“Was he kidnapped?”
“Impatient. Said he got tired of waiting for you.”
“That little jerk-?off!”
Several people stopped in their tracks and stared.
I lowered my voice and turned, facing the phone. “Sorry, I got carried away,” I said to Ranger.
“Understandable, Babe.”
“He's got my jacket.”
“Bones will get it when he gets the car. You need a ride home?”
“I can call Lula.”
“YOU SHOULD HAVE taken me with you,” Lula said. “This wouldn't have happened if you hadn't hauled your skinny ass off on your own.”
“It seemed like such an easy job. Pick up a kid and drive him somewhere.”
“Look at this,” Lula said, “we're passing by the mall. I bet some shopping would cheer you right up.”
“I do need shoes.”
“See,” Lula said, “there's a reason for everything. God meant for you to shop tonight.”
We entered the mall through Macy's and blasted into the shoe department first thing.
“Hold on here!” Lula said. “Look at these shoes!” She'd pulled a pair of black satin shoes off the display. They had pointy toes and four-?inch heels and a slim ankle strap. “These are hot shoes,” Lula said.
I had to agree. The shoes were hot. I got my size from the salesperson and tried the shoes on.
“Those shoes are you,” Lula said. “You gotta get those shoes. We'll take these shoes,” Lula said to the salesclerk. “Wrap 'em up.”
Ten minutes later, Lula was pulling dresses off the rack. “Yow!” Lula said. “Hold the phone. Here it is.”
The dress she was holding was barely there. It was a shimmery black scrap of miracle fiber with a low-?cut neck and a short skirt.
“This is a genuine hard-?on dress,” Lula said.
I suspected she was right. I looked at the price tag and sucked in some air. “I can't afford this!”
“You gotta at least try it on,” Lula said. “Maybe it won't fit so good, and then you'll feel better about not being able to buy it.”
It seemed like sound reasoning, so I dragged myself off to the dressing room. I did a fast computation of money left on my credit card and winced. If I caught Randy Briggs and I ate all my meals for the next month at my mother's house and I did my own nails for the wedding, I could almost afford the dress.
“Damn skippy,” Lula said when I tottered out of the dressing room in the black shoes and black dress. “Holy shit.”
I checked myself out in the mirror. It was definitely a “damn skippy, holy shit” outfit. And if I could lose five pounds in the next two days, the dress would fit.
“Okay,” I said. “I'll take it.”
“We need some french fries to celebrate with,” Lula said after I bought the dress. “My treat.”
“I can't have french fries. Another ounce and I won't get into the dress.”
“French fries are a vegetable,” Lula said. “They don't count when it comes to fat. And besides, we'll have to walk all the way down the mall to get to the food court, so we'll get exercise. In fact, probably we'll be so weak from all that walking by the time we get there we'll have to have a piece of crispy fried chicken along with the french fries.”