Joe sat in the tan unmarked cop car down the street from Shiropolli's house. It was big, too big to be in Trenton, even on the outskirts like it was. It was manor, or a very small mansion. Morelli had relieved the other shift, the night shift who had been watching the house. He only had to do this for three hours then he was free, free to go home and catch up on sleep he so desperately needed. He looked down at the third cup of coffee, the taste was starting to wane in his mouth. At times like these, he wished he drank on the job. He would rather be half sloshed and bored out of his mind than being bored and having a foreboding feeling that something bad was going to be taking place.
Reaching over to the glove compartment he opened it up and pulled out the bottle of Maalox. He took a swig. I'm going through cases of this shit. My life is to drown in a tunnel of Maalox. Maybe Antoine's right, I should see a doctor about this. Yeah, but I don't want to find out I have a stomach ulcer. I don't need a doctor, I am a man, in the prime of my life. He looked at the Maalox bottle and tossed it in the passenger seat. A man who has an orange dog who will eat me out of house and home and that includes the furniture.
Morelli snickered. I like that dog though, I still can't believe I ended up with the dog. I ended up with the responsibility of that dog while Stephanie gets visitation rights but not the responsibility of him. Who am I kidding Steph wouldn't be able to handle Bob. Bob walks all over her. Just like her damn skips do, they walk all over her.
Joe looked up as he saw the front door open. A little dog came bounding out on a leash, he could see Shiropolli starting to walk down his long drive with the little dog. As they came closer to the end of the drive towards the street, Morelli noted the little dog looked like a chocolate teddy bear. He noted the time on the log book that had been passed over to him from the previous look out. Mainly there was a lot of comings and goings with plate numbers being written down. He flipped back through the last couple of days and noticed Shiropolli took the dog for a walk at the same time every morning down to the end of his street and back. Joe continued to watch, the man was a creature of habit when he was at home. Shiropolli didn't look out of place in this neighborhood. Joe felt he belonged here, Shiropolli looked like he belonged here.
His cell phone rang, Joe answered it. "Fuck, we are already twenty minutes late."
"Who is this?" Joe asked.
"Morelli, Shiropolli finally said something in his house and we got him on tape. He ordered a message to be delivered at the kid's house." Joe recognized the voice as the dark haired agent he had spoken to earlier at the station.
"Shiropolli is out walking his dog right now." Joe told him.
"Good, just stick with him. Davarus and I are heading to the kids house now. I just hope we aren't too late in catching Shiropolli's handymen."
"I'll watch him, call me." Joe hung up the phone.
He looked back at Shiropolli just strolling down the street without a care in the world but for his little dog. If you looked at Shiropolli twice, no one would guess that he was a loan shark. The FBI had his house wired for the last three months and hadn't gotten anything out of the man they could possibly use until today. The guy was smooth, Joe couldn't believe he made this slip. Joe still couldn't shake the feeling that something didn't feel right with this case, it was like everything was falling into place too easily for it to go this smoothly.
His phone rang again and Joe flipped it on, "Talk to me."
He could hear Lula in the background. "I ain't staying here, not with no naked dead woman. Don't care."
"Shut up! Get a grip, it's not like you haven't seen a dead body before." Joe heard Stephanie yell angrily back at Lula.
"Don't give me no lip, its not like I go around finding dead bodies all the time, just because I'm with you sometimes and see them."
Joe couldn't handle it anymore, "Stephanie!" Joe yelled into the phone.
"What!" Stephanie yelled back at him, "Oh, Joe you need to send someone over to Alex Ramono's apartment."
Ramono's? "Fuck! Stephanie, you aren't supposed to be in that apartment. Why do you keep doing shit you know you aren't allowed to do?" Joe growled into the phone with authority.
"Don't yell at me! I don't need any damn orders from you. I'm reporting a fucking dead body for the thousandth time." Stephanie snapped back into the phone.
"Orders? I haven't even began to give you orders. You want orders, quit your fucking job and get a new one. You don't do that then there is no us!" The venom dripped from Joe's tongue as his breathing accelerated.
Stephanie kicked at the karate trophies in the room, "I tried that…You know what, fuck off."
"Get the fuck out of there before the Feds come breaking down the door!" Joe reached for the Maalox he had thrown on the seat next to him. "Stay out of my damn cases!"
"Don't tell me what to do. You don't have that right anymore! I'm not going to listen to anyone anymore, this is my life, no one else's." Stephanie yelled at him.
Lula couldn't believe Stephanie was in raging hormonal war mode. "I'm leaving, let's just get the hell out of here. I don't want no dead body cooties, I don't like death cooties. She's just creeping me out with that black belt in her mouth, that's a message. Message for not talking."
