CHAPTER 6

I closed the door behind Morelli, leaned against it, and gave a great big sigh. It was a sigh of mixed emotions. Relief, for one.

I'll be honest. When I opened the door and saw Morelli, my imagination went into hyper-drive. It conjured up images of him with his arms waving around like a windmill and spittle flying from his mouth while my face turned purple and I screamed back like a banshee. Shockingly, that wasn't the case. We sat down and had a nice long chat, without yelling, discussing what our relationship was and what it wasn't. Awkward? Yes. Somewhat painful? Yes. However, the reality is that this talk was long overdue. We wanted such different things that we knew that it wouldn't work out. Especially not right now, with all the feelings that I was having for Ranger. But maybe I didn't tell Morelli that part.

There were a few hairy moments, such as when he asked why a shiny, black BMW was sitting in my usual parking spot instead of my car. I glossed over the truth as much as possible on that one. I could see the skepticism in his face, but he wisely didn't push the issue. I'm thinking maybe he knew that he really didn't want to know. As soon as possible, I put him on the defensive by asking about the creepy staring at the police station.

Getting up to leave, Joe paused, almost like he was unsure of what to do. The old Joe would have snagged me around my waist and played tonsil hockey. The new Joe looked like he was thinking about it, but restrained himself. He left with a "well, see you around, Cupcake."

I wandered in my bedroom and flopped down on the bed in my usual thinking position, flat on my back, sprawled across the bed. I had a lot to think about, that's for sure.

First of all, Ranger. What exactly did I feel for him? Lust? Desire? Yep. Yep. Okay, now for the biggie...love? Hmm. That one needs more thought, but I would say that I'm heading in that direction. Damn. I didn't know if I was ready to go there or not. That left me with only one thing to do...procrastinate.

I got up and took a shower, doing the usual make up and hair thing, and looked square in the mirror.

"Take that, you scum bag!" I said, glaring at the mirror with my death rays. I changed my tactic, putting on a sweet and innocent expression, flitting my eyelashes. "Flowers? For me? You shouldn't have!"

Warmed up, I walked out the door, grabbing my purse and coat on the way and telling the apartment bye. I sauntered out the back door with the Beemer keys in my hand. Might as well do things right, I figured. If I'm in such a kick ass mood I think I deserve to drive a kick ass car. Hell, I always deserve to drive a kick ass car.

I stopped in the middle of the lot, looking around for the car. Oookay. Something's wrong in this picture. No Beemer. The spot where I had parked was now filled with Mr. Slockter's old Buick. Damn those Buicks.

Okay Steph, be reasonable, I told myself. Look around. Maybe someone just moved it...or something. I quickly canvassed the area and looked down all the streets that were by my apartment.

No Beemer.

My first reaction was to call Morelli. He was a policeman, after all. However, in light of the recent events, and the fact that I'd lost Ranger's car, I figured that wasn't the best thing to do.

I could always call Ranger. Except that this was his car that was missing. Strike that one out, too.

Who else? My father? Lula? Mary Lou? Bingo! She wanted me to call her anyway, right? So I could be killing two birds with one stone. I ran back into the building and up in my apartment. I noticed Dillon had wasted no time in collecting Bob for the day, since Bob was now gone from my apartment. Rex blinked his beady eyes. I could read his thoughts and they were along the lines of what the heck are you doing back again?

I gave him a glare. "Don't you start."

I called Mary Lou and filled her in and she said that she would be happy to drive me around for a while. Her kids were at her mother's and Lenny was at work so she was at loose ends anyway.

Thirty minutes later I was setting out once again, this time in the mom van, which wasn't very compatible with my kick ass mood. Except now my kick ass mood was gone with the wind and I was more in a holy shit I'm going to be shipped to Cambodia mood. Cars were almost never stolen out of my parking lot, so this was definitely not the norm. To tell the truth, the only thing that did happen to cars in my parking lot were them blowing up. They always belonged to me.

After a little debate, we decided to just head over to the office and see what Connie and Lula knew. They might even have something to eat.

