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“No. You’ll do better interviewing them without me. I’ll catch up with you later this afternoon.”
I carted Tiki back to the Buick and returned to the office.
“How’d it go?” Lula asked. “Did you have to get Briggs injected with happy juice?”
“No. Briggs was fine. We all watched the security videos together.”
“Who’s all?”
“Morelli was there. Pitch was his collar, and he’s not comfortable that Pitch might have walked away.”
“Oh boy,” Lula said. “You’re not gonna have to work with Morelli, are you? Last time you tried that he had to stop carrying his gun so he wouldn’t be tempted to shoot you. And remember the time he chained you to a pipe in his cellar?”
On the positive side, the possibility that I’d be set on fire was a lot slimmer when I was with Morelli.
“I don’t have much choice,” I said. “We’re after the same guy. And Morelli might be helpful. It’s not like I’m making a lot of progress on my own.”
“Long as I don’t get caught in the crossfire,” Lula said. “Where is he now? He in the Buick with Tiki?”
“He’s doing his own thing for a while.”
“How did the fitting go?” Connie asked me. “What does the dress look like?”
I squinched my eyes closed and smacked my forehead with the heel of my hand. “I forgot all about it!”
“That’s one of them subliminal things,” Lula said. “You keep forgetting because you don’t want to do it.”
This was true. “I’ll go now,” I said. “And then I’m going to Atlantic City to get the guy at the nudie beach.”
“I don’t want to miss either of those things,” Lula said. “I’ll go with you.”
The bridal shop was on Hamilton, not far from the Tasty Pastry bakery. I’d been there before on a couple other excruciating occasions when I was a bridesmaid. It was presided over and owned by Mary DeLorenzo. She had coal black hair pulled back in a bun. She was in her fifties. And she ate way too much pasta. She employed two cousins who served as seamstresses. They were imported from Italy and spoke no English beyond S’cusa me when they stuck you with a pin or pushed your breast out of the way to adjust the bodice.
The walls of the shop were lined with gowns in zippered plastic bags smushed together on racks. One side was bridal and the other bridesmaid. Mother of the bride was in a separate room.
“This might not be so bad,” Lula said, following me through the front door. “You got to look on the bright side. It could be a pretty dress. If I was getting married I’d have my bridesmaids in animal print. Zebra or leopard.”
Mary DeLorenzo rushed over to me, all smiles, hoping for a new bride. I explained who I was and the smile faded a little.
“Of course,” she said. “We’ve been expecting you. Let me get the dress. I’ll bring it to the dressing room at the back of the shop.”
Lula looked around at the cocooned dresses. “You want me to come back there with you? You might need a second opinion on this.”
“Whatever.”
“And remember to have a good attitude. You don’t want to prejudge stuff. You go in expecting it to be bad and that’s all you’ll see.”
“You’re right. I need an attitude adjustment. I need to look forward to this. It could be fun. I’ll be with Ranger. It’ll be a party.”
“Yeah. And I bet the dress is real classy. This is a pretty classy place in an Italian kind of way.”
Mary bustled back with a zippered bag and ushered me into the dressing room. “This is so beautiful,” she said. “We had to special order the fabric. And the bride was very specific about the color. She wanted something romantic.”
“Romantic is good,” I said. “Right?”
“Of course. It’s a wedding.” She pulled the dress out of the bag and fluffed it up. “This is going to be stunning on you.”
It was a floor-length Pepto-Bismol pink taffeta dress with big puffy cap sleeves, a huge bow at the waist in the back, and a bell skirt.
