Hooker gave me a sideways glance. “How happy are you?”

“Not that happy,” I told him.

Hooker blew out a sigh.

“You wouldn’t take advantage of me in a drunken state, would you?” I asked him.

“Darlin’, I drive stock cars. Of course I’d take advantage of your drunken state. It’s practically required.”

A truck engine rumbled outside the warehouse, and there was a short blast from an air horn.

“That’s Rosa,” Felicia said, going to the bay doors. “I’ll let her in.”

“Tell her to back in,” Hooker said. “I’m going to cut some of the lights.”

The door to the middle bay rolled up, and we could see red brake lights attached to a massive industrial-grade dump truck.

“You’re clear,” Felicia yelled. “Back it up.”

The truck inched into the warehouse, stopping a couple feet short of the pile of scrap metal. Felicia hit the button that rolled the bay door back down. The driver’s-side door to the truck opened, and Rosa swung out, wearing four-inch heels that were clear plastic and rhinestones, a tight black spandex skirt, and a red sweater with a low scoop neck that showed a lot of cleavage.

“I was on a date when you called,” she said to Felicia. “You guys owe me big-time for ruining my love life.”

Hooker was smiling, hands in pockets, rocked back on his heels. “Where’d you learn to drive a dump truck?” he asked Rosa.

“My first husband was a truck driver. I used to go on the road with him sometimes. And sometimes I helped my uncle in the junkyard. You gotta know how to do a lot of different things in my family.”

A car horn beeped outside the warehouse.

“That’s probably my uncle,” Rosa said. “I told him you’d autograph his hat if he loaned us the truck.”

I sensed Hooker do a mental grimace.

“You didn’t tell him about the hauler, did you?” Hooker asked.

“No. I told him there was a big secret in here and he couldn’t come in. So he’s waiting outside for you.”

Rosa, Felicia, and I started throwing pieces onto the dump truck, and Hooker trotted to the door with a pen. He opened the door and took a step back.

“Rosa, there must be fifteen people out here!”

“Yeah,” Rosa said. “You’re such a popular guy. Everybody loves you. Just hurry up because we’re saving the big, heavy pieces for you to put in the truck.”

Twenty minutes later Rosa went to the door, opened it, and stuck her head out. “Hey, Mr. Rock Star, you want to stop signing autographs and help us out here?”

I could hear Hooker yelling though the open door. “This crowd keeps growing! Where are these people coming from?”

“All you people,” Rosa shouted. “You gotta go home and let Hooker come in here now. We got some bimbos in here for him.”

Felicia giggled. “I guess that’s us!”

I didn’t think it was all that funny. I’d actually been his bimbo.

Some laughing and clapping drifted through the open door. Hooker swooped in, and Rosa closed and locked the door behind him. We wrestled the heavy pieces onto the truck, cleaned up the stray nuts and bolts, swept the floor, and dumped the sweepings into the back with the rest of the criminal evidence.

Rosa climbed into the cab and cranked the engine over. “I’ll take this to the junkyard and tomorrow it’ll get compacted into a chunk the size of a loaf of bread.”

“We’ll follow you,” I said.

“You don’t need to do that,” Rosa said. “My cousin Jimmy is going to tie up the dogs and let me in.”

We killed the lights in the warehouse and Felicia opened the bay door. Rosa popped her headlights, the dump truck rumbled out of the warehouse, into the street, and turned left. Felicia rolled the bay door closed, and we put the lights back on in the warehouse. I put the thermos and cake containers back into the bags and walked Felicia out to her car.

“Thanks,” I said. “I really appreciate the help. This didn’t work out exactly as planned.”

“You mean with the dead guy? That’s okay. We’re in the wholesale fruit business. It’s not the first time I had to do cleanup after a dead guy. See you at breakfast.”

I nodded numbly and looked at my watch. Breakfast wasn’t all that far away. Hooker and I put the tools back in the carts and pushed the carts onto the lift. I powered the lift up to the bottom deck and rolled the carts off, into the narrow hauler aisle. We secured the carts and then we secured the pocket doors. I pressed the button that magically turned the lift into the hauler back door and watched it slide into place. We secured the two top-to-bottom corner pieces that held the back panel firmly in place. And then I disconnected the power cord and control and stowed it in the outside compartment. Then we walked through the warehouse, making sure it was exactly as we’d found it. No spare parts or tools left behind for Police Squad to find.

Hooker looked at his watch. “Four o’clock,” he said. “Let’s get the hauler out of here and wrap this up. I’m dead on my feet, excuse the expression.”

“Do you need help backing out of the warehouse?” I asked him.

“I’m cool. Kill the lights.”

“You won’t be able to see the door.”

“I have eyes like a cat.”

I shut the lights off in the warehouse and stood to the side, watching Hooker move the hauler. He misjudged the door by about six inches and bashed in the left-rear corner of the trailer.

“Maybe you’re right about the lights,” Hooker said, taking the truck forward.

I switched the lights on and Hooker made another try, this time succeeding in getting everything out the door and into the street. He pulled forward and sat there at idle. I made sure the warehouse was locked, and then I ran to the SUV and fell in line behind Hooker. Any halfway intelligent person would have had heart palpitations and a sick stomach at this point. I was too tired to be weirded out. I had a backache and very little going on in my head. I followed after Hooker on autopilot, just wanting it all to be over.

Hooker drove out of Little Havana and took Route 95, heading north to the interstate that stretched, dark and endless, in front of him. Trucks sporadically cruised by in the blackness, only headlights and running lights visible, moving in caravans, looking like highway ghost trains.

After ten miles Hooker pulled off the interstate, found a strip mall, and parked the truck. I parked behind him, and jumped out of the SUV with the motor still running. I peeled the aluminum wrap off the GPS, gave Hooker a weary thumbs-up, and we climbed into the SUV and hauled ass back to the highway.

I was behind the wheel, and Hooker was eyes closed, slumped in the seat next to me.

“Are we the good guys or the bad guys?” he asked me.

“That’s a tough one. We started out as the good guys. We rescued Gobbles. After that it goes into the gray zone.”

“At least it’s done, and we got rid of all the evidence without getting caught. We were careful. We used gloves. We wiped everything down. We compacted the cars. No one will tie us to any of this.”

I pulled into a space behind Felicia’s house, and Hooker and I staggered across the small yard, through the door, and up the stairs to our guest room. Hooker flopped onto the bed and I flopped on top of him.

“I’m too tired to get undressed,” I said. “I can barely breathe.”

“I’ve got you beat,” Hooker said. “I’m too tired to get you undressed.”