Smokin' Seventeen (Stephanie Plum 17)

I looked down at Lula’s shoes. I was with her when she bought them out of the back of Squiggy Biggy’s van two days after an eighteen-wheeler got hijacked on its way to Saks.

“These are hot shoes,” Lula said.

This was true.

“I’m a bond enforcement agent,” I told the bartender. “I’m conducting an investigation on behalf of the accused and his dependent.”

Lula raised her eyebrows. “He got a dependent?”

“Bruce,” I told her.

“Oh yeah. I almost forgot.”

“Melanie’s taking a break,” the bartender said. “She’s out back.”

Lula and I walked around the side of the building and found Melanie sitting on a beer keg, smoking. The first delicious rush of nicotine was behind her, and she was mechanically working her way through the remainder of her cigarette.

I introduced myself and asked if she had witnessed the shooting.

“I was there,” she said, “but I didn’t see how it happened. I was waiting on a couple in a booth, and I heard the gun go off. And then I heard Jeff yelling how he was shot. And at first I was panicked, you know? I mean it could have been some loon looking to wipe out a room.”

“Did you see anyone holding a gun?”

“No. By the time I looked around Jeff had fainted and was laid out behind the bar. And there was this guy in a red shirt looking shell-shocked, standing in front of the bar.”

“Anyone else around?”

“No. It was closing time, and the place was just about empty. The people in the booth called 911, and I went to see if I could help Jeff.”

“And the guy in the red shirt?”

“It was like he was glued to the floor. His eyes were big, and his mouth was open, and he was hanging onto a barstool.”

“Was he drunk?”

“Let’s just say if he was the one who got shot he wouldn’t be feeling any pain. When Jeff came around, he said the guy in the red shirt shot him.” Melanie took one last drag on her cigarette, dropped it onto the blacktop, and ground it out with her shoe. “I gotta get back to work.”

“One last thing,” I said to her. “While all this is going down, where’s the gun if it’s not in anyone’s hand?”

“It was on the floor by Jeff.”

Lula and I walked back to my Escort, and I called Morelli.

“Do you know who has the Boris Belmen case?” I asked him. “Belmen is accused of shooting a bartender.”

“Jerry caught that one. Belmen put his bear up as a guarantee against his bond, right?”

“Right. I just spoke to the waitress on duty when the bartender got shot, and it doesn’t add up to me. The gun was found behind the bar, next to Belmen.”

“I’ll pass it on to Jerry.”

“Did you get a chance to look at the Beck video?” I asked.

“Yeah. I’ve got it up on my computer.”

“Anything jump out at you? Do you recognize the killer?”

“No and no, but I think the Frankenstein mask is a nice touch.”