Stephanie looked at Lula, "Don't let the feds fucking get to my skip, because I'll make damn sure I'll hound you till your dying breath."
"Damn it Stephanie, get out of there now, if you don't listen to me this time, this is it. We're through. I can't have you walking into my cases that can get you killed." Joe slammed back a dose of Maalox, he was contemplating on downing the whole bottle.
"NO. NO! I broke up with you." Stephanie wanted to throw something, anything. Then the phone line went dead.
Stephanie looked at Lula's phone, "He hung up on me!"
Lula put her hands on her hips, "And?"
"I hate when people do that to me!" Stephanie growled out at Lula, "I broke up with him, I'm the queen of break ups, and he tried to take that away from me."
"Well! Don't that beat all. I hate to tell you this, but there is a dead body in that bed." Lula pointed over to the bed.
Stephanie turned to look at the body and her mind slowly started comprehending what Joe had said about the feds. "Oh Shit!"
"We did that before." Lula said, "I'm out of here."
Lula spun around and started walking out of the bedroom, that was when she heard the front door open up. Lula turned and headed to the window waving her arms. Stephanie ran past Lula and reached the window first and wrenched it open. She pushed on Lula to get her through the window and ended up having to put her foot in Lula's big butt to get her out of the window. Stephanie climbed out after her and just made it when two men came through the door to the room with guns drawn.
"Stop! Freeze!" The blonde said and then shot a round towards Stephanie who bolted and started running. She beat Lula to the firebird.
"They are shooting at us!" Stephanie yelled at Lula, "Get in here."
Lula just got behind the wheel and turned the engine over when she reversed out of the parking space and went over the curb going backwards with her eyes as wide as golf balls. "This isn't good. This is so not good."
"I hate getting shot at." Stephanie told Lula.
"Those were cops, cops never shoot at us." Lula said, "I'm more used to the skips doing that shit, not the good guys."
Lula turned the wheel and ended up with her back tire in one of the potholes in the pavement. She moved the gear shift to drive and punched the gas peddle to the floor when another shot rang out and hit the back of her car. Two more shots ran out and hit another car they just passed, the trunk of the car had been open and hanging in the back of the car was one of those medium sized canisters that looked like a clown that blew up helium balloons at kids birthday parties. The bullets hit the clown and the explosion was deafening, the rear end of the car went up four feet flipped over and landed on the van that was beside it. Lula kept the car going not bothering to look back as she drove like a demon running from the angels of the host.
Davarus hit his partner in the shoulder, "You stupid Fuck, you just landed us with no vehicle to go after Shiropolli's stooges."
Jackson turned to his partner, "That wasn't my bullet that was yours."
They both then turned to look at the rear end of the fire blazing car that was crumbled inside the van up top. Jackson started towards the van along with Davarus as the crackle of the fire kept blazing away.
Joe was still sitting in the unmarked car as he heard the call go over the police scanner. There had been an explosion on Damascus Street, one block from Slayerland. Joe downed the rest of the Maalox bottle. "I'm seeing a doctor tomorrow. I need a fucking shrink to get my head on straight."
Lester was sitting on the couch with his legs propped up on the coffee table in front of him, just staring off at the dark TV across the way. He heard the cough at his door and turned to see Hal standing in the doorway. "That was fast, Ranger get Gaspick to drop the charges that quick?"
"No, he dropped me back off here, he had a fight with Stephanie Plum and then just took off." Hal said, "He said I'm to be with you. So where's the kid?"
Ranger had a fight with Stephanie? Ranger has never had a fight with Stephanie. "Come again?" Lester asked in perplexed shock.
"They had a fight over the kid, something about being incompetent to control her skips." Hal said as he took a step in Lester's apartment. "So where's the kid?"
Incompetent? Ranger wouldn't have said she was incompetent, Stephanie wasn't incompetent, but Ranger never thought she was. Ranger only said she had no control, there was a difference. He looked back at Hal. "So he left you with me, and just took off, he didn't say where he was going?"
"No, just took off." Hal shrugged his shoulders. He looked at Lester and then growled out, "Where is the fucking kid?"
What is his problem with Alex? Lester put his feet down and stood up and walked towards the door. He glared at Hal, "Change your damn attitude." Lester swelled his chest out, "She has a name, Miss Ramono."
Lester moved around Hal and pushed into his shoulder as he did and punched the intercom by the door. "Tank we have a situation, come to my room." He jerked his finger back and crossed his arms across his chest glaring at Hal.
"What is your fucking problem?" Hal asked.
"I don't want you anywhere around Miss Ramono." Lester told him.
Hal squared off and crossed his arms over his chest and glared back at Lester. "You don't have any say over that, only Ranger does."
