Free 18 Explosive Eighteen by Janet Evanovich Page A

grandmother were at the smal kitchen table enjoying a ritual glass of port, celebrating the return of order and cleanliness in the kitchen. And I departed in the powder blue and white ’53 Buick that was kept in the garage for emergencies. Sitting on the seat beside me was a doggy bag that included fried chicken, soft little dinner rol s from the bakery, a jar of pickled beets, half a homemade apple pie, and a bottle of red table wine. The wine had been sent along, I’m sure, with the hopes that I might have a romantic evening with Morel i and make a grandchild. So much the better if I got married first.
    I drove past the Bugkowski house out of morbid curiosity to see if my car was there. Not only wasn’t the car parked at the curb, but the house was dark.
    No one home. Probably, Big Buggy took his parents for a drive in his new RAV4.
    Twenty minutes later, I rol ed into the lot to my apartment building and did another car check. No RAV4. No black Lincoln Town Car. No green SUV
    that belonged to Morel i. No megabucks shiny black Ranger car. I found a space close to the building’s back door, parked, and locked up. I took the elevator to the second floor, walked down the hal , and listened at my door. Al was quiet. I let myself in, kicked the door closed, and a swarthy guy with lots of curly black hair jumped out of the kitchen at me.
    He was holding a huge knife, and his dark eyes were narrowed.
    “I want photograph,” he said. “Give it to me, or I kil you big-time. I make you very painful.” I grabbed the bottle of wine from the doggy bag, hit the guy in the face with it as hard as I could, his eyes rol ed back, and he crashed to the floor. I’d acted total y on instinct and was as surprised as he was that he got knocked out. I put a hand to the wal to steady myself and took a couple deep breaths. It felt icky to have the guy in my apartment, so I cuffed him and dragged him into the hal . I returned to my apartment and closed and locked the door in case there was a partner lurking somewhere.
    I retrieved my Smith & Wesson from the cookie jar and walked through my apartment looking in closets and under the bed, finding dust bunnies but no more swarthy guys. I went back to the kitchen and cal ed Bil Berger.
    “There was a nasty-looking guy in my apartment when I came home just now,” I told him. “He had a big knife, and he said he’d kil me if I didn’t give him the photograph.”
    “And?” Berger asked.
    “I hit him in the face with a bottle of table wine and knocked him out.”
    “Where is he now?”
    “He’s in the hal .”
    There was a beat of silence. “What’s he doing in the hal ?”
    “I didn’t want him in my apartment, so I dragged him into the hal .”
    More silence. Probably, Berger wasn’t believing any of this.
    “Did you check for ID?” he final y asked.
    Damn! “No. Hold on, and I’l go look.” I opened the door, and the hal was empty. No swarthy guy.
    “He’s gone,” I said to Berger.
    “Problem solved,” Berger said. And he hung up.
    I closed and locked the door, plugged my stun gun into a wal socket, returned the Smith & Wesson to the cookie jar, and opened the bottle of wine. Thank God it hadn’t broken, because I real y needed a drink. A Cosmo or a Margarita or a water glass fil ed with whiskey would have been even better. I brought the bottle into the living room, settled in front of the television, tuned in to the Food Network, and tried to get my heart rate under control.
    Some woman was making cupcakes. Cupcakes are good, I told myself. There’s an innocence to a cupcake. A joy. I poured a second glass of wine, and I watched the woman frost the cupcakes.
    Halfway through the bottle of wine, I flipped to the Travel Channel, and I don’t remember much after that.

    • • •
    I woke up to the sun streaming into my bedroom. I was naked, tucked under the covers, and alone. I vaguely remembered half-waking to Morel i tel ing me the chicken was al he hoped it would