To the Nines (Stephanie Plum 9)

“Lucky me,” Joe said. And he ruffled my hair.

“I see babies,” Bella said. “Mark my words, this one is pregnant.”

“That would be nice,” Joe said, “but I don't think so. You're getting your visions confused. Stephanie's sister is pregnant. Right kitchen, wrong pot.”

My breath stuck in my chest. Did he say it would be nice if I was pregnant?

When Joe left for work I ran a computer check on McDonald's franchises in the area. I started dialing the numbers that turned up, asking for Howie, and I got a hit on the third McDonalds. Yes, I was told, a guy named Howie worked there. He would be in at ten.

It was early so I packed off in my happy yellow car and I checked in at the office before cutting across town to look for Howie.

“Anything happening?” I asked Connie.

“Vinnie's at the pokey, writing bail. Lula hasn't come in yet.”

“Yes she has,” Lula said, bustling through the door, big tote bag on her shoulder, take-?out coffee in one hand, brown grocery bag in the other. "I had to stop at the store on account of I need special food. There's a new man in my life and I've decided I'm too much woman for him, so I'm losing some weight. I'm gonna turn myself into a supermodel. I'm gonna lose about a hundred pounds.

“It'll be easy because I joined FatBusters last night. I got everything I need to lose weight now. I got a notebook to write in every time I eat something. And I got a FatBusters book that tells me how to do it all. Every single food's got a number assigned to it. All you gotta do is add up those numbers and make sure you don't go over your limit. Like my limit is twenty-?nine.”

Lula set the bag on the floor, plopped herself down on the couch, and took out a small notepad. “Okay, here I go,” she said. “This here's my first entry in my notebook. This here's the beginning of a new way of life.”

Connie and I exchanged glances.

“Oh boy,” Connie said.

“I know I've tried diets in the past and they haven't worked out, but this is different,” Lula said. “This one's realistic. That's what they say in the pamphlet. It's not like that last diet where all I could eat was bananas.” She paged through her FatBusters book. “Let's see how I'm doing. No points for coffee.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You never get plain coffee. I bet that's a caramel mochaccino you're drinking. I bet that's at least four points.”

Lula narrowed her eyes at me. “It says here coffee's got no points and that's what I'm writing. I'm not getting involved with all that detail bullshit.”

“You have anything else for breakfast?” Connie asked.

“I had a egg. Let's see what an egg's gonna cost me. Two points.”

I looked over her shoulder at the book. “Did you cook that egg yourself? Or did you get it on one of those fast-?food breakfast sandwiches with sausage and cheese?”

“It was on a sausage and cheese sandwich. But I didn't eat it all.”

“How much didn't you eat?”

Lula flapped her arms. “Okay, I ate it all.”

“That's got to be at least ten points.”

“Hunh,” Lula said. “Well, I still got a lot of points left for the rest of the day. I got nineteen points left.”

“What's in the grocery bag?”

“Vegetables. You don't get any points for vegetables, so you can eat as much as you want.”

“I didn't know you were a big vegetable eater,” Connie said.

“I like beans when you put them in a pan with some bacon. And I like broccoli. . . except it's got to have cheese sauce on it.”

“Bacon and cheese sauce might up your points,” Connie said.

“Yeah, I'm gonna have to wean myself off the bacon and cheese sauce if I want to get to supermodel weight.”