“That would be a real bummer. That would defeat my purpose for apprehending him.”
* * *
—
I hauled my laundry basket into my parents’ house just before six o’clock. I was wearing new jeans and a new long-sleeved, scoop neck, silky-feeling sweater that Carol had dropped into my jeans bag without me noticing. The price tag was still on the sweater. $175.00. I was now aiding and abetting a shoplifter. Screw it. I didn’t care. It was a great sweater, and I had bigger fish to fry.
“Don’t you look pretty,” Grandma said when I walked into the kitchen. “Is that a new sweater?”
“Yes. And new jeans.”
“You must be doing good at work.”
I smiled at the irony of that. Just when I decide that I hate my job, I have the best week ever.
My mother was working at the stove, and the kitchen was heavy with the smell of meat and gravy. I looked in the fridge. Pineapple upside-down cake smothered in whipped cream. This meal was a mainstay of my life and almost as good as sex. Okay, who was I kidding? This was as good if not better than sex. And I could enjoy it without reciprocating.
Morelli walked in, and my mom and grandmother got all smiles. They liked Morelli. They would like me to marry him and make a bunch of little Morellis. Grandma also liked Ranger, but not to marry.
“This is my favorite meal,” Morelli said to my mom. “I could smell the gravy when I parked my car.”
“You’re just in time,” she said.
She poured the gravy into the gravy boat and handed it over to me. Grandma took the bowl of mashed potatoes. My father was already at the table. My mother set the pot roast platter in front of him. He had the carving knife and fork in hand. We were Catholic and my mother and grandmother went to Mass almost daily, but we didn’t say grace. We assumed God knew our thoughts when it came to food. We were thankful, we wanted world peace, yadda yadda yadda.
Morelli always sat next to me. Grandma was across from me. My mom and dad were at either end of the table. This was a good arrangement because Grandma was a reach for my dad if she went off on aliens doing anal probes on humans and he decided he had to stab her with the meat fork.
“What are you working on now?” Grandma asked Morelli. “Did you ever find out about the guy who tried to kidnap me? The dead one with the red shoes.”
“We’re running down some leads,” Morelli said.
“So, in other words,” Grandma said. “You got nothing.”
Morelli took a slab of pot roast and passed the platter to me. “Yep. That’s about it.”
“I hear his body got shipped back to Newark for burial. Not even having a viewing here. That’s a shame,” Grandma said. “A lot of people would like to take a look at him. He would have drawn a good crowd.”
My father had his head down, concentrating on his meat. My mother had emptied her iced tea glass and was gnawing on her lip, wondering if anyone would notice if she got more. Grandma had the bottle of red wine in front of her and poured out a glass.
“Who wants wine?” she asked.
Morelli and I raised our hands.
By the time the pineapple upside-down cake came out, I’d had three glasses of wine and my lips were numb.
“Did you see I’m wearing a special medallion necklace?” Grandma said to Morelli. “If you press it, like this, people know where you are.”
Morelli whipped his phon
e out and called Ranger’s control room. “That was a test drive,” he said. “No reason to respond.”
He stayed on the line for a couple beats and then said, “Hunh, for real?” He looked over at Grandma. “Press it again.” Another thirty seconds of silence. Morelli turned to me. “Press your medallion.”
I pressed it and waited.
“So, nothing?” Morelli said to the guy in the control room.
Morelli hung up and slid a glance at me. “They aren’t working.”