Fearless Fourteen - Janet Evanovich [50]
I blew out a sigh. Morelli was irresistible in his bunny boxers. “I haven’t changed my mind about the SUV, but I’ve changed my mind about your bedroom.”
MORELLI IS AT his best on a Saturday morning. His body temperature is a little higher and his blood pressure is a little lower than on a Monday. Everything about him is a little softer, a little more sensual. He was at the kitchen table in faded navy sweatpants and a matching sweatshirt that had the sleeves cut short. I suspected he was commando under the sweatpants. He’d showered, but he hadn’t shaved, and he looked like he could give a dead woman an orgasm.
He glanced up from his paper and smiled at me. “Shazam.”
I smiled back at him. It had been a multiple shazam morning.
I sipped my coffee. “What’s going on today?”
“I’m getting someone to demo the basement floor. And I’m going door-to-door looking for Dom. I think you’re right. He’s nearby.”
It was a little after eight, and Zook was still sleeping. Mooner and Gary hadn’t yet appeared on Morelli’s front doorstep. The sound of car doors slamming shut and people talking carried in from Morelli’s backyard.
“It’s Saturday morning,” Morelli said. “Don’t these people take a day off?”
I peeked out the window. “Brenda is in the yard with the film crew.”
Morelli took his coffee to the door and stepped out.
“Hell-o!” Brenda said, eyeballing Morelli. “You are hot. Hold me back!”
Morelli turned and looked at me. “Is she for real?”
“Yes. And you want to keep arm’s distance, or she’ll give you a pat-down.”
“You’re trespassing on private property,” Morelli said. “And you’ve ignored the crime scene tape.”
“We didn’t ignore it,” the cameraman said. “We got a real good shot of it.”
Brenda was in another black leather outfit. She was wearing four-inch spike-heeled shoes, and her hair and her face and her chest were blue. She had a handheld mic, and she was having a hard time navigating because her heels were sinking into the freshly dug dirt. She climbed onto a dirt mound and looked down into the hole. The cameraman focused on Brenda.
“Here we are at Aunt Rose’s house,” Brenda said to the camera. “And as you can see, digging for the stolen money has already begun.”
“Excuse me,” Morelli said. “You’re going to have to leave.”
Brenda stumbled over to Morelli with the mic. “Are you by any chance the handsome owner of the property—”
“That’s it,” Morelli said. “I’ve had enough.”
He set his coffee cup on the stoop, reached over the railing, grabbed the garden hose, and turned it on Brenda and the cameraman.
Brenda hit high C at the first blast of water. “Eeeeeee!” she shrieked. “Dammit, shit, sonovabitch!”
The dirt instantly turned to mud, and Brenda lost her footing and went down. The sound guy rushed in to help, and he went down, too.
“Maybe you want to turn the hose off,” I said to Morelli.
Brenda had one shoe on and one shoe in her hand. “What is your problem?” she yelled at Morelli. “Do you know who I am? I’m Brenda. I’m doing the news here, and the news is sacred, for cripe’s sake. You can’t turn the hose on the news, you moron!”
Morelli shut the water off and retrieved his coffee cup. “This is going to be another one of those days,” he said.
We backed into the house, closed and locked the door, and pulled all the shades down.
Morelli stood in the middle of his kitchen. “I hate this,” he said. “I hate bringing this shit into my home.”
“We need to find Dom.”
Morelli nodded agreement. “I’m going to change my clothes and canvass the neighborhood.”
“We’ll split it in half.”
Morelli smiled down at me. “Nice offer, Cupcake, but you’re blue. You’ll scare the crap out of everyone.”
“I forgot.”
“Stay here with Zook. Keep people out of my yard. Get me some estimates on jackhammer rentals.”
Morelli went upstairs, and I crept to the window and looked out. No Brenda. No cameraman. No film crew van. I went to the front of the house. No one was there, either. Good deal.
Bob was sleeping in a patch of sun in the living room. He was still spray-painted. He didn’t seem to care. While I was standing, looking out