cream truck was wild. Everyone was laughing and eating ridiculous amounts of ice cream. It was easy to see why people liked Hoodie. He made happiness. The breakdancing came next.

“Whoa,” I said. “This is awful! This is the equivalent of Herbert playing the clarinet.”

“He’s got a good move coming up,” Lula said. “He sticks a Michael Jackson thing in here.”

“Why would he do this?” I asked.

“He’s entertaining,” Lula said. “He does these odd bits every now and then. Breaks up the monotony of watching homeless folks.”

“And he keeps his income stream up,” Connie said. “People keep tuning in, so he keeps getting paid. I heard he uses the money to compensate people for their losses. Like when all those UPS packages didn’t get delivered.”

“That’s a lot of money,” I said. “I saw the video. There were a lot of packages.”

“It’s rumored that he’s made over a million dollars from his YouTube channel,” Connie said.

“So what’s up for the rest of the day?” Lula asked. “Now what?”

“I want to go back to Zoran’s house.”

“Boy,” Lula said. “You know how to ruin a perfectly good day.”

“I’m on a mission.”

“Does this mission have a name?” Lula asked.

“Take Down Zoran.”

“This mission might be above your pay grade,” Lula said. “It’s not like you’re Buffy.”

I hiked my messenger bag higher on my shoulder. “Are you coming with me or what?”

“Let’s do it,” Lula said.

We bypassed the front door to Zoran’s house and went straight to the back door. Lula had already broken the lock the last time we were here, so it was easy entry. I walked in and yelled, “Bond enforcement.”

I opened a couple kitchen drawers, found a garbage bag, pulled on some disposable gloves, and started collecting garbage. I cleaned out the fridge and emptied trash. I went to the bedroom and added a sock that was on the floor. I went to the bathroom and added the toothbrush, a comb, his razor, and the roach just for fun.

I did a walk-through to see if there was something I missed the first time around.

“There’s nothing to see here,” Lula said. “There’s no grocery notes or laptops. There’s hardly any junk in his junk drawer. And the only thing in his freezer are some breakfast sausages in a baggie.”

I hadn’t checked the freezer. I went to the kitchen and looked in the freezer.

“These aren’t sausages,” I said to Lula. “They’re fingers with freezer frost. I must have missed it last time I was here.”

“No way!”

I added the baggie with the fingers to the big garbage bag.

“Our work is done here,” I said to Lula.

I left the garbage bag in the trash can behind the house, pulled my gloves off, stuffed them into my messenger bag, and called Morelli.

“Come and get it,” I said. “I cleaned out the freezer, so you don’t want to wait too long to pick up the trash.”

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone where I assumed he was trying to get a grip. “It isn’t a head, is it?” he finally said. “I hate when it’s a head.”

“It’s not a head.”

Lula and I went back to my SUV and buckled in.

“Are we going shopping now?” Lula asked.

“No,” I said, “I’m going to drop you off at the office, and then I’m going to my parents’ house. I feel like I need a dose of normal.”

“Normal is relative,” Lula said. “Seems like these days finding fingers in the freezer is our new normal.”

That was the gruesome truth.

I left Lula at the office and drove the short distance to my parents’ house. I turned onto Green Street and felt a sense of calm settle in. My family was a little dysfunctional, but at least they didn’t have fangs, and the only body parts in their freezer belonged to cows and chickens. The calm disappeared when I saw that a Prius was parked in my spot at the curb. I parked behind the Prius and debated going in. I told myself that Herbert wasn’t the only one who owned a Prius. The car could belong to one of Grandma’s lady friends. With that in mind I trudged to the front door and let myself in.

My father was asleep in his chair in front of the TV. I could hear clanking sounds coming from the kitchen and the house smelled like cookies. Grandma was at the dining room table with Herbert.

“What’s going on?” I asked Grandma.

“I ran into Herbert at Giovichinni’s, and he gave me a ride home,” Grandma said. “He has a Prius.”

