"What is it?"

"It's a document attesting to the fact that you willingly went to the pet cemetery with Carol and asked her to tie you to the tree."

"What are you, nuts? I'm not signing that."

"Then I'm hauling Ranger out of your backseat."

Joyce looked at the SUV and her precious cargo. "What the hell," she said, taking the pen and signing her name. "I got what I wanted."

"You take off first," I said to Joyce, pulling my Glock out of my pocket. "I'll make sure you get out of the alley safely."

"I can't believe you did this," Joyce said. "I didn't think you were such a sneaky little shit."

Honey, you don't know the half of it. "It was for Carol," I said.

I stood there with the Glock drawn and watched Joyce drive away. The instant she turned from the alley to the street, Lula jumped into the car, and we took off.

"I give her about a quarter-mile," Lula said. "I'm the queen of the spike-and-run."

I had a visual on Joyce. There was no traffic, and she was a block ahead of me. Her taillights wobbled and the car slowed.

"Good, good, good," Lula said.

Joyce drove another block at reduced speed.

"She'd like to just drive on that tire," Lula said, "but she's worried about her fancy new SUV."

There was another flash of brake lights, and Joyce pulled to the curb. We were a block behind her with our lights killed, looking parked. Joyce had gotten out and turned toward the back of her car when a van swerved around me and skidded to a stop alongside her. Two men jumped out, guns drawn. One trained his gun on Joyce, and the other grabbed Morgan just as he set foot on the pavement.

"What the hell?" Lula said. "What the fuck?"

It was Habib and Mitchell. They thought they had Ranger.

Morgan got bundled into the mom-van, and the van rocketed off.

Lula and I sat in shocked silence, not sure what to do.

Joyce was yelling and waving her arms. Finally she kicked the flat tire, got into her SUV, and, I assume, made a phone call.

"That worked out pretty good," Lula finally said.

I backed up half a block without lights, turned the corner, and drove away. "Where do you think they picked us up?"

"Must have been at my house," Lula said. "They probably didn't want to make a move when there were two of us. And then they got real lucky when Joyce got that flat."

"They're not going to think they're so lucky when they find out they've got Morgan the Horse."

DOUGIE AND MOONER were playing Monopoly when I got back to Dougie's house. "I thought you worked at Shop amp; Bag," I said to Mooner. "Why aren't you ever working?"

"I lucked out and got laid off, dude. I'm telling you, this is a great country. Where else could a dude get paid for not working?"

I went into the kitchen and dialed Morelli. "I'm at Mooner's house," I told him. "I just had another weird night."

"Yeah, well, it isn't over yet. Your mother's called over here four times in the last hour. You'd better phone home."

"What's wrong?"

"Your grandmother went out on a date, and she isn't back yet, and your mother's losing it."

MY MOTHER ANSWERED on the first ring. "It's midnight," she said, "and your grandmother isn't home. She's out with that turtle man."

"Myron Landowsky?"

"They were supposed to go to dinner. That was at five o'clock. Where could they be? I've called his apartment and there's no answer. I've called all the hospitals-"

"Mom, they're adults. They could be doing lots of stuff. When Grandma was living with me I never knew where she was."

"She's running wild!" my mother said. "Do you know what I found in her room? Condoms! What does she want with condoms?"

"Maybe she makes balloon animals out of them."

"Other women have mothers who get sick and go to nursing homes or die in their beds. Not me. I have a mother who wears spandex. What did I do to deserve this?"

"You should go to bed and stop worrying about Grandma."

"I'm not going to bed until that woman comes home. We're going to have a talk. And your father is here, too."

Oh great. There'll be a big scene, and Grandma will be back, living in my apartment.

"Tell Daddy he can go to bed. I'll come over and sit up with you." Anything to keep Grandma from moving back in with me.

I called Joe and told him I might be over later, but he shouldn't wait up. Then I reborrowed the Cherokee and drove to my parents' house.

My mother and I were sleeping on the couch when Grandma came in at two o'clock.

"Where were you?" my mother hollered at her. "We were worried sick."

"I had a night of sin," Grandma said. "Boy, that Myron is some kisser. I think he might even have got an erection, except it was hard to tell what with the way he hikes his pants up."

My mother made the sign of the cross, and I looked in my purse for some Rolaids.

"Well, I gotta go to bed," Grandma said. "I'm pooped. And I got another driving test tomorrow."

WHEN I WOKE up I was stretched out on the couch with a quilt over me. The house was filled with the smell of coffee cooking and bacon frying, and my mother was banging pots around in the kitchen.

"Well, at least you're not ironing," I said. When my mother got out the ironing, we knew there was big trouble brewing.

She slammed a lid on the stockpot and looked at me. "Where's your underwear?"

"I got caught in the rain, and I borrowed dry clothes from Dougie Kruper, only he didn't have any underwear. I would have gone home to change, but there are these two guys who want to chop off one of my fingers, and I was afraid they were at my apartment waiting for me."

"Well, thank God," she said. "I was afraid you left your bra in Morelli's car."

"We don't do it in his car. We do it in his bed."

My mother had the big butcher knife in her hand. "I'm going to kill myself."

"You can't fool me," I said, helping myself to coffee. "You'd never kill yourself in the middle of making soup."

Grandma trotted into the kitchen. She was wearing makeup, and her hair was pink.

"Omigod," my mother said. "What next?"

"What do you think of this hair color?" Grandma asked me. "I got one of them rinses at the drugstore. You just shampoo it in."

"It's pink," I said.

"Yeah, that's what I thought, too. It said on the label that it'd be Jezebel Red." She looked at the clock on the wall. "I gotta get a move on. Louise will be here any minute. I got the first appointment for my driving test. Hope you don't mind I asked Louise to take me. I didn't know you were going to be here."

"No sweat," I said. "Knock yourself out."

I made myself some toast and finished my coffee. I heard the toilet flush overhead and knew my father would be down momentarily. My mother looked like she was thinking about ironing.

"Well," I said, jumping up from my seat. "Things to do. Places to go."

"I just washed some grapes. Take some home," my mother said. "And there's ham in the refrigerator for a sandwich."

I DIDN'T SEE Habib or Mitchell when I pulled into my lot, but I had the Glock in hand, just in case. I parked illegally, next to the back entrance, leaving as little space as possible between me and the door, and went directly to my apartment, taking the stairs. When I got there I realized I didn't have a key, and Joe had locked the door when he left.

Because I was the only one in the entire universe who couldn't open my door without a key, I got the spare from my neighbor Mrs. Karwatt.

"Isn't this a nice day?" she asked. "It feels just like spring."

"I guess everything's been pretty quiet here this morning," I said. "No loud noises or strange men out here in the hall?"