Lean Mean Thirteen (Stephanie Plum 13)

First up was the conversation with Joyce. I drove to her house and parked in her driveway behind a Pro Serve van and hatchback. Joyce's front door was open, and I could see a cleaning crew working inside. A couch and chair had been set curbside. Terminal victims of the beaver explosion.

I picked out a guy who looked like he might speak English and asked for Joyce. “Not here,” he said. “She let us in and split.”

"That's okay, I'll just look around until she gets back. I'm her interior decorator. We had an

appointment, but I'm early."

“Sure,” he said. “Knock yourself out.”

The house was elaborately decorated with a lot of velvet upholstery and gilt-framed

mirrors. Rugs were plush. Marble in the kitchen and bathroom. Satin in the bedroom. Flatscreen televisions everywhere. Joyce had married well this last time around. She'd chosen more velvet and gilt than I could manage, but it looked expensive.

There was a designated office/library, the shelves filled with hardcover books that had probably belonged to her ex. A large carved mahogany desk floated in the middle of the room. The desktop was clean. Telephone but no scribble pad. No computer. I checked all the drawers. Telephone book. Nothing else.

I returned to the kitchen and sat at the little built-in workstation. The phone was attached to an answering machine. A Starbucks coffee mug held pens and markers. A couple sticky pads were stacked next to the phone.

I opened the top drawer and found a piece of paper with two nine-digit numbers and a phone number scrawled on it. I recognized one as Dickie s social security number. Odd how you remember things like that. I didn't recognize the second number or the phone number.

I dialed the phone number, and a programmed voice introduced itself as the Smith Barney automated Reserved Client Service Center and asked for an account number. That was as far as I was going to get, so I copied the three numbers on a sticky pad and put the paper in my pocket.

I didn't see anything else of interest on Joyce s desk. I scrolled through calls made and calls received on her phone and copied the list, going back four days.

I packed up and ran into Joyce as I was leaving the kitchen.

“What the fuck?” Joyce said.

“I was looking for you,” I told her.

“Well, you found me. What do you want?”

“I thought if we put our heads together we might be able to figure out what happened to Dickie.”

“I know what happened to him. I just don't know where he is now.”

“Why do you care?” I asked Joyce.

“I love him.”

I burst out laughing, and Joyce cracked a smile.

“Okay, even I couldn't keep a straight face on that one,” Joyce said.

“Do you think he's dead?”

“Hard to say one way or another until a body turns up. What I can tell you is this-stay out of my way. I've got an investment here, and I intend to collect. And I'll run over anyone who tries to stop me.”

“Hard to believe Dickie had that much money. From what I could see, he wasn't that smart.”

“You have no idea what's involved here. And I'm warning you again. Stay out of it.”

Joyce was really starting to annoy me. Bad enough from time to time Morelli and Ranger tried to push me around, now Joyce was telling me to butt out.

“Looks like you're doing some redecorating,” I said to Joyce. “Is that animal fur on your chandelier?”

We locked eyes, and I knew the thought was fluttering in her head… did Stephanie Plum mastermind the beaver bombing? And then the moment passed, and we both stepped back from it.

I walked to the Cayenne, got in, and powered out of the driveway. I drove to Coglin s house just for the heck of it and saw that the green SUV was parked in the alley, two tires on Coglins property line. I angle-parked behind the SUV, blocking its exit, and approached Coglins back door with stun gun in hand.