“The Huevo corporate yacht is tied up in South Beach,” Gobbles said. “We could put him on the yacht.”

“That would be nice,” Felicia said. “We could take him for a ride. I bet he’d like that.”

“He’s dead,” Hooker said. “He doesn’t like anything. And that’s a terrible idea. We’ll get caught and arrested and spend the rest of our lives in jail. We’ll never get him on the yacht without being seen.”

“Then maybe someplace close to the yacht,” Felicia said. “God likes the yacht idea.”

“What, do you have a direct line?” Rosa wanted to know.

“I got a feeling.”

“Uh-oh, is it just a feeling feeling? Or is it one of those Miguel Cruz feelings?”

“I think it might be a Miguel Cruz feeling.”

Rosa looked at me. “That’s a serious feeling. Felicia had a feeling Miguel Cruz was in trouble, and an hour later he fell into a sinkhole on Route One, car and all, and broke his back. And another time Felicia told Theresa Bell she should light a candle. And Theresa didn’t do it, and she came down with shingles.”

Hooker looked pained. He drove race cars. The only vision he really related to was a back bumper.

“How about this,” Hooker said. “In the interest of moving on with our lives, let’s put Oscar in the SUV and drive him to South Beach. We can go to the marina and look around for a nice final resting place for him. Then we can check into a hotel for the night, and we’ll figure the rest out in the morning when we’re not so creeped out.”

I nodded agreement. I was hoping I’d go to sleep and wake up and find out none of this had ever happened.

“We gonna have to scootch him to the door,” Felicia said. She looked at Huevo through the plastic wrap. “Okay, mister, we gonna move you now. You gonna be home soon.” She looked over at Gobbles. “You and Hooker gotta grab hold of Mr. Dead Guy’s behind, or something.”

Gobbles clapped a hand over his mouth and ran for the bathroom.

“Gobbles got a weak stomach,” Felicia said. “He’d never make it in wholesale fruit.”

“If we scootch him along, we’ll rip the plastic,” Rosa said. “I think we gotta carry him. I’ll get one side and Hooker can get the other side.”

I got disposable gloves from the box in the tool chest and gave them to Hooker and Rosa. They took opposite sides of Huevo. Hooker got his hands under Huevo, then turned white and started to sweat again.

“I can do this,” Hooker said. “No problem. I’m a big, tough guy, right? I don’t go all pukey just because I’m carrying a dead guy around, right? It’s not like I’m gonna get cooties, right?”

“Right,” I said. Trying to be supportive. Glad I wasn’t the one with my hands under Huevo’s dead ass.

Hooker and Rosa got Huevo out the hauler door, down the ramp, and set him on the cement floor. We all took a couple steps back and fanned the air.

“We gotta rewrap Mr. Dead Guy if we’re taking him for a ride,” Felicia said. “Mr. Dead Guy don’t smell good.”

I ran to the hauler and came back with boxes of plastic wrap, some duct tape, and a can of room freshener I’d snitched from the bathroom. We sprayed Huevo with Tropical Breeze, rewrapped him in plastic, and secured him with duct tape.

“I think he looks good,” Felicia said. “You can hardly see where he got chewed on. He looks like a big present.”

“Yeah, but some of the smell is still leaking through,” Rosa said. “We’re gonna have to strap him to the roof rack.”

I hustled back to the hauler and returned with three air fresheners shaped like pine trees and designed to hang in a car. I tore their cellophane wrappers off and taped them to Huevo.

“That’s better,” Felicia said. “Now he smells like a pine tree. It’s like being in the forest.”

“Good enough for me,” Hooker said. “Let’s get him in the car.”

Hooker and Rosa picked Huevo up and walked him to the SUV. A big shaggy head appeared in the back window, nose pressed against the glass.

“WOOF!” Beans said, eyes riveted on Huevo.

“You got a real sicko dog,” Rosa said to Hooker. “You’re not gonna be able to put Mr. Dead Guy back there with Cujo. Mr. Dead Guy’s gonna have to go in the front seat.”

I moved the front seat back as far as it would go, and Hooker wedged Huevo in and closed the door. Huevo looked like he was intent on the road ahead, knees bent and pressed against the dash, feet on the edge of his seat, arms tucked in at odd angles. Probably best not to dwell on how his arms got to look like that.

Felicia and Rosa slid onto the backseat, and Beans snuffled them from the cargo area at the rear of the SUV. Gobbles, fresh from the bathroom, climbed in with Beans.

Hooker stared in at Felicia and Rosa. “You don’t have to go with us to South Beach. It’s late. You probably want to get home. Barney and Gobbles and I can handle this.”

“That’s okay,” Rosa said. “We’re gonna help you.”

Hooker draped an arm around my shoulders and whispered into my ear, “We have a problem, darlin’. I was going to leave Huevo sitting in front of a Dumpster. Taking him to the marina is a stupid idea.”

“I heard that,” Felicia said. “And you’re not leaving that poor Mr. Dead Guy sitting by a Dumpster. Shame on you.”

Hooker did an eye roll and took the wheel, and I squeezed in next to Rosa. Hooker drove north to First Street and headed east. He wound his way through downtown Miami and picked up the MacArthur Causeway bridge to South Beach. It was after midnight and there weren’t a lot of people on the roads. Hooker turned south onto Alton and pulled into the lot by Monty’s Restaurant. Miami Beach Marina and Huevo’s yacht were just beyond a fringe of trees. And the entire marina was lit up like daylight.

“I wasn’t counting on so much light,” Felicia said.

“Maybe we could steal a car and leave him in valet parking,” Rosa said.

“What’s to the side, past those trees?” Felicia wanted to know. “Looks like there’s a driveway going somewhere.”

“It’s for deliveries to Monty’s,” Hooker said.

“I think we got a delivery,” Felicia said.

Hooker cut his eyes to her. “You sure it’s okay with God?”

“I’m not getting any messages,” Felicia said. “So I’m thinking it’s okay.”

Hooker dimmed his lights and pulled into the driveway, close to the delivery door. We wrangled Huevo out of the front seat and set him on the little cement pad in front of the door.

“How they going to know what to do with him?” Felicia asked. “Maybe no one recognize Mr. Dead Guy.”

I went to my bag and returned with a black Magic Marker and wrote OSCAR HUEVO in big letters on the top of Huevo’s head. We all got back into the SUV, Hooker cranked the motor over, and Beans started barking. He was doing his bird-dog impersonation, his attention riveted on Huevo.

“What’s wrong with him?” Rosa asked. “Maybe he thinks we leave his chew toy behind?”

And then we saw it. The dog. It was a big scruffy mutt, and it was creeping in on Huevo. Huevo was a dog magnet.

“This won’t work,” Felicia said. “God won’t like it if Mr. Dead Guy turns into dog food.”

We got out of the SUV, picked Huevo up, and put him back into the passenger seat, next to Hooker.

“Now what?” Hooker asked. “Does God have a plan B?”

“Go back to the parking lot,” I told him. “We’ll just put Huevo on top of a car. The dog won’t be able to reach him there.”

“What about cats?” Felicia asked. “Suppose some kitties find Mr. Dead Guy?”

I cut a death glare at Felicia. “God’s just going to have to deal with it.”

“Yeah,” Rosa said, “if it’s all so big-deal important to God, let him keep the cats away.”

We returned to the lot and slowly drove around. Hooker stopped at the end of the second line of parked cars. He was looking at one of the cars and grinning. “This is the car,” he said.

I looked past Hooker. It was Spanky’s gift car from Huevo. It was a brand-new, shiny red Avalanche LTZ sport utility truck. The vanity license plate read DICK69. Most likely sounded good on paper.