I grinned at her. "So why did she rob a truck again, anyway? Was it her time of the month?" Last time she robbed a truck it was because of her period. You gotta go something about cramps.
Alrighty. Here's Chapter 9...
Cindy rolled her eyes. "No. She has been on a diet since the chip-incident and she was really strung out with chocolate cravings so she snapped."
I smiled. I could definitely relate. I walked up the porch and banged on the door.
"Carol, COME OUT! You aren't going to jail, I promise!"
Her answer through the door was muffled, "But I have priors now!"
"No. You only have one prior. And I bet you'll have a woman judge, anyway."
Carol opened the door and peeked out. She was a wreck. She was in an over large tee shirt and pink pajama pants. Her make up was smudged and there were chocolate stains everywhere. "Are you sure?"
No. I wasn't sure. "Absolutely. Vinnie will just bond you out again as soon as you get there."
She didn't look convinced, but she opened the door and let us in anyway.
"Do I get to keep the chocolate?"
"No," said Lula, "What about your diet? You can't go eatin' a bunch of chocolate on a diet. Believe me, I know all about diets that work, and this isn't one of them."
"Really?" asked Carol.
"Yep. I lost a lotta weight on the no carb diet. I got to eat all the meat I wanted but no carbs."
"Wow. I should try that one next."
We stuffed all the left over chocolate bars into two plastic garbage bags and hauled them along with Carol out to Lula's Fire Bird. After dropping Carol off at the police station and getting my body receipt, Lula and I stopped off at MacDonald's for lunch.
"So how about we each get a bag?" said Lula, smushing her fries into her ketchup.
"Tempting, but no. I can hardly fit into my jeans as it is." Sadly enough, it was true. I could barely button the top snap anymore. I needed to stop eating crap. I needed to start running. Ha…yeah right.
"You could get Ranger to take you running again," said Lula, "I bet he'd just loooove that."
Ugh.
That night was dinner at my parent's house again. Except this time Valerie, Albert and the girls were there. To make a long story short, Val bawled all over Jamie, Jamie met for the first time Val's kids, Grandma spilled wine all over the table, Albert spilled spaghetti sauce all over himself, Jamie convinced Mary Alice that not only was she a horse, but she could change into different animals if she wanted to, and Morelli brought Bob who puked up underwear all over the living room.
Jamie, Morelli, and I were sitting on the front steps, waiting for the war zone inside to die down.
"Omigod I cannot believe I actually lived through that," I said, sipping my wine.
"Fuckin' A." said Morelli.
"Hey Jamie, how did you know Val got married?"
"'Cause I was there, duh. Do you think I'd miss my own sister's wedding? I was at yours too."
"I didn't see you there."
"No shit Sherlock, I was hiding. I didn't want anyone to see me. I wasn't ready to give up traveling and come home yet."
"Huh."
The next morning I woke up to a sudden heavy weight on my chest, an incredibly loud noise and a very cold sensation
"WAKE UP STEPHANIIEEEEEEEEEEE!" yelled Jamie, dumping a handful of ice on me.
I shreiked at the cold and tried to move away, but Jamie was sitting on me
"You dumped ICE ONE ME!" I shreiked again.
"Well be thankful it wasn't a bucket of icewater!"
"Arg Jamie go 'way, I'm tired. Wha' timzit?"
"It's only six, jeez. Ranger wanted to come at five but I convinced him to let you sleep 'til six."
Ranger? Here? At Morelli's house? I shoved Jamie and the iceoff of me and sat up, "Where's Joe?" I asked.
"Downstairs eating breakfast. I told him I was kidnapping you and making you run and he said it was a good idea. Ranger is out in the car," she added, reading my thoughts.
I got out of bed and pulled on a pair of shorts "Running? Why? I hate running."
Jamie stood back and grinned at me. She was in shorts and a track jacket and sprinting shoes. "That's not what Lula said. Lula said you wanted to fit better into your jeans."
Damn Lula. I stuffed myself into sweats and running shoes and followed Jamie down the stairs.
"Have fun," said Morelli, biting into a doughnut.
"Yeah right."
I climbed into the back of Ranger's Mercedes and buckled my seat belt. "So where are we going?" I asked.
