We were half a block down Hamilton when Lula looked in her rearview mirror. “I think we're being followed. That black SUV pulled out right after us and now he's sitting on our bumper.”
“It's Tank. Ranger thinks I need a baby-?sitter.”
Lula took another look. “He's fine. He's not as hot as Ranger. But he's fine all the same. I wouldn't mind having my way with him.”
“I thought you had a new boyfriend?”
“Don't mean I can't think someone else is fine. I'm just going steady, girl. I'm not dead.”
In a couple minutes we were at my apartment building and Lula parked in the lot, beside the Escape.
“I think you should go up to your apartment just to check it out and shit,” Lula said. “I could go with you and I bet King Kong over there'll go, too. And I'd get a chance to see him up close.”
“Sure,” I said. “I should probably see if everything's okay, anyway.”
We all got out of our cars and walked to the back door. Tank is about six foot six and is built like ... a tank. He hasn't an ounce of fat on him. He wears his hair in a Marine buzz cut. He was dressed in desert cammies.
We climbed the stairs and walked down the hall. Tank took the key from me and opened the door. He was the first to step through. He looked around and he motioned us in.
It was cool and quiet inside. No flowers. No photos. No killers. I gathered together some clean shirts and underwear and we left.
“I'd forgotten about Tank following me,” I said to Lula. “He can chauffeur me around if you want to get back to the office.”
“What are you, crazy? If I go back there I'll have to file. And Vinnies there. Vinnie creeps me out these days. All he does is mope around, worrying about Samuel Singh. It's unnatural. Vinnie's usually out having a nooner with a goat. I hate having him just hang around the office.”
Tank smiled at the part about the nooner, but he didn't say anything. He got into his shiny black SUV. Lula got into her red Firebird. And I got into my yellow Escape. And we all motored off to Joe's house.
Lula parked behind me and immediately got out of her car. “Are you going in?” she asked. “I hope you're going in because I've never been in Morelli's house. I'm dying to see the inside. What's the decor? Modern? Traditional? Colonial?”
“Mostly Pizza Hut with a splash of Aunt Rose.”
I opened the door and Bob rushed out at us, nose twitching, eyes wild. He looked from Tank to Lula to me and then his head swung back to Lula and he gave a loud woof.
“What the ...” Lula said.
Bob gave another woof, chomped down on Lulas purse, ripped it out of her hand, and took off out the door down the street.
“Hey,” Lula yelled. “Come back with that! That's my purse.” She looked to Tank. “Do something. I paid good money for that purse.”
Tank whistled, but Bob paid no attention. Bob was at the end of the block, tearing the purse to shreds. We jogged down to Bob and found him gnawing on a pork chop.
“That was my snack,” Lula said. “It was barbecue. I was looking forward to that pork chop.”
I took Bob by the collar and dragged him back to Morelli's house.
“I'm on a diet,” Lula explained to Tank. “The fat just melts away on this diet, but you've gotta eat lots of pork chops.”
I locked Bob in the house and Lula and I drove back to the office with Tank following.
“That was sort of embarrassing,” Lula said. “It's hard to explain a pork chop in your purse.”
“Sorry it all got destroyed.”
“Yeah, I really wanted that pork chop. I don't care so much about the bag. I bought the bag from Ray Smiley, out of the back of his Pontiac. It was one of those things that accidentally fell off a truck.” Lulas eyes got bigger. “Hey, we should make a stopover at the mall. I could get a new purse and then just for the hell of it we could go into Victoria's Secret and see if Tank follows us in. That's how you tell what a man's really made of. It's one thing for a man to be big and brave and kill a spider. Any man could do that. Trailin' after a woman when she's shopping for thongs and push-?up bras is a whole other category of man. And then if you want to see how far von can go with it, you ask him to carry one of those little pink bags they give you.”
I've never been shopping with Ranger so I can't say how he'd do with the Victorias Secret test. Morelli flunked hands down. Morelli takes off for soft-?serve ice cream when I head for Victoria's Secret.
“No time,” I told Lula. “Ranger's picking me up at five o'clock.” And Ranger doesn't like to be kept waiting.