Hard Eight (Stephanie Plum 8)

“She's worried about Evelyn and Annie. They're the only family she has left.”

“Well, find them,” Grandma said. “We don't know what to do with all these coffee cakes.”

I drove to Key Street and parked across from Evelyn's house. I thought about Annie sleeping in her bedroom upstairs, playing in the small backyard. A little girl with curly red hair and large serious eyes. A kid who was best friends with my niece, the horse. What kind of a kid would buddy up with Mary Alice? Not that Mary Alice isn't a great kid, but let's face it, she's a couple inches off average. Probably Mary Alice and Annie were both on the outside looking in, needing a fr

iend. And they found each other.

Talk to me, I said to the house. Tell me a secret.

I was sitting there, waiting for the house to say something, and a car pulled up behind me. It was the big black Lincoln with two men in the front. I didn't have to think too long or hard to figure out it was Abruzzi and Darrow.

The smart thing would be to take off and not look back. Since I had a long history of rarely doing the smart thing, I locked my door, cracked the window on the driver's side, and waited for Abruzzi to come talk to me.

“You've got your door locked,” Abruzzi said when he walked over. “Are you afraid of me?”

“If I was afraid of you, I'd have the motor running. Do you come here often?”

“I like to keep an eye on my properties,” he said. “What are you doing here? You aren't planning on breaking in again, are you?”

“Nope. I'm just sightseeing. Strange coincidence that you always show up when I'm here.”

“It's not a coincidence,” Abruzzi said. “I have informants everywhere. I know everything you do.”

“Everything?”

He shrugged. “Many things. For instance, I know you were at the park on Sunday. And then you had an unfortunate accident with your car.”

“Some moron thought it would be cute to put spiders in my car.”

“Do you like spiders?”

“They're okay. Not as much fun as bunnies, for instance.”

“I understand you hit a parked car.”

“One of the spiders took me by surprise.”

“The element of surprise is important in a battle.”

“This isn't a battle. I'm trying to put an old woman's mind at ease by finding a little girl.”

“You must think I'm stupid. You're a bounty hunter. A mercenary. You know perfectly well what this is about. You're in this for the money. You know what the stakes are. And you know what I'm trying to recover. What you don't know is who you're dealing with. I'm toying with you now, but at some point the game will get boring for me. If you haven't come over to my side by the time I get bored with the game, I'll come after you with a vengeance, and I'll rip the heart out of your body while it's still beating.”

Yikes.

He was dressed in a suit and tie. Very tasteful. Looked expensive. No gravy stains on the tie. He was insane, but at least he dressed well.

“Guess I'll go now,” I said. “You probably want to go home and get medicated.”

“Nice to know you like bunnies,” he said.

I cranked the engine over and took off. Abruzzi stood there, staring after me. I checked my rearview mirror for a tail. Didn't see anyone. I wiggled around a couple streets. Still no tail. I had a bad feeling in my stomach. It felt a lot like horror.

I drove past my parents' house and noticed Uncle Sandor's Buick was parked in the driveway. My sister was using the Buick until she saved enough money to get her own car. But my sister was supposed to be at work. I pulled in behind her and popped into the house. Grandma Mazur, my mom, and Valerie were all at the kitchen table. They had coffee in front of them but no one was drinking.

I opted for a soda and took the fourth chair. “What's up?”

“Your sister got fired from her job at the bank,” Grandma Mazur said. “She got into a fight with her boss, and she got herself fired, on the spot.”