Ranger glanced back at me, "There's a track nearby." He said, and pulled away from the curb as Jamie buckled herself in. Arg. I hate tracks. You just go around and around and around and around until you get sick and barf. Well maybe not get sick and barf…but it's really boring.
"What about Jack? Won't he be after us?"
Jamie laughed. "Jack is on his way to Indonesia. Since he hasn't heard from me he checked the airport and discovered I bought a one way ticket to Indonesia. It will take him maybe a week to figure out it was a joke and he'll be back. So now we have time to have some fun."
"Oh boy. Running. Fun"
Ranger pulled off Route 1 and drove a few miles to a huge park. I could see the track, and I could also see a trail around a big man- made lake. I followed Jamie and Ranger to the track where they started stretching. I just kinda stood there dreading this whole experience. Jamie and Ranger ended up making me run ten laps around the HUGE track. I staggered to a finish and collapsed on a bench.
Jamie shook her head in disgust. "That's really pathetic, Stephanie," she said, "Ranger made me run up sides of mountains, while at the same time dodging bullets. This isn't that bad." I just flipped her an Italian hand sign. Jamie and Ranger had lapped me a lot, and they weren't even breathing hard. I had stopped counting after ten.
"Muuuuh…." I groaned. My legs didn't work. And neither did my arms. I tried to shift into a more comfortable position, but ended up flopping onto my side…which wasn't that bad.
Jamie laughed at me and turned to Ranger. "I'll race you around the lake. Three laps. Ready, setty, GO!" she yelled, taking off.
I watched them sprint around the lake. They were going way too fast for normal human ability. I just got exhausted watching. Ranger was fast, but Jamie was smaller. She won by about an inch. At this point I had painfully moved to a bench closer to the lake. Jamie and Ranger were on the other side, and Jamie was doing a victory dance. She said something to Ranger, pointing her finger, and he scooped her up and tossed her into the lake in one fluid motion.
"ASS!" she yelled at him when she surfaced, "That was SO uncalled for!"
I was laughing pretty hard at this point. They were so….imature was the only word I could think of. Ranger was acting like he did when he first saw Jamie. This was the normal-ish guy Ranger. Not the Scary Mercenary Ranger. This was the Ranger Jamie knew.
Jamie slogged up to the bank and followed Ranger back to me.
"Stop flirting," I said, smiling. Ranger stared at me and his eyes darkened. Jamie noted this reaction and grinned.
"Well don't mind me, I'm off to air dry myself, see ya!" she said and took off.
Ranger leaned over me, placing his hands on the back of the bench beside each shoulder. Then he kissed me, and I swear I went unconscious for more than a second. When I came back to reality Ranger was sitting next to me, staring out at the lake, thinking mysterious thoughts.
We sat there in silence for a beat. Then I spoke, wondering if this was the right thing to say.
"Jamie really likes you," I said slowly. I was pretty sure he could decode that to mean "she is head over heels in love with you"
His eyes flicked over to me, "I know."
Well that was good. Because it would be kind of weird if he hadn't noticed. We sat in silence for a while and I was about to ask what the hell happened between them when Jamie came back bearing two huge ice cream cones. One was two scoops of chocolate, my favorite, and the other was a scoop of something yellow and a scoop of something blue. She was also carrying this puny little red popsicle. It was the kind of popsicle that wouldn't even help on a hotday. It was a dud popsicle.She dropped the dud popsicleon Ranger, sticking her tongue out at him.
"It doesn't really matter," I said, accepting my ice cream from Jamie, "he doesn't like to pollute his body with sugar, anyway."
Jamie grinned at Ranger, "Oh really? What about that chocolate mousse you destroyed in France? And the Chocolate Orange Guinness Cake in Ireland? And the—"
She was cut off by gunshots. Pop pop pop. We all threw ourselves to the ground, ice cream forgotten. We silently counted shots until we knew the clip was used up. It looked like Jack was back from his trip. Ranger got up with is gun drawn, intently staring at the parking lot. Jamie was still on the ground, hand over her arm. Her eyes were shut and her teeth were clenched, and I could see blood oozing out between her fingers.
"Fuck," she said weakly.