Page 6 of Now or Never

“Yes.”

“Even if it’s not your first choice?”

“Yep. Not a problem. I had a hard time choosing, anyway,” I said.

“You got a point,” Lula said. “You can’t go wrong with either of them. When are you going to know if you’re pregnant?”

“I can start testing six days after Morelli and I celebrated.”

“That would be four days from now,” Lula said. “When is Aunt Flo supposed to show up?”

“I’m not sure. I have almost two weeks of pills left, but I’ve stopped taking them, so Aunt Flo might be confused.”

“Okay, so we have to wait until Friday,” Lula said.

“The six-days-after isn’t a sure thing,” I said. “The ten-days test is more reliable, and the best test is after you’ve missed a period.”

“I can’t wait for ten days,” Lula said. “As it is, I’m gonna be holding my breath until Friday.”

“What about your apartment?” Connie asked me. “I heard you got evicted.”

“I did, but I’ve been reinstated. The management company changed its mind. They realized the fire wasn’t my fault. I mean, I can’t help it if some wacko firebombed my apartment.”

“Yeah, and we caught the wacko, so that has to count for something,” Lula said.

I glanced at the doughnut box on Connie’s desk. Empty. Damn. Connie kept a flask in her bottom drawer, along with her gun and a can of hair spray. Probably it was too early to take a hit from the flask. I didn’t usually drink hard liquor, but in the absence of a doughnut, it served a purpose. I gave up on the doughnut and the liquor and slumped a little lower in my chair.

“Most of the damage was cleaned up by the restoration team,” I said. “And if I can bring Jug in, I’ll collect enough on his apprehension to buy new bedroom furniture. And maybe a television.”

“Are you sure you want to do all that if you’re getting married?” Connie asked.

“I can get a mattress and frame overnight for under three hundred dollars. Otherwise, I might be sleeping on my couch for a couple months.”

“I see where you’re going with this,” Lula said. “You’ve got to keep two guys on the hook, so it’s not like you could live with one of them. I don’t know how you’re going to do this.”

“It should be okay for a day or two,” I said. “I’ll be busy getting my apartment set up. And I’ve got a couple FTAs that will be a priority. Ranger is out of town, so I only have to deal with Morelli.”

“What happens after a couple days?” Lula asked.

“I might get sick. Something contagious.”

“That’s good,” Lula said. “You should say you got COVID. That always works. That’s good for at least a week. And then you could get long COVID if you need more time.”

I was hoping I wouldn’t need more time. I didn’t like keeping Ranger and Morelli hanging like this. It felt icky. It wasn’t the way I wanted to start a marriage.

“Uh-oh,” Lula said to me. “You’ve got that face.”

“What face?”

“The face like you’re not happy, where your mouth turns down and your eyes don’t have no sparkle.”

“I shouldn’t have celebrated with both of them.”

“Yeah, well, that ship already sailed. You just need to take your mind off it. We should go get the indecent-exposure guy. They’re always fun. And they hardly ever shoot at us.”

My phone rang. It was Morelli.

“Hey,” I said to him.

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