“I like to be on the cutting edge with my purchases,” Herbert said. “Hybrid is the way to go, and the new Prius has improved acceleration and improved interior design features.”

“He’s a clever one,” Grandma said. “And he knows all about computers. He’s coaching me on improving my blog and videos.”

“You make videos?” I asked Grandma.

“I just started. I got the idea from Robin Hoodie. Everybody’s doing it.”

“What kind of videos are you making?” I asked Grandma.

“Originally, I was thinking of breakdancing like Robin Hoodie, but once I got down on the floor, I had a hard time getting back up. Then Herbert and I got this idea to do a blog on funeral parlor viewings.”

“Omigod.”

“Yeah, that’s what I said too,” Grandma said. “It’s a winner idea. If it takes off, I could make a million dollars. Herbert and I would do it together. And it would all be shot on-site so we wouldn’t need a studio setup.”

“It’s a good idea because we both have extensive knowledge of funeral operations,” Herbert said. “There’s almost nothing we don’t know about viewing dead people. I even went down to the embalming room once. I was looking for the men’s room and I ended up in the embalming room. There was a fat man on the table and stuff was draining out of him. I guess we aren’t supposed to say fat anymore. Some people find it offensive. I personally think it’s okay. I mean, it’s a description, right? Saying someone is big is different from saying someone is fat. How are you supposed to describe someone fat if you can’t say fat ?”

“It could be someone with extra stuff under their flesh,” Grandma said, “but that’s a lot of words. I’ve been down to the embalming room, but I never saw anyone on the table. That must have been something.”

“He was undressed,” Herbert said. “If I was an undertaker, I would embalm people with their clothes on.”

“See, now, that’s something people would want to know,” Grandma said.

My mother stepped out of the kitchen. “We’re having pot roast and there’s homemade cookies for dessert. Who’s staying for dinner?”

“I am,” I said.

“Am I invited?” Herbert asked. “I love pot roast. My mom never makes it because my dad had polyps on his last colonoscopy, and they told him to lay off the beef. They cut all the polyps off and my dad is fine, so I don’t know what the deal is with the beef. You eat beef, and you grow new polyps, and they cut them off.”

“It’s the green vegan people who start bad beef rumors like that,” Grandma said. “If it was up to them, there’d be no more cows.”

“I like cows,” Herbert said. “I like the light brown ones the best. They have pretty faces. I wouldn’t get too close to one though. I got close to a cow once at a petting zoo and it stepped on my foot.”

“Of course you can stay for dinner,” my mom said. “There’s always extra helpings with a pot roast.”

Oh boy. Herbert, Grandma, and my dad together at the dinner table. If it wasn’t for a possible pregnancy I’d start drinking now.

Grandma and Herbert went back to making plans for their viewing project and I went into the kitchen to help my mom.

“There’s something wrong with this Herbert person,” my mom whispered to me. “I can’t put my finger on it. He’s nice enough, but odd.”

“I agree,” I said, “but people say that about Grandma too.”

“Not the same,” my mom said. “Not everyone thinks she’s nice.”

I peeled potatoes and set the table, pushing Grandma and Herbert down to one end. My mom was in her groove in the kitchen and I was in the way, so I went into the living room to watch TV with my dad.

“What’s going on in the dining room?” he asked. “I hear people mumbling.”

“It’s Grandma and Herbert.”

“Who’s Herbert?”

“That’s a good question,” I said. “I went to school with him, and Grandma knows him from the funeral home. She ran into him at Giovichinni’s today, and he gave her a ride home, and here he is. Mom invited him to stay for dinner.”

“Oh jeez.”

“What are you watching?”

“I don’t know. I just woke up. It looks like news.”

At six o’clock we were all at the table, and Morelli walked in.

“I don’t want to disturb anything,” he said. “I saw Stephanie’s car parked here, and I need to talk to her.”

