Explosive Eighteen - Janet Evanovich [49]
“Louisa Belman is ninety-three years old.”
“Well, I guess to Earl underpants are underpants.”
We walked the block to the truck without incident. We got in and Grandma got a text.
“It’s from Annie,” Grandma said. “She wants to know if you found your true love.”
“Tell her I’m not looking, but if he happens along, she’ll be one of the first to know.”
“That’s a lot to write,” Grandma said. “I’ll just say not yet.” She tapped out the message and sat back in the seat. “It was so much easier when I was young. You got a boyfriend, and you married him. You had some kids, you got older, one of you died, and that was it.”
“Jeez. No true love?”
“There’s always been true love, but in my day, you either talked yourself into thinking you had it, or you talked yourself into thinking you didn’t need it.”
• • •
I took Grandma home, but I didn’t go in. It had been a long day, and I was looking forward to my quiet apartment. I did the usual bad guy car search in my lot, parked the truck, and crossed to the apartment building’s back door with one hand wrapped around the Glock. I took the elevator to my floor and walked down the hall thinking I should probably learn how to shoot. I knew the basics. Lula, Morelli, and Ranger all carried semiautomatics. So I had a lot of exposure, but my actual use was limited.
I let myself into my apartment, still holding the Glock. I stepped into the small foyer and realized the television was on. I was thinking Ranger or Morelli, but it turned out to be Joyce Barnhardt.
“Hey, girlfriend,” Joyce said.
“What the heck are you doing here? And I’m not your girlfriend. I’ve never been your friend. I will never want to be your friend.”
“Gee, that hurts.”
“How did you get in?”
“I climbed up the fire escape and jimmied your window.”
I raised the Glock. “I guess I should be thanking you. This makes everything easy for me.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m not going anywhere, especially not to jail.”
“I have an arrest agreement, and I have a gun aimed at you.”
“Honestly,” Joyce said, “put the gun down. You’re not going to shoot me. For one thing, I’d bleed all over your carpet. Not that it’s all that great. And I’m unarmed. Just think of the paperwork, not to mention you’d probably get charged with assault with a deadly weapon. That carries a decent amount of time in an orange jumpsuit.”
“I hate you.”
“Blah, blah, blah,” Joyce said. “Get over it. Besides, I’m an entirely new person.”
“You don’t lie?”
“Well, of course I lie. Everyone lies.”
“You don’t steal husbands?”
“Okay, once in a while I steal a husband. I don’t see what the big deal is. They all turn out to be losers anyway.”
“So how are you new?”
“For one thing, I have blond streaks in my hair. What do you think?”
Joyce dyed her hair flame red, so the blond streaks were icing on the cake. Some of the hair was real, and some of it was fake, and when you put it all together there was a lot of it. She wore it teased up, exploding out into big curls and waves, like Farrah Fawcett’s hair on steroids.
I looked more closely at the color. “I like it. It’s flattering to your skin tone.” Good grief, I thought, now I was complimenting her hair. This was absolutely wrong.
“It wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to do some sprucing up,” Joyce said. “You don’t ever look wonderful, but you look worse than usual. You get into a fight with Morelli?”
“I slipped and fell in a parking garage.”
“Yeah, right. That’s how you got the busted-up face. What, do I look stupid today?”
“Why are you here?”
“I was going to come get my key, and then I realized this was the perfect place to hide out. No one would ever think to look for me here.”
“Hide out? Here?” I vigorously shook my head. “No. No, no, no. No way.”
“Deal with it,” Joyce said. “I’m not leaving.”
Keep your eye on the prize, I told myself. Go with a capture plan. Let her stay here, and when she falls asleep, sneak up on her, zap her with the monster stun gun, and cuff her. Then drag her ass back to jail and collect the money.
“Did you kill Frank Korda?” I asked her.
“No, but if he wasn’t