"Ranger isn't here, so Tank will give you new orders." Lester told him.
Tank walked just inside the door and stopped when he saw Lester squaring off with Hal. "What's going on?"
Lester looked past Hal's shoulder. "Ranger is in the wind, he had a fight with Stephanie, Ranger had told Hal to come back to me. I don't like his attitude towards the young lady that Ranger placed in my custody."
Tank glanced from Lester to Hal, "Ranger had a fight with Stephanie?" He asked in disbelief.
Hal turned to look at Tank, "They fought over that fucking kid and Stephanie's incompetence."
Tank's brows raised, "I see…Hal, right now, you will not be working with Lester covering Miss Ramono. Lester has it handled. I need you to follow me and we'll see about placing you with someone who needs your insight on other matters." Ranger has never called Stephanie incompetent. Hal thinks Stephanie is incompetent. Now what do I do with Hal?
Bobby walked out of the bail bonds office, "If she went into that apartment after Ranger told her she wouldn't be welcome in that neighborhood, Ranger is going to shake her to pieces."
He got in the front seat and started the Bronco the police scanner he had turned on was blaring out a call on Desmond Street with explosions. "Damn it! Why Stephanie? Why on my watch?"
Bobby had let all the air out of the tires on the Cooper before he had went into the bond office, he didn't want Stephanie having an easy time getting away from him. He felt sadistic in doing it, but it was a partial pay back for throwing his phone in the dumpster. He looked at his chocolate covered phone, praying that it wouldn't ring, because he hadn't even had the chance to even try to clean it yet. He pulled out on the road and started heading to Desmond Street, three blocks away from the bond office. Lula's firebird flew passed him at an alarming rate of speed.
"What the fuck?" Bobby said to no one as he made a U-turn to follow the firebird. "Lula, Tank is going to hurt your damn lead foot."
He cheered up a little bit though, Stephanie was with Lula, he had gotten that out of Connie only after she had thrown her nail file at him. Then proceeded to throw several other things at him as well. He had been treated to constant threats and something about Ranger's damn fault for Stephanie being in such a foul mood that she had rejected taking any of the skips they had piled up on the counter and taking Lula with her.
He caught up with the firebird and hit the horn. Lula swerved at the horn and took out a Federal blue mailbox. "Damn woman, that's federal offense messing with United States mail." Bobby slowed his pace some staying at a safe distance.
"Lula! Slow the fuck down!" Stephanie told her as she had her feet planted on the dashboard and her hands bracing herself for the impact of the erratic driving Lula was doing. Stephanie looked back and noticed the black Bronco following them. Stephanie groaned. "Great just fucking great, he found me."
"The feds, the feds are behind me?" Lula asked hysterically and ran a red light.
Stephanie closed her eyes as they barely made it through the intersection as the other cars started pulling into it. Bobby saw them coming and swerved to miss the cars and did a 180 before he got the Bronco turned back in the right direction going after the firebird.
"Jesus! I think I just messed my pants." Bobby was more intent now at catching them. "What the fuck is wrong with them? Jesus Stephanie its not like you haven't blown things up before."
Stephanie was trying to breath, she reached over towards the keys on the firebird. "You're going to get us killed!"
"Don't yell at me."
"Well stop!" Stephanie yelled back as she finally got a hold of the keys.
Lula let go of the wheel and started slapping Stephanie's hands. "Those are my keys, I didn't say you can touch my keys."
"Drive!" Stephanie yelled as the firebird was now careening towards the sidewalk.
Lula grabbed the steering wheel and barely missed taking out the light post and then slammed on the brakes. Stephanie was jerked forward and her legs slipped down to the floor, the seatbelt caught her in the chest and she lost her breath with the gut wrenching pain of being thrown forward. Lula skidded to a stop one block later.
Bobby's heart felt like it was beating out of his chest as he saw the firebird almost take out the light post. He stopped the Bronco right behind the firebird and jumped out and went straight over to the firebird and wrenched open the door to the driver side.
"Are you okay?" Bobby asked. He saw Lula babbling about how her baby was fine.
Stephanie already had her hands inside Lula's purse and pulled out the electric taser that Tank had given Lula and shot it at Bobby.
"Holy cow! What you do that for?" Lula asked Stephanie.
Stephanie looked at the Bronco and then to Lula, "We need to change vehicles. And we'll just take Bobby us. I mean, we can't leave him on the street. I just sent enough volts up him to light up Brooklyn."
Lula looked out at Bobby laying on the concrete beside her open door. "But the feds are after us."
"Ranger and Tank will be after us when they find out what we just did to Bobby, we can't just leave him here." Stephanie told her.
"You have a point there."