Lean Mean Thirteen (Stephanie Plum 13)

“Shut up, Dick breath,” I said. "And anyway, it wasn't one slipup. In the fifteen minutes we

were married, you screwed half the women in Trenton."

“I have a high libido,” Dickie said to Morelli.

"It had nothing to do with your libido. It had to do with the fact that you're a pathological

liar and a worm.“ ”You have control issues,“ Dickie said. ”Men aren't designed for

monogamy, and you can't handle that."

I narrowed my eyes at Morelli. “Hit him.”

“I can't hit him,” Morelli said. “He's in my protective custody.”

“And you!” I said to Morelli.

“I had no choice,” Morelli said. "He had to get squirreled away somewhere, and I had the

house, so he got dropped in my lap."

“You could have told me!”

“I couldn't tell you. You would have acted differently.”

“I thought I was going to jail for murder!”

“I told you not to worry,” Morelli said.

“How was I supposed to know that actually meant something? People say that all the time.” “What about me?” Morelli said. 'Where's the sympathy for me? I've been trapped in my

house with this idiot."

“Boy, that hurts,” Dickie said. “I thought we were bonding.”

“What about the shooting at your house the night you disappeared?” I asked Dickie. "And

what about the blood on your floor?"

Morelli was hands in pockets, rocked back on his heels. "Dickie shot one of the hired help

in the knee. And then he ran like hell out his back door, right Dickie?"

“I ran like the wind.”

“And why is Dickie here in protective custody?”

"They wanted him on ice while they investigated the law firm's client list. The original

thought was we needed him to testify against his partners, but his partners have disappeared in

one way or another. One is confirmed dead and another presumed dead. And the third

dropped off the face of the earth when Dickie went missing."

“You can't find Petiak?”

"Vanished. We know he's still around because from time to time one of his goon squad