minutes to do hair and makeup. If I wore a hat I could forgo hair, and that would cut the time in half. I decided the hat was the way to go.
I hit the back door running with a few minutes to spare. I’d gone with taupe eye-liner, a bronze-tone blusher, natural lip gloss and lots of black mascara. The key ingredient to hangover makeup is green concealer for the under-eye bags, covered over with quality liquid foundation. I was wearing my Rangers ball cap, and a fringe of orange frizz framed my face. Orphan Annie, eat your heart out.
I paused for a light at Hamilton and Twelfth and noticed the Nissan was running rough at idle. Two blocks later it backfired and stalled. I coaxed it into the center of the city. Ffft, ffft, ffft, KAPOW! Ffft, ffft, ffft, KAPOW!
A Trans Am pulled up next to me at a light. The Trans Am was filled with high school kids. One of them stuck his head out the passenger-side window.
“Hey lady,” he said. “Sounds like you got a fartmobile.”
I flipped him an Italian goodwill gesture and pulled the ball cap low on my forehead. When I found a parking space in front of the Shuman Building, I revved the engine, popped the clutch and backed into the parking slot at close to warp speed. The Nissan jumped the curb and rammed a meter. I gnashed my teeth together. Stephanie Plum, rabid woman. I got out and took a look. The meter was fine. The truck had a big dent in the rear bumper. Good. Now the back matched the front. The truck looked like someone had taken a giant pincers to it.
I stormed into the coffee shop, spotted Morelli and stomped over to him. I must have still looked rabid, because Morelli stiffened when he saw me and made one of those unconscious security gestures cops often acquire, surreptitiously feeling to see if their gun is in place.
I tossed my shoulder bag onto the floor and threw myself into the chair across from him.
“I swear I didn’t intentionally try to get you drunk,” Morelli said.
I squeezed my eyes shut. “Unh.”
“Well, okay, so I did,” he admitted. “But I didn’t mean to get you
“Take a number.”
He smiled. “You have other problems?”
“My car is possessed by the devil.”
“You should try my mechanic.”
“You have a good mechanic?”
“The best. Bucky Seidler. You remember him from high school?”
“He got suspended for letting a bunch of rats loose in the girls’ locker room.”
“Yeah. That’s Bucky.”
“He calm down any?”
“No. But he’s a hell of a mechanic.”
“I’ll think about it.”
Morelli thumbed through a stack of cards he kept in his wallet. “Here it is,” he said, passing the card over to me. “Mr. Fix It. You can keep the card.”
“Bucky Seidler, proprietor.”
“Yeah,” Morelli said. “And resident crazy man.”
I ordered a Coke and French fries. Morelli ordered a Coke and a cheeseburger.
When the waitress left I leaned my elbows on the table. “Do you think Mo could actually have something to bargain?”
“The rumor going around is that Mo is claiming he didn’t kill anybody.”
“Being an accomplice to murder is the same as pulling the trigger in Jersey.”
“If he was cooperative and had something vital to give us…” He made a palms-up “who knows” gesture with his hands.
The waitress set the plates on the Formica-topped table and returned with the drinks.
Morelli snitched one of my French fries. “What did you ever see in Dickie Orr?”
I’d asked myself that same question many times and never found a satisfactory answer. “He had a nice car,” I said.
Morelli’s mouth curved. “Seems like a sound basis for marriage.”
I poured ketchup on the fries and started working my way through them. “You ever think about getting married?”
“Sure.”
“Well?”
“It’s been my sad observation that cops don’t make wonderful husbands. In all good conscience, I’d have to marry someone I didn’t especially like, so I wouldn’t feel crummy about ruining her life.”
“So you’d marry someone like me?”
Morelli’s face creased into a broad smile.
“I hate to admit this, but I actually like you. You’re out of the race.”
