Smokin’ Seventeen(55)

“How goes it?” Mooner asked.

“A madman is sending me dead people, a crazy woman wants to run me over, I need to catch a guy who thinks he’s a vampire, and I have the vordo.”

“Excellent,” Mooner said.

I looked at the empty lot and tried to visualize the killer driving the car in and dragging the body out.

“Did you kill Juki Beck?” I asked him.

“I don’t think so,” Mooner said, “but heck, what do I know?”

I turned my attention to the bus. The seven-foot Stephanie on the sidewalk side had something dripping off her face and boobs.

“What happened to the bus?” I asked Mooner.

“A little old lady came by. She was dressed all in black, and she threw a bunch of eggs at you. Then she started laughing this real crazy laugh. It was like witch cackle. And then she put her finger to her eye, spit on the sidewalk, and left. Freaked me out, dude.”

Okay, so Morelli was fun and sexy and smart and handsome. It might not be enough to compensate for the fact that he came with an evil grandmother. Maybe my mother was right, and I should consider Dave. I was pretty sure his grandparents were dead.

I gave Mooner the peace sign, and I returned to the Shelby and ate my sandwich and drank my water. I looked at my hair in the rearview mirror and wondered if my mother was right. Maybe I needed some sprucing up. Especially now that I was riding around in the Shelby. I supposed it wouldn’t hurt to have Mr. Alexander sprinkle in some blond highlights.

• • •

I definitely had to capture Ziggy. I’d had the highlights put in, and then it was like something snapped in my brain. Not only did I have a manicure and pedicure … I went on a shopping spree. Once my toes were painted pink and pretty I had to go all the way.

I rolled into my apartment building parking lot and was relieved to find it back to normal. No emergency vehicles, no crime scene tape, no car with a dead guy in it. I let myself into my apartment, said hello to Rex, and went directly to my bedroom. I dropped the bags and flopped spread-eagle on my bed. Deep breaths, I told myself, this is a simple panic attack. No big deal. Everyone has them. All you have to do is drag Ziggy back to jail, get your capture money from Connie, and you can pay your credit card bill. And there’s a possibility that the clothes will look terrible on you, and you’ll take them back. Just because they looked good in the store doesn’t mean they’ll look good now.

I sat up and dumped the clothes out on the bed. Semi-dressy red dress with a low scoop neck and swirly skirt, and spike-heeled red shoes. I tried them on and twirled in front of my bathroom mirror. I looked fabulous. No way was I taking them back.

I changed back into jeans, T-shirt, and sneakers, took my notepad to the dining room table, and listed out all the places I might find Ziggy. I had a lot of evening activities, but his house and Maronelli’s were the only two daytime leads. No point spinning my wheels looking for Ziggy now, I thought. I’d go after him tonight.

I opened my laptop and plugged Nick Alpha into some of the search programs we used to find people. Bad enough I was sitting here waiting for Regina Bugle to run me over, I wasn’t going to sit around waiting for the next dead body delivery … or worse, discover the next dead body was mine.

From what I could get online, Nick was currently without wife. He’d been married twice and divorced twice. He had two adult children by the first wife and none by the second. He had no recent credit activity and no current address. His parole officer would have an address, but I didn’t have access to his parole officer.

I called Connie because Connie had access to almost everything, one way or another.

“What’s all that noise?” I asked her. “Are you having a party? I can hardly hear you over the music.”

“It’s the television. I have it cranked up to drown out my mother’s humming.”

“I need information on Nick Alpha.”

“What?”

“Nick Alpha,” I yelled into the phone. “I ran him through the basic programs, but nothing current turned up. I’m looking for a home address. Does he have a car? And is he working?”

“I’ll make some phone calls and get back to you.”

I hung up, and there was a knock on my door. There was a time when this would have generated happy excitement that I had a visitor. That time was in the past, and a knock on the door now conjured visions of Regina Bugle, a big lumpy guy in a Frankenstein mask, and Dave Brewer. I crept to the door and looked out the peephole, and sure enough, it was Dave. He had a bottle of wine and a grocery bag. Yes, he was reliably nice. Yes, he was a good cook. No, I did not want him in my apartment. I held my breath and tiptoed away.