Hot Six (Stephanie Plum 6)

Ranger grimaced. “Carol?”

I told him about Carol and Joyce and how Carol didn't want to get caught on Candid Camera and how it was all sort of my fault this time.

Ranger thunked his head on the file cabinet. “Why me?” he said.

“I wouldn't have let Joyce keep you,” I told him. “I was going to turn you over to her and then figure out a way to get you back.”

“I know I'm going to regret this, but I'm going to set you loose so, God forbid, Carol doesn't jump off the bridge. I'm going to give you until nine o'clock tomorrow morning to work things out with Joyce, and then I'm coming after you. And I want you to promise you won't go near Arturo Stolle or anyone named Ramos.”

“I promise.”

I DROVE ACROSS town to Lula's house. She has a second-floor apartment, facing front, and her lights were still on. I didn't have a phone, so I walked up to her door and rang the bell. A window opened above me, and Lula stuck her head out. “What?”

“It's Stephanie.”

She dropped a key down, and I let myself in.

Lula met me at the top of the stairs. “Are you spending the night?”

“No. I need some help. You know how I was going to turn Ranger over to Joyce? Well, it didn't exactly work out.”

Lula burst out laughing. “Girl, Ranger is the shit. No one's better than Ranger. Not even you.” She took in the T-shirt and jeans. “I don't mean to get too personal, but were you wearing a bra when you started the evening, or is this something recent?”

“I started out this way. Dougie and Mooner don't wear my kind of underwear.”

“Too bad,” Lula said.

It was a two-room apartment. Bedroom with bath attached, and another room that served as living room and dining room and had a small corner kitchen. Lula had placed a little round table and two ladderback chairs at the edge of the kitchen area. I sat on one of the chairs and took a beer from Lula.

“You want a sandwich?” she asked. “I got bologna.”

“A sandwich would be great. Dougie just had crab puffs.” I took a long pull on the beer. “So this is the problem: what are we going to do about Joyce? I feel responsible for Carol.”

“You can't be responsible for someone else's bad judgment,” Lula said. “You didn't tell her to tie Joyce to that tree.”

True.

“Still,” she said, “it'd feel good to screw Joyce over one more time.”

“You have any ideas?”

“How well does Joyce know Ranger?”

“She's seen him a couple times.”

“Suppose we slip her someone who looks like Ranger, and then we take back the ringer? I know this guy, Morgan, who could pass. Same dark skin. Same build. Maybe not as fine, but he could come close. Especially if it was real dark, and he didn't open his mouth. He got the name Morgan 'cause he's hung like a horse.”

“I'd probably need a couple more beers to think it would work.”

Lula looked over at the empty beer bottles sitting on her counter. “I got a head start on you. So I'm real optimistic about this plan.” She opened a dog-eared address book and thumbed through it. “I know him from my former profession.”

“Customer?”

“Pimp. He's a real asshole, but he owes me a favor. And he'd probably get off on passing as Ranger. He probably got a Ranger outfit in his closet, too.”

Five minutes later, Morgan answered his page, and Lula and I had ourselves a fake Ranger.

“Here's the plan,” Lula said. “We pick the dude up on the corner of Stark and Belmont in a half hour. Only he hasn't got all night, so we gotta get this thing moving.”