“We sat down just this second,” Grandma said. “We got pot roast and mashed potatoes. I’ll get a place setting for you.”

“Thanks, but I need to get home to Bob,” Morelli said.

Grandma was already on her feet. “You can eat and run, and you can take some pot roast for Bob.”

“Who’s Bob?” Herbert asked.

“Morelli’s dog,” I said.

“I don’t have a dog,” Herbert said. “I have a cat. Her name is Miss Fluff. She’s very fluffy. She sleeps with me. Not in a strange way. Like a cat. She could be a show cat but her one eye looks off to the side and she has an overbite. They’re picky about things like that at cat shows.”

Grandma put a plate and some silverware next to me, and Morelli sat down. “Really?” he said to me.

Food was getting passed around. Grandma offered Herbert a glass of red wine and I suggested that might not be a good idea.

“Herbert gave Grandma a ride home from Giovichinni’s,” I said to Morelli. “Grandma is a big fan of the Robin Hoodie videos and she decided to make some videos like Robin Hoodie.”

Morelli cut his eyes to Grandma. “You’re going to steal packages off porches?”

“No. That’s old news,” Grandma said. “Herbert and I are going to make videos about viewings.”

Morelli looked confused.

“Funeral home viewings,” I said to Morelli. “Like at Stiva’s.”

“We could show what dead people look like before and after makeup,” Grandma said. “And we could interview the grieving mourners, but we’d do it in a way that would be fun.”

My father froze with his fork raised, and a piece of pot roast fell out of his mouth.

My mom raised her Big Gulp glass of whiskey. “Dilly dilly.”

Morelli was working hard not to laugh out loud.

“You’re going to get a hernia if you keep holding it in like that,” I told him.

“This is excellent pot roast,” Herbert said. “You must use a good cut of beef to get this flavor.”

“Rump roast,” Grandma said. “We always use rump roast.”

“Gravy,” my father said. “I need more gravy. Who’s holding up the gravy?”

By the time we got to the cookies, Grandma and Herbert had moved on to alien encounters and Grandma’s theory that Zoran wasn’t a vampire but could possibly be an alien.

Morelli looked at his watch at that point and said he needed to check in with his partner and feed Bob dinner. My mom gave Morelli some cookies and a nice portion of pot roast for Bob, and I walked Morelli out to his car.

“You wanted to talk to me,” I said.

“That was quite the bag of goodies you left for me. I especially liked the fingers.”

“They almost got passed up. Lula thought they were sausages.”

“I imagine they’re trophies,” Morelli said. “Three of them. All from different women.”

“I identified four potential victims that were before the laundromat killing. Zoran’s wife. They only recovered part of her. Two hookers that disappeared and were never found. And Julie Werly. If he got a finger from the laundromat and the jogger, he wouldn’t have been able to put it in his freezer without you picking him up on video.”

“The jogger was missing a finger,” Morelli said. “It looks like he didn’t have time to get one from the laundromat victim.”

“Ugh.”

“Yeah. This guy is a real psycho.”

“Were you able to identify victims from the three fingers?”

“Not yet. We have to wait for DNA results. We have the state police and the FBI involved and they’re rushing the testing and tracing.”

“I’m hoping the missing finger belongs to Werly. It might mean that she’s still alive.”

“I haven’t been to church in a while, but I’d be willing to drop in and say a prayer for that one,” Morelli said. He leaned in and kissed me. “Would you like to take Bob for another walk? Maybe stay and watch a movie?”

“I don’t know about the movie but walking Bob would be nice.”

Morelli’s phone buzzed, and he stared down at the ground.

“Are you going to answer it?” I asked him.

“I’m deciding,” he said. “I’m still on call. Two guys are out with the flu, and Riley is out with a gunshot wound.”

“Who shot Riley?”

