Mrs. Crandle rattled her cart down the aisle. "Hello, Stephanie, dear. How are you today?"
"I'm fine, Mrs. Crandle."
"Some disguise," my mother said. "Everybody knows you. And why do you have to be disguised as a tramp? Why can't you ever be disguised as a normal person?" She looked into my cart. "Jars of spaghetti sauce. The checkout clerk will think you don't cook."
My left eye had started to twitch. "I have to go now."
"I bet this is a good getup for meeting men," Grandma said. "You look just like Marilyn Monroe. Is that a wig? Maybe I could borrow it sometime. I wouldn't mind meeting some men."
"You loan her that wig and anything happens, I'm holding you responsible," my mother said.
I UNPACKED my groceries, replaced the wig with a Rangers hat, traded the skirt in for a pair of shorts and resigned the retro slut shoes to a back corner of my closet. I shared a Pop-Tart with Rex and cracked a beer open for myself. I called Dillon to tell him about my door, and then I went out the bedroom window to my fire escape to think. The air was still and sultry, the horizon dusky.
The parking lot was filled with cars. The seniors were all home at this time of day. If they went out to eat it was for the early bird special at the diner, and even if they went to the park to sit for a half hour they were home by six. If they were eating in it was at five o'clock so as not to interfere with Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy.
Most cases I get from Vinnie are routine. Usually I go to the people who put up the bond and explain to them that they'll lose their house if the skip isn't found. Ninety percent of the time they know where the skip is and help me catch him. Ninety percent of the time I have a handle on the sort of person I'm dealing with. This case didn't fall into the ninety percent. And even worse, this case was weird. A friend had lost a finger, and a mother had been scalped. Maxine's treasure hunt seemed playful by comparison. And then there was the message on my door. "I hate you." Who would do such a thing? The list was long.
A pickup pulled away from the curb half a block away, exposing a black Jeep Cherokee which had been parked behind the pickup. Joyce.
I allowed myself the luxury of a sigh and drained the beer bottle. You had to respect Joyce's tenacity, if nothing else. I raised my bottle in a salute to her, but there was no response.
The problem with being a bounty hunter is it's all on-the-job training. Ranger is helpful, but Ranger isn't always around. So most of the time when something new comes up I end up doing it wrong before I figure out how to do it right. Joyce, for instance. Clearly, I don't know how to get rid of Joyce.
I crawled back through the window, got another bottle of beer and another Pop-Tart, stuffed the portable phone under my arm and went back to the fire escape. I ate the Pop-Tart and washed it down with beer and all the while I watched the black Cherokee. When I finished the second bottle of beer I called Ranger.
"Talk," Ranger said.
"I have a problem."
"So what's your point?"
I explained the situation to Ranger, including the tire and the park episode. There was a silence where I sensed he was smiling, and finally he said, "Sit tight, and I'll see what I can do."
Half an hour later, Ranger's $98,000 BMW rolled to a stop in my parking lot. Ranger got out of the car and stood for a moment staring at me on my fire escape. He was wearing an olive-drab Tshirt that looked like it had been painted on him, GI Joe camouflage pants and shades. Just a normal Jersey guy.
I gave him a thumbs-up.
Ranger smiled and turned and walked across the lot and across the street to the black Cherokee. He walked to the passenger-side door, opened the door and got in the car. Just like that. If it had been me in the car, the door would have been locked, and no one looking like Ranger would get in. But this is me, and that was Joyce.
Five minutes later, Ranger exited the car and returned to my lot.