We were greeted with an enthusiastic "Hey girlfriends!" from Lula when we walked in the door and a more sedate hello from Connie. I guess the bad guys were still skipping even without Vinnie. Lucky for business that Connie could write the bonds. Truth be told, Vinnie was getting to be at the bottom of my list, too. Finding the Beemer was at the top. I wasn't keen on losing yet another one of Ranger's cars.

"Why you here, girl?" Lula asked Mary Lou in between slurps of what looked like a milkshake.

"Steph's car is missing," Mary Lou replied, rolling her eyes in my direction. I stuck my tongue out at her. Talk about letting the cat out of the bag.

Lula and Connie just looked incredulous. "What happened to the Buick? I thought your car was at Pino's?" Connie asked.

I sighed. "Actually, the Buick is fine. It is at Pino's. The car that's missing in the Beemer I was driving this morning."

"Shee-it girlfriend! Ranger gave you another car! And you lost it already! What'd you do to him this time? Cause you know what a Beemer's worth-"

I cut her off. "Nothing. I did nothing. We followed up on a lead on Vinnie last night after we had dinner at Pino's so I left my car there. On the way back I fell asleep and Ranger took me to his house. We didn't do anything."

"You're crazy," Lula replied. "Cause I sure as hell would have done something! Many, many times."

"Yeah, yeah. But the point is, have you heard anything about a Beemer around here?"

"Nope," Connie replied. "It's been really quiet."

Just then the door opened and Ranger walked in. I felt my stomach drop to the floor and I made a panicked LET'S GO face to Mary Lou. She was struck so dumb by his arrival that it was totally wasted.

He smiled when he saw me. "Hey, Babe."

I smiled nervously back, edging past him to the door. "Hey. Mary Lou and I were just about to go..uhh...shopping so I need to get going. I'll catch up with you later!"

I ran out the door with Mary Lou only a few steps behind me. We hopped in the mom van, Mary Lou revved the engine, and we were off to the races.

We spent a few minutes getting our breathing under control, me from panic and Mary Lou from hormones.

"So, now what?" Mary Lou asked, glancing at me sideways. "We're not really going shopping, are we?"

"Hell no! I've got more important things to do right now...maybe later though. I have an appointment with Mr. Alexander at 3:30." It was noon now.

"Oh, really? What are you going to get done?"

"Some blond highlights, I think. We'll see." Okay, I was getting off track. The car, Stephanie, the car! "Let's go to my Mom's and get some lunch. We can ask if they've heard anything."

"Good idea!"

Almost an hour later we were both full to bursting with meat loaf sandwiches. Mom was so happy to see Mary Lou again that she insisted we have some of the cake that was going to be tonight's dessert. The downside to the visit was the fact that neither she nor Grandma Mazur knew anything about a mysterious Black Beemer. Damn. Not to mention, I had to do some fast-talking to explain why I hadn't returned her million messages and why the Buick was at Pino's all night.

The more I thought about it, the more I thought how weird the situation was. I mean really! Under any other circumstances, news of the missing BMW would be flying along the Burg grapevine at the speed of light. Not now, though.

We eventually mustered our energy and left, declining Grandma's offer to accompany us. We didn't need to make this a bigger shit-show than it already was.

We were cruising on down Hamilton, once again aimlessly. I was staring out the window and wishing the car would just appear, poof, right in front of me. As we passed the Cluck in a Bucket on Hamilton I could see some poor soul inside in a big chicken suit, clucking around and performing his chicken duties.

My eyes wandered over the Cluck in a Bucket and then moved on before I had a moment of clarity. There was something on the flat roof of Cluck in a Bucket. That something looked an awful lot like a Beemer. And, to all appearances, it was a BLACK Beemer. Just sitting there. Weird.

"STOP! Stop the car! Turn around!" I shrieked to Mary Lou, eyes bugging out of my head.

"What?" she shrieked back in panic.

"I found my car! The car is on top of the Cluck in a Bucket! Someone put my car on top of the Cluck in a Bucket!"