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“I should have eaten the desserts first. I’m all filled up with egg salad and roast beef. And I’m exhausted. I’m not going to be able to eat the last mini chocolate mousse.”
Ranger’s phone buzzed. He had a short conversation and hung up.
“That was the control room,” he said. “There’s a problem at your apartment. Explosion and fire. They got the notice from your security system and from police dispatch. No more information than that.”
I tried calling Lula and Nutsy but no one picked up.
“I need to be there,” I said.
Ranger was on his feet. “Leave Bob here. I’ll have someone come up to babysit him.”
We took the Porsche Batmobile and reached my apartment building in record time. The parking lot was crammed with fire trucks, EMTs, cop cars, and gawkers. My stomach was filled with food but felt hollow. My heart was beating too fast and too hard. This felt like my bad. I’d tried to do the right thing, but it had turned out hideously wrong. I’d played the tough-guy card at thefuneral home, and I’d ignored the midnight deadline, and now Plover was retaliating and playing his tough-guy card.
Ranger parked at the outer perimeter of the lot, and I hit the ground running. I ran past a fire truck and caught sight of an ambulance with people clustered around it. Two of the people were Lula and Nutsy. I stopped running and bent at the waist to breathe. I’d feared the worst, and this was the best. They were on their feet, and they looked okay. Rex was safe, Bob was safe, Lula was safe, Nutsy was safe. That’s all that mattered.
Ranger wrapped an arm around me and swiped a couple tears off my cheek.
“I’m not crying,” I said. “It’s the smoky air.”
Lula spotted us and started waving and yelling. Impossible to know what she was saying over the noise of the fire trucks.
We joined Lula and Nutsy and several med techs.
“Are you okay?” I asked Lula and Nutsy.
“Yeah,” she said. “We’re as good as you could be after your apartment’s been bombed. We were lucky on account of we were in the living room playing a game on Nutsy’s Xbox. Whatever-it-was came in through the bedroom window, so we had a chance to get out. We didn’t even think twice. We were like,Holy cow. And we ran out. And then the fire alarms went off and everybody was coming out of the building, and the cops came, and the fire trucks came.”
Ranger wandered off to talk to some of the first responders.
“I tried calling you,” I said to Lula.
“Our phones are still inside,” Lula said. “There was a crash when the window got broken and then a bigbangand then there was a whoosh of flames, and we didn’t waste time getting out of there.”
“Smart,” I said.
“I had it all decorated out too,” Lula said. “Maybe some of it is still okay. I couldn’t believe how fast the fire trucks pulled in. We were just out the back door, and we could see the trucks coming.”
I was hoping the bathroom was destroyed. I hated my bathroom.
“We should have taken the Xbox,” Nutsy said. “I wasn’t thinking.”
Ranger returned. “The fire is mostly out. It was confined to your apartment,” he said to me. “This building is up to code with fire walls, and the trucks got here fast. The fire marshal will be here in the morning and we’ll know more. Apparently, something smashed through the bedroom window. Most people wouldn’t be able to throw a bottle grenade from down here, so it was probably mechanically launched.”
The trucks were packing up to leave. The gawkers were dispersing.
“I’m homeless again,” Lula said. “This is getting old. I’m going to have my cards read tomorrow. There’s something wrong with my juju. I got an ogre on my ass and things keep burning down around me.”
Ranger and I exchanged glances. We were having the same thought. This smelled like more than bad juju. Her fire and my fire were suspiciously alike.
“Why Lula?” I said to Ranger. “Why would she be targeted?”
“I don’t know,” Ranger said, “but it’s hard to believe there isn’t a connection.”
“We can stay at Duncan’s house,” Nutsy said. “I have his key.”
“Not a good idea,” Ranger said. “I have a car coming. They’ll put you in a hotel and stand watch. We’ll regroup in the morning.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
