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“Hard to say.”
Morelli disconnected, and I limped into the bathroom, where I stood in the shower until all the rust was washed out of my hair. When I was done, I looked at the shampoo bottle. Empty. My refrigerator was also empty. I needed money. I needed to make another capture.
VINNIE WAS BACK to wearing only his underwear. He was in my kitchen, unshaven, his hair spiked up from sleep, his eyes half open.
“Where’s the coffee?” he asked. “Where’s the orange juice?”
“I don’t have any,” I told him. “I need to go shopping.”
“I need coffee. Lucille always had my coffee ready.”
“There’s no Lucille,” I told him. “Get used to it. And after today, there’s no me. You can’t stay here.”
“Where will I go?”
“Stay with one of your friends.”
“I don’t have friends,” Vinnie said. “I have hookers and bookies. And my bookie wants to shoot me.”
“Do you have money?”
Vinnie flapped his arms. “Do I look like I have money? My wallet was left behind with my pants. Maybe we should go back and check out the lawn in front of my house to see if Lucille tossed out cash and credit cards along with my clothes.”
“What about the office? Don’t you keep petty cash? Doesn’t Connie have a corporate credit card?”
“We might have a small cash flow problem,” Vinnie said.
“How small?”
“We might be a million in the red, give or take a couple bucks.”
“What?”
“It’s complicated,” Vinnie said. “Bookeeping issues. We have too many outstanding skips.”
“I have a stack of skips in my bag that I’m working on, but I don’t think they add up to a million. And what about the bankers who underwrite you?”
“They aren’t answering their phones.”
Oh boy.
“You’ve got three minutes to get dressed,” I said to Vinnie. “I’m taking you to my parents’ house. When they get fed up with you, I’ll think of something else. At least you can get coffee there before my mother kicks you out.”
I debated calling ahead but decided against it. If I dumped him on my mother’s doorstep and drove away real fast, she’d have to take him in, at least for a while. If I called, she could say no.
Twenty minutes later, I idled in front of my parents’ house while Vinnie walked to the front door. On the rare possibility that no one was home, I didn’t want to just drive off. He didn’t have a cell phone to call me to come back. I saw the front door open and I laid rubber.
I drove by the office twice before I parked. I didn’t see the bashed-in SUV, and I didn’t see any angry-looking guys hanging out with guns drawn, so I figured things were quiet this morning. Connie was at her desk. Lula hadn’t arrived.
“You didn’t bring Vinnie with you, did you?” Connie asked. “I already had a visit from Bobby Sunflower this morning.”
I poured myself a cup of coffee. “He gets up early.”
“I guess he was motivated. He wants his money or he wants Vinnie. He said if he didn’t get either of those things by Friday he was going to eliminate the office.”
“Eliminate it?”
“Like from the face of the earth.”
