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I parked at the curb and joined Connie and Lula in the office. Connie was touching up a chipped nail, and Lula was napping on the couch. Vinnie was nowhere.
“I have a problem,” I said. “The La-Z-Boys think Grandma has the keys, but she doesn’t have them.”
“Have you explained this to them?” Connie asked.
“Yes, but they didn’t completely buy it. I’ll try again tomorrow.
Out of respect for Jimmy they aren’t going to rough Grandma up until after the funeral.”
“Those keys must be real important for them to want to pull the fingernails off a nice old lady like Grandma,” Lula said.
“You have connections,” I said to Connie. “Can you find out what this is all about?”
“My only La-Z-Boy connection is dead,” Connie said, “but I’ll ask around.”
“It’s gonna be interesting to see who gets Jimmy’s chair,” Lula said. “Anybody would want a La-Z-Boy. I sat in one of them, and I never wanted to get up. You could put your feet up and everything.”
“Are you going to the funeral?” I asked Connie.
Connie nodded. “I have to take my mother. It’s like the event of the century.”
“I can see that,” Lula said. “Not every day you get to go to a wake in a titty bar.”
“I was thinking about putting some bullets in my gun,” I said. “Ranger gave me some.”
“I have a salon appointment to get glamorized for my date tonight,” Lula said. “You could come with me and get pink streaks in your hair or magenta eyelash extensions. It could be the first step on the road to the new you.”
* * *
—
It was almost six o’clock when Lula and I left the salon. Lula had silver glitter on her eyelids and her hair was fluffed up into a huge pink puffball. I had a bunch of metallic midnight blue extensions in my hair.
“You made a good choice on those extensions,” Lula said. “It’s dark as a witch’s bum in the Mole Hole, and your extensions are gonna catch whatever light they got there. You’ll probably be the only one who can tell the potato salad from the mac and cheese. Everyone else is gonna have to use the flashlight app on their smartphone.”
I rolled my eyes up as if I could see the top of my head. “They look pretty though, right?”
“Hell, yeah. And they’ll be the shit tomorrow when you gotta wear black. Black isn’t a happy color, if you get what I’m sayin’. You gotta sparkle black up. If you haven’t got a lot of diamonds, then aluminum foil is the next best thing. Or if it’s all black leather you could break it up with chains.”
“My extensions are aluminum foil?”
“I can’t say for sure, but they look like foil and that’s what counts.”
“Can I wash them?”
“Yeah,” Lula said, “but you might not want to use real high heat with the hair dryer.”
“Are you coming to the funeral tomorrow?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
I watched Lula drive away, I waved to the Rangeman guys, and I climbed into the Buick. It was Friday night. Lula had a date. I had the Rangeman guys. I wondered if they’d want to go to dinner. And later we could all watch a movie. I checked them out in my rearview mirror. Dinner and a movie might be awkward. They’d have to clear it first with Ranger. And then they’d be overly polite and afraid to talk to me. And when they went off their shift Ranger would grill them. Okay, dinner with the Rangeman guys was a bad idea. That left my parents and Grandma. An equally bad idea. My mother would take one look at my blue hair and go straight to the liquor cupboard. Better to spring it on her tomorrow when she’s distracted by the funeral. Ordinarily I’d be seeing Morelli on a Friday night, but he was off to Atlantic City with his cousin Mooch. Annual poker tournament. They always lost, but they went every year anyway.
I drove home on autopilot, parked, and took the stairs to the second floor. I walked the hall and stopped at my door. It was partially open. My heart stuttered in my chest. I took a couple steps back and called Rangeman. Three minutes later, my Rangeman escorts were in my apartment, guns drawn, doing a security check while I waited in the hall.
One of the guys came out to get me. “It’s clear,” he said, “but it’s a mess.”
I stepped inside and looked around. Drawers had been dumped out, cushions thrown onto the floor and slashed, linens torn off the bed, cereal boxes emptied. The lid was off Rex’s cage, and his soup can sleeping den had been emptied onto the kitchen counter. Rex wasn’t in his soup can or his cage. I had several moments of breathless panic until I saw Rex peeking out from behind my brown bear cookie jar.