“He shot himself. He was playing quick draw and shot himself in the leg.” He put the phone to his ear. “Yeah.” He listened for a couple minutes and disconnected. “I have to go. Can you feed Bob for me? I don’t know what time I’ll be home.”

“Sure.”

I went back into the house, told everyone I was Bob-sitting, and drove to Morelli’s. I fed Bob some pot roast and some of his Bob food. I hooked him up to the leash, took him to the front door, and hesitated. It was dark outside. I experienced a small ripple of fear in the pit of my stomach, and I tamped it down. Just be alert, I told myself. Be careful. I closed the door, got my gun from my messenger bag, hooked the holster onto the waist of my jeans, and holstered the gun. The gun felt uncomfortable at my waist, and my biggest fear was that I’d do a Riley and shoot myself in the leg.

“Okay,” I said to Bob. “Now we’re ready to walk. I’m sure you’re more used to the gun than I am. Morelli wears one all the time.”

Lights were on in all the houses. Dinner was done and kids were doing homework and watching television. The air was crisp with a hint of autumn. I was glad I was wearing my sweatshirt. Bob was prancing along, enjoying himself. I got to the end of the block and was about to cross the street when Bob stopped and stood stiff-legged, nose up. He growled low in his throat, and a chill ripped through me. I pushed my sweatshirt to one side, exposing the gun. I did a quick look around. I didn’t see anything unusual. Bob turned, and I turned with him. I had a tight grip on his leash with one hand and the other hand was on the SIG Sauer. Bob gave a loud bark and lunged on his leash, and I saw Zoran standing in the sidewalk about twenty feet away. He had the knife in his hand, and he was staring at me, mouth open, showing his fangs. It was the first time I’d actually seen the knife. It looked like something Rambo would use. Large and deadly with a hefty handle. I snatched the SIG out of the holster and aimed, and Zoran disappeared behind a parked car. I heard footfalls running down the street and then there was quiet again.

I looked down at Bob. My hero. He was breathing heavily, and I was in the same state, sucking in air. It took a couple beats for the rush of adrenaline to settle and my brain to go from fight-or-flight to what the heck just happened! It felt like a nightmare. Imagined. Too horrible and bizarre to be real.

“Good boy,” I said to Bob. “I didn’t hear him coming up behind me.”

We walked back to Morelli’s house, both of us on high alert. I had the gun in my hand and didn’t holster it until I was at Morelli’s door and had to open the door with a key. I left Bob on his leash and went to the kitchen. I wrote a note to Morelli telling him Bob was spending the night with me. I grabbed my messenger bag, and Bob and I went back to my apartment. I felt safer in my own space. Morelli had too many windows and doors. I had one door, and once I locked everything from the inside the only one who could get in was Ranger. I had no idea how he managed it. When I asked him, he said it was magic. I was inclined to believe him.

My apartment is on the back side of the building. My living room windows look out at the parking lot. Not especially scenic but it’s quieter than the street side. It’s an older building with exterior fire escapes that are now used as little balconies holding potted plants and small grills. My fire escape balcony holds nothing. I always mean to buy plants but never get around to it. At Christmas I string colored lights on the railing, but that’s as far as my decorating goes.

I looked out my living room window and scanned the parking lot. It felt benign. Bob had immediately found his place on my couch and looked comfy. I thought that was a good sign. As long as Bob was comfy and not growling, I could relax a little. I put a bowl of water on the floor in the kitchen for Bob, and I gave Rex a slice of apple and a peanut.

I brought my laptop to the couch, put my gun on the little table next to the couch, and sat alongside Bob while I checked my email. I closed the laptop and thought about Zoran. How long had he been following me? I thought he must have picked me up at the office and followed me to my parents’ and then to Morelli’s house. If Morelli hadn’t been called in to work, I would have gone for a walk with him and Bob and then gone home. I would have been alone getting out of my car and walking into my building, and things might have taken an ugly turn. My gun would have been in my messenger bag. I might not have heard Zoran come up behind me. And I might have ended up being another woman who was missing a finger.

