Finger Lickin' Fifteen (Stephanie Plum 15)

“Nobody calls me pecker head and lives,” Pecker said. And he launched himself across the table and tackled Julia Child.

The two men went to the floor, punching and grunting, rolling around locked together.

“Look at that,” Grandma said, leaning across the table. “He is wearing ladies’ panties.”

My father kept his head down, shoveling in buttered biscuits and barbecued chicken, and my mother went to the kitchen to refill her glass.

Lula hauled her Glock out of her purse and fired off a round at the ceiling. A small chunk of plaster fell down onto the table, and Larry and Pecker stopped gouging each other’s eyes out long enough to look around.

“We got chicken on the table,” Lula said, pointing the gun at the two men. “And I want some respect for it. What the hell are you thinking, rolling around on the floor like that at dinner hour? You need to get your asses into your chairs and show some manners. It’s like you two were born in a barn. Not to mention I got a contest coming up, and I need to know if this is gonna give you all diarrhea on account of everything I’ve cooked so far has gone through people like goose grease.”

Larry righted his chair and sat down, and Pecker went to his side of the table. Pecker’s nose was bleeding a little, and Larry had a bruise developing on his cheekbone.

“I hope this chicken’s okay,” Grandma said, spooning coleslaw onto her plate. “I’m hungry.”

Everyone looked to my father. He’d been shoveling food into his face nonstop, including the chicken.

“What do you think of the chicken?” my mother asked him.

“Passable,” my father said. “It would be better if it was roasted.”

Pecker tested out a leg. “This is pretty good,” he said, reaching for another piece.

“It’s Larry’s recipe,” Grandma said.

Pecker looked over at Larry. “No kidding? How do you get that sweet but spicy taste?”

“Blackberry jelly,” Larry said. “You add a dab to the hot sauce.”

“I would never have thought of that,” Pecker said.

I ate a biscuit and ni

bbled at the chicken. Pecker was right. The chicken was good. Really good. I didn’t have any delusions about winning the contest, but at least we might not poison anyone.

My father reached for the butter and noticed the chunk of plaster in the middle of the table. “Where’d that come from?” he asked.

No one said anything.

My father looked up to the ceiling and spotted the hole. “I knew when we hired your cousin to do the plastering it wasn’t going to hold,” my father said to my mother.

“He plastered that ceiling thirty years ago,” my mother said.

“Well, some of it fell down. Call him after dinner and tell him he better fix it.”

“I heard some interesting news today,” Grandma said.

“Arline Sweeney called and said they were going to hold the Chipotle funeral here in Trenton.”

“Why would they do that?” Lula asked.

“I guess he had three ex-wives who didn’t want him in their plot. And his sister didn’t want him in her plot. So the barbecue company decided to take charge and bury him here since that’s where his head is. And he’s gonna be at the funeral home on Hamilton. Right here in the Burg.”

“That’s weird,” Lula said. “Are they going to have a viewing?”

“Arline didn’t know anything about that, but I guess they’d have a viewing. There’s always a viewing.”

“Yeah, but they only got a head,” Lula said. “How do they have a viewing with just a head? And what about the casket? Would they put just the head in a whole big casket?”