Sizzling Sixteen (Stephanie Plum 16)

“Maybe the bar was serving breakfast.”

“I didn’t think of that,” Lula said. “I guess that would be okay.”

“This place has real hostage potential. I’d go in and pretend I’m a customer, but I don’t look like I belong in this neighborhood.”

“You mean on account of you’re the only white woman on this whole street, dead or alive?”

“Yeah.”

“I see your point, but I’m not going in there. I hate funeral parlors, and I hate dead people even more. I get the creepy crawlies just sitting here thinking about it.”

“Okay, we’ll do this later. Let’s take a look at the apartment building.”

The apartment building was half a block away and looked like the Tower of Terror. It was four stories tall, black with grime, and slightly lopsided.

“Holy bejeezus,” Lula said, eyes bugged out, looking at the building. “This is scaring the crap out of me. This is like where Dracula would live if he didn’t have any money and was a crack head. I bet it’s filled with rabid bats and killer snakes and hairy spiders as big as dinner plates.”

I thought it looked like it would be filled with despair and craziness and broken plumbing. Either way, it wasn’t anywhere I wanted to go. Unfortunately, it was also a good place to stash Vinnie.

“How bad do we want to find Vinnie?” I asked Lula, unable to take my eyes off the hellish building.

“The way I see it, either we find Vinnie, or I’m gonna be working the fry basket at Cluck-in-a-Bucket. Not that there’s anything wrong with the fry basket, but all that grease floatin’ in the air isn’t gonna be good for my hairdo. And what if they already got someone working the fry basket? What if I can’t get another job and they come repossess my Via Spigas?”

And what if I don’t come through, and they kill Vinnie? How could I live with that? I thought.

I speed-dialed Ranger’s cell phone.

Ranger picked up and there was a moment of silence as if he was sensing me at the other end, taking my body temperature and heart rate long distance. “Babe,” he finally said.

“Do you know the slum apartment building Bobby Sunflower owns on Stark?”

“Yes. It’s on the same block as his funeral home.”

“That’s the one. I’m going in to look for someone. If you don’t hear from me in a half hour, maybe you could send someone to check.”

“Is this a smart thing to do?”

“Probably not.”

“As long as you know,” Ranger said. And he disconnected.

“I got two doughnuts left,” Lula said, “and I’m eating them before I

go in just in case I don’t come out.”

I angled out of the Firebird. “Take them with you. If I don’t go in now, I’ll chicken out.”

The front door was ajar, leading to a small, dark foyer spray-painted with a bunch of gang symbols. Stairs going up to the left. A bank of mailboxes to the right. No names on the mailboxes. Most were open and empty. Some didn’t have doors at all. The message was clear. If you lived here, you didn’t get mail.

Two doors led off the foyer. Lula and I listened at the doors. Nothing. I tried one of the doors. Locked. The second door opened to cellar stairs.

Lula poked her head in the doorway. “There’s stairs going down, but I can’t see nothing. It’s blacker’n night down there. Don’t smell too good, either.”

“I hear scritching sounds,” I said to Lula.

“Yeah, I hear it, too. Kinda squeaky.”

And then a tsunami of rats swept up the stairs and over our feet.