Eleven on Top (Stephanie Plum 11)

“Cupcake, you should be happy I lost. He would have put you through the car wash at the corner of Hamilton and Market.” He took my hand and tugged me forward.

“Let's go home.”

“Will Big Blue be safe here?”

“Big Blue is safe everywhere. That car is indestructible.”

Morelli was in the shower with me. “Okay,” he said. “There's some bad news, and then there's some bad news. The bad news is that it would seem some clumps of hair got yanked out of your head when we ripped the electrician's tape off. The other bad news is that you still smell like fried chicken, and it's making me hungry. Why don't we towel you off and send out for food?”

I put my hand to my hair. “How bad is it?”

“Hard to tell with all that oil in it. It's sort of clumping together.”

“I shampooed three times!”

“I don't think shampoo is going to cut it. Maybe you need something stronger... like paint stripper.”

I grabbed a towel, stepped out of the shower, and looked at myself in the mirror over the sink. He was right. Shampoo wasn't working, and I had bald spots at the side of my head where the tape had been bound to me. “I'm not going to cry,” I said to him.

“Thank God. I hate when you cry. It makes me feel really shitty.”

A tear slid down my cheek.

“Oh crap,” Morelli said.

I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. “It's been a long day.”

“We'll figure this out tomorrow,” Morelli said. He took the cap off a tube of aloe ointment and carefully dabbed the ointment on my chicken-fryer burns.

“I bet if you go to that guy at the mall, Mr. Whatshisname . . .”

“Mr. Alexander.”

“Yeah, he's the one. I bet he'll be able to fix your hair.” Morelli recapped the tube and reached for his cell phone. “I'm calling Pino. What do you want to eat?”

“Anything but chicken.”

I woke up thinking Morelli was licking me, but it turned out to be Bob. My face was wet with Bob slurpees, and he was gnawing on my hair. I made a sound that was halfway between laughing and crying, and Morelli opened an eye and batted Bob away.

“It's not his fault,” Morelli said. “You still smell like fried chicken.”

“Great.”

“Could be worse,” Morelli said. “You could still smell like cooked car.”

I rolled out of bed and shuffled into the bathroom. I soaped myself in the shower until there was no more hot water. I got out and sniffed at my arm.

Fried chicken. I returned to the bedroom and checked out the bed. Empty. Large grease stain on my pillowcase. I borrowed some sweats from Morelli's closet and followed the coffee smell to the kitchen.

Bob was sprawled on the floor next to his empty food bowl. Morelli was at the table, reading the paper.

I poured out a mug of coffee and sat across from Morelli. “I'm not going to cry.”

“Yeah, I've heard that before,” Morelli said. He put the paper aside and slid a bakery bag over to me. “Bob and I went to the bakery while you were in the shower. We thought you might need happy food.”

I looked inside the bag. Two Boston cream doughnuts. “That's so nice of you,” I said. And I burst into tears.

Morelli looked pained.