Ranger called. “Just checking in, babe. I heard you brought Bruno Jug in.”

“It was a little complicated, but everything worked out.”

“And I heard there was another Zoran victim.”

“Morelli and I were at the birthday party and Jimmy called. I got to tag along to the crime scene. I couldn’t bring myself to look at the body, but I got all the details from Morelli. She was a jogger. Hit from behind and dragged into a wooded area. Bite marks on her neck and her throat slashed. And her finger cut off. Zoran keeps trophies. I went through his house again and found three fingers in his freezer. All from different women. I gave them to Morelli to get tested. Also, toxicology came back on the laundromat lady. She had a multi-drug cocktail in her system.”

“He drugged his victim and that made the kill easier,” Ranger said. “My control room tells me you have an overnight guest.”

“Morelli got called in to work, and I said I would babysit Bob.”

I wanted to tell Ranger about Zoran stalking me and confronting me when I was walking Bob, but it would set off a chain of events that I preferred not to have happen. He would want me to move back to Rangeman. And there was a part of me that would love to move back. It was by far the safest place for me to stay. Rangeman was impenetrable. Problem is, it would be difficult to explain this move to Morelli.

“What are your plans for tomorrow?” Ranger asked.

“I’m taking a fruit basket to Harry the Hammer.”

“Babe,” Ranger said. And he hung up.

I remoted the television on and scanned Prime. I settled on a documentary about Antarctica. That was followed by a documentary about Argentina.

I fell asleep halfway through Argentina, and I woke up to Bob growling. Crap! Now what! I shut the television off, grabbed my gun, and sat very still, listening. Truth is, it would have been hard to hear anything over the pounding of my heart. I could have had a steam train go through my living room and probably wouldn’t have heard it.

Bob uncurled himself and sat up on the couch. He was still doing the soft growling, and he was looking toward the windows. I looked at the windows and could only see black glass. I was about to tell Bob there was nothing at the window when BAM! Zoran appeared and hit the window with the butt of his Rambo knife. BAM, BAM, BAM.

Bob hurled himself off the couch and charged the window, barking and snarling. I was also off the couch. I planted my feet, pointed the gun at Zoran, placed the red dot over his heart, and pulled the trigger. The glass shattered around point of impact but didn’t break. What the heck! I crept closer to the window. The bullet was lodged in the glass. Zoran was nowhere to be seen.

I called Ranger. “Did you by any chance have bulletproof glass installed in my windows after this last firebombing?”

“Yes. I thought three firebombings were enough. The glass won’t stop everything, but it’ll stop a bottle rocket.”

“It’ll also stop a nine-millimeter bullet.”

Silence for a beat. “I’m assuming you didn’t get this information from Google.”

“Zoran was on my fire escape. He tried to smash my window with his knife butt, so I tried to shoot him, but the bullet got stuck in the glass.”

“Where was your red dot?”

“Over his heart.”

“That’s my girl,” Ranger said. “Are you okay?”

“I’m in better shape than my window.”

“I’ll get it replaced tomorrow. Do you want to spend the night here?”

“No. Zoran’s not going to come back tonight, and I’ve got Bob.”

I got off the phone and thought about what had just happened. Two things nagged at me. I’d aimed for Zoran’s heart because that was what I was taught to do. In this instance it wasn’t the right target to choose. If my bullet hadn’t been stopped by the window and I’d killed Zoran, there would be no hope of finding Julie Werly if she was still alive. And because Zoran was able to escape without injury, he might have gone looking for easier prey.

I went to bed with my clothes on. If Zoran somehow got in and I had to shoot him, I didn’t want to do it in my underwear. I slept with Bob pressed tight against me and my gun on the nightstand next to me. I had a nightmare that I was in an elevator that was out of control and eventually shot out of the top of an eighty-floor building. Aside from that my night was uneventful.