I gave an internal sigh of regret and told Sally we'd go in my car and I'd pick him up at seven. No way was I going to be able to cut Lula out of this caper.
Stephanie Plum 4 - Four To Score
Stephanie Plum 4 - Four To Score
Stephanie Plum 4 - Four To Score
7
“OTHER MOTHERS have daughters who get married and have children,” my mother said. “I have a daughter who blows up cars. How did this happen? This doesn't come from my side of the family.”
We were at the table, eating dinner, and my father had his head bent over his plate, and his shoulders were shaking.
“What?” my mother said to him.
“I don't know. It just struck me funny. Some men could go a lifetime and never have their kid blow up a car, but I have a daughter who's knocked off three cars and burned down a funeral home. Maybe that's some kind of record.”
Everyone sat in shocked silence because that was the longest speech my father had made in fifteen years.
“Your Uncle Lou used to blow up cars,” my father said to me. “You don't know that, but it's true. When Louie was young he worked for Joey the Squid. Joey owned car lots back then, and he was in a war with the Grinaldi brothers, who also owned car lots. And Joey would pay Louie to blow up Grinaldi cars. Louie got paid by the car. Fifty dollars a car. That was big money in those days.”
“You've been to the lodge, drinking,” my mother said to my father. “I thought you were supposed to be out with the cab?”
My father forked in some potatoes. “Nobody wanted to take a cab. Slow day.”
“Did Uncle Lou ever get caught?”
“Never. Lou was good. The Grinaldi brothers never suspected Lou. They thought Joey was sending out Willy Fuchs. One day they clipped Willy, and then Lou stopped blowing up Grinaldi cars.”
“Ommigod.”
“Worked out okay,” my father said. “Lou went into the wholesale fruit business after that and did pretty good.”
“Funky bracelet you got on your arm,” Grandma said. “Is it new?”
“Actually, it's half of a pair of cuffs. I accidentally locked myself into them and then couldn't find the key. So I had to hacksaw one of them off. I need to go to a locksmith to get this half opened, but I haven't had the time.”
“Muriel Slickowsky's son is a locksmith,” my mother said. “I could call Muriel.”
“Maybe tomorrow. I have to go to Atlantic City tonight. I'm checking out a lead on Maxine.”
“I should go along,” Grandma said, jumping out of her chair, heading for the stairs. “I could help. I blend right in there. Atlantic City's full of old babes like me. Let me change my dress. I'll be ready in a jiffy!”
“Wait! I don't think . . .”
“Wasn't nothing good on TV tonight anyway,” Grandma called from the second floor. “And don't worry, I'll come prepared.”
That brought me out of my seat. “No guns!” I looked over at my mother. “She doesn't still have that forty-?five, does she?”
“I looked all over in her room, and I couldn't find it.”
“I want her strip-?searched before she gets in my car.”
“Not enough money in the universe,” my father said. “Not under threat of death would I look at that woman naked.”
* * * * *
LULA, Grandma Mazur and I stood in the hall, waiting for Sally to answer his doorbell. I was wearing a short denim skirt, white T-?shirt and sandals. Grandma was wearing a red-?and-?blue print dress with white sneakers. Lula was wearing a low-?cut red knit dress that hiked up about three inches below her ass, red-?tinted hose and red satin sling-?back heels.