Page 42 of Now or Never

It was five in the morning when Ranger returned to my bedroom. He smelled slightly smoky, and he had a five o’clock shadow that was a combination of beard and soot.

“Is there anything left of your account?” I asked him.

“It’s now a vacant lot. This was a major screwup on my end. We obviously missed an incendiary device when we cleared the building. I have an early morning briefing, but I need to talk to you.”

“Okay,” I said. “Talk.”

“Do we have a marital schedule?”

“No.”

“Do you want one?”

“Not right now,” I said. “I have a lot going on.”

“That works for me,” Ranger said. “I’m behind at Rangeman. I need to hire two more men and an office assistant. And now I need to find out what went wrong tonight. To be honest awedding ceremony isn’t important to me. Having you in my apartment when I finish my dayisimportant.”

“It’s important to me too,” I said. “I miss Ella.”

“If I fired Ella, would you still want to marry me?”

“I’d have to think about it.”

That made him smile. His teeth were very white in his dark, sooty beard. “Are you making any progress with Bruno Jug and the vampire?”

“I have an agreement with Bruno. The vampire is disturbing and complicated.”

“Do you need help?”

“Yes. I want to interview a bartender on Stark and I don’t feel like enough of a brute to do it alone.”

“So, you need Rent-A-Brute?”

“Yes.”

“I’m your man. When do you want to do this?”

“Any time after nine thirty tonight.”

“I’m not sure of my schedule. I’ll text you a half hour ahead. It’ll probably be around ten.”

Ranger left. I went into the kitchen and stared into the fridge. The bread had grown a blue splotch of mold while I’d been sleeping. No milk. No juice. Small amount of peanut butter. I got a spoon and ate the remaining peanut butter.

“I’m pathetic,” I said to Rex. “I might be pregnant and the major food group in my diet is doughnuts. That’s irresponsible.” I looked around my kitchen. “What’s worse is, I don’t even have any doughnuts.”

Rex was asleep in his soup can and didn’t respond.

I called Morelli. “Are you still home?”

“Yep,” he said. “I just got out of the shower. Did you pull anall-nighter? Is everything okay? I’ve never known you to be awake at this hour.”

“I’m good,” I said. “I’m coming over. I need breakfast.”

Fifteen minutes later I was at Morelli’s little kitchen table, and he was making scrambled eggs. I had coffee with real half-and-half, a small glass of orange juice, and a wheat bagel with cream cheese. He brought our eggs to the table and sat across from me.

“What’s going on?” he asked, adding Tabasco to his eggs.

“I’ve decided to get healthy. From now on I’m going to get up early, get some exercise, and eat good food.”

---