Dirty Thirty (Stephanie Plum, #30)(69)

“Sounds like a good contact,” I said.

“You bet your behind,” Lula said.



* * *




The handyman was already on site when Lula and I arrived at her apartment house.

“There he is,” Lula said. “That’s Julio.”

Julio was built like a fireplug. He was in his fifties with weathered skin and a leather tool belt to match. His black hair was pulled back into a ponytail. His truck had seen better days.

“It’s important to check out a person’s truck before you hire them,” Lula said. “You never want to hire someone with a new truck. It’s a sign that they don’t need the job real bad, and they’re going to overcharge you. Julio’s truck has just the right amount of rust. Not so much that he looks like a failure, but enough to tell you he’s a hardworking man. Either that or he spends his money on beer and dope instead of getting a new truck, but I haven’t seen any evidence of that.”

We walked through Lula’s rooms and Julio took a couple pictures with his cell phone.

“The bad part is that everything on the surface is pretty much charred,” he said. “Kitchen gone. Closet gone. Bathroom gone. Living area gone. The good part is the structure seems okay. Like, it isn’t as if the house is falling down. And when we fix things up, we can do it better than it was. I can give you a little kitchen. There’s not a lot of room here, but maybe we can section things off to give you a space for a bed.”

Lula was fanning her face and flapping her hands. “I’m gonna cry. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to get so emotional. Maybe I could have a little stove so I could make a roast chicken. And I always wanted to bake a cake.”

“I’ll draw up a plan,” Julio said. “I know someone who happened on some almost-new appliances so it might not cost you a lot.”

“When can you start?” Lula asked. “I’m living with Stephanie right now. I’m sort of homeless.”

“I can start right away,” Julio said. “I have an opening. Usually, it’s the appliances that take time, but these are available. And I can get a deal on cabinets if you don’t mind slightly used. We’ll give them a coat of paint and they’ll be like new.”

The translation of this was that the appliances were hijacked off a truck last week, and in the dark of night, the cabinets would be removed from a house that had been foreclosed on and abandoned. Not that any of this was so terrible. At least they’d be finding a good home. Besides, it was environmentally friendly, like recycling.

“This is one of those things that was meant to be,” Lula said when we were back in the Rangeman SUV. “At first the fire looked like a bad thing, but now it’s a good thing. I’m going to start practicing cooking as soon as we get home. I’ve got to be ready to have a stove. I didn’t see any sign of Grendel either. There were no tufts of ogre hair sticking to anything.”





CHAPTER TWENTY




I dropped Lula off at the office and I drove to my parents’ house. It was midmorning and my mom’s car wasn’t in the driveway. I parked at the curb, let myself into the house, and yelled hello.

“I’m in the dining room,” Grandma yelled back.

She was at the table, surfing on her laptop.

“Your father is at his lodge and your mother is at the grocery store,” she said. “I stayed home so I could catch up on my socials.”

“Anything fun happening?”

“The usual blah blah blah,” Grandma said, “but Mitchell Zelinsky has a viewing tonight at the funeral home. It’s going to be a good one. He was a big deal in the Knights of Columbus. They’re putting him in slumber room number one. That means they’re expecting a crowd. I thought I would wear my new blue dress. It’s a copy of the dress Princess Kate wore for some shindig. I got it online. You can’t go wrong with Princess Kate.”

CNN, MSNBC, CBS, and Fox paled in comparison to the amount of news that was passed along the Burg gossip line. And Grandma was a premier member. Originally, I’d planned to get her to plant a rumor about Plover and fake jewelry, but now I had something better. There was only one thing that could top the gossip line, and that was a major viewing at the funeral home. A Plover rumor dropped there would spread like wildfire.

“You should come with me,” Grandma said. “I could use a ride.”

“Are dogs allowed?”

“I don’t know. I never saw a dog at a viewing. I guess if you say he’s a service dog it would be okay. He could be one of those comfort dogs. Like an emotional support dog but he could be a bereavement dog.”

I looked over at Bob, not sure if he could pull it off. He’d probably be okay if I kept him away from the cookie table.

“Doors open at seven,” Grandma said. “There’s going to be a rush to get in, but I’ll bet we could use the side door if we’ve got a bereavement animal with us.”

“I’ll pick you up at six forty-five.”

I left my parents’ house and drove to my apartment building. When I’d packed for my move to Rangeman I hadn’t included anything my mother would consider to be suitable for wearing to a viewing.

Lula was in the kitchen when I let myself in. There were candles in jars on the counter and Lula had a spray can in each hand.