Hardcore Twenty-Four (Stephanie Plum 24)

“You grab her, and I’ll go open the back door,” Lula said.

“Here’s the deal,” I said to Ethel. “I promised Diggery I’d sort of take care of you while he was locked up. So I have to get you back to the double-wide. And that means I have to get you into my car. And that means I have to immobilize you a little. I swear to God, it’ll be okay, and after I get you home I’ll bring you a pizza. It’s the best I can do because the rats got all eaten.”

Ethel lunged at me, and I gave her a bunch of jolts with the stun gun. She shuddered and twitched, her head hit the ground, and she didn’t move.

“What did you do?” one of the women said. “Is she dead?”

“She’s stunned,” I said.

I wrapped my hands around Ethel’s tail and tried to pull her toward the car, but it was like moving a fifty-pound sandbag.

“I need help,” I said. “I can’t move her all by myself.”

No one came forward.

“She’s currently on someone’s front lawn,” I said.

A woman with short brown hair raised her hand.

“If you want her off your lawn you’re going to have to help me move her.”

“What the heck?” the woman said. “I have three out-of-control kids and a three-hundred-pound husband who snores like a yeti. I guess I can move a snake.”

Everyone but Lula grabbed a piece of Ethel. We wrestled her into the back of the Mercedes and closed the door on her.

“Appreciate the help, ladies,” I said. “I’m sure Ethel will be happy to get home.”

I jumped behind the wheel, and Lula got in beside me.

“That went off easy-peasy,” Lula said. “Bing bang bam. Are we a team, or what? Now all we got to do is get Ethel into the double-wide. I bet you got a plan for that too.”

“I have hot dogs. And I promised her pizza.”

“That would do it for me.”

I turned onto State, drove for ten minutes, and turned onto Diggery’s road.

“This could be a new profession for us,” Lula said. “We could be snake wranglers. I bet there’s good money in it.”

“I think I hear some rustling in the back. Check on Ethel for me. See if she’s okay.”

“It’s just this bumpy, crap-ass road,” Lula said. “Ethel’s sleeping like a baby.”

“Still, just turn around and make sure.”

“No problem. YOW! She’s awake. Lordy, she’s coming to get me. She’s going to eat me alive!”

“Don’t panic. Take my stun gun and give her another shot of electric.”

“Let me out. Stop the car.”

In my peripheral vision, I saw a snake head slither over Lula’s shoulder.

“YOW!” Lula shrieked, flailing her arms. “Let me out of here!”

Lula jumped out of the moving car. The snake slid onto the floor and over my foot. I went into a freak-out, the SUV veered off the road, and I crashed into an outhouse that belonged to one of the yurt people. I fought my way free of the inflated airbag, opened my door, tumbled out, and the snake zigzagged over me and disappeared into the woods.

I lay there for a full minute, struggling to breathe, before Lula gave me a hand-up and pulled me to my feet.