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“I sell floss. We have three new flavors this season. I’m expecting a lot of excitement over it.”
Lula, Connie, and I didn’t exactly know where to go with that announcement so we wished him good luck and told him to stay in touch.
“You never know with people,” Lula said when he left. “Who would guess he’d have such stellar taste in dildos?”
“Stellar,” Connie said. “Where’d that word come from?”
“It’s my word of the day,” Lula said. “I’m always self-improving. I pick a word out and use it all day and then it’s mine. Today’s word is stellar.”
“When did you start doing that?” Connie asked her.
“Today,” Lula said. “This is the beginning of a new Lula. So what are you doing now?” Lula asked me. “You going home to bake another cake?”
I took the new FTA file from Connie. “One cake was enough.” I read through the file. “Jesus Sanchez. Wanted for theft of a lawn mower. Are you kidding me? If I catch him I’ll make fifty dollars. And I’m not going to catch him because by now he’s cutting grass in Guatemala.”
“I just hand them over,” Connie said. “I don’t necessarily tell you what to do with them.”
“I tell you what to do with them,” Vinnie yelled from inside his office. “Go find that asshole. Fifty bucks to you is five hundred smackers to me.”
I stuffed the file into my messenger bag. Maybe I could go to beauty school. I could be a hairdresser. It would be like making a cake only with hair. Creative, right?
“I have stuff to do this afternoon,” I said to Lula, “but I might be on the prowl for Gobbles tonight. Can I call you?”
“Yep. You can count on me.”
•••
I went home and googled beauty schools. There were two in Trenton and one in Bordentown. One of the Trenton schools I could attend part-time. That would be perfect. I went into the bathroom and looked at my hair. Shoulder length. Brown. Curly. Now that the rain had stopped it was calming down. When I was in high school I’d ironed it to get it straight.
I heard someone knocking on my door. I went to the door and looked out the security peephole. It was Morelli. He was holding a package.
“And?” I said, opening the door.
“I ran into the UPS guy in the lobby, and I said I’d take this up to you.”
“The UPS guy knows you?”
“He’s my cousin.”
“And you were coming here anyway?”
“Yeah. I’m on my way home, and I thought I’d stop by and tell you about the forensic report so far on Mintner.”
“That’s nice of you, but not typical. You don’t usually share information about ongoing investigations with me. Even when I want the information. Even when I beg you for the information.”
“Don’t push it, okay? I’m trying to be helpful.”
I raised an eyebrow. Not buying it.
“I needed an excuse to see you,” Morelli said.
“Why do you need an excuse?”
“I dumped you, remember? You haven’t punched me in the face yet. I’m giving you another shot at it.”
“The moment has passed.”
“Open the package. It says it’s from someone named Kenny. Is this a new boyfriend?”
