"Check on what?"

"On Mooner. Make sure he's not listening at the door."

"I don't care if he's listening at the door."

"I care."

Morelli sighed and rolled off me. "I should have fallen in love with Joyce Barnhardt. She would have invited Mooner in to watch." He opened the door a crack and looked out. He opened it wider. "Oh s.h.i.t," he said.

I was on my feet with my pants up. "What? What What?"

Morelli was out of the room, moving through the house, opening and closing doors. "Mooner's gone."

"How could he be gone?"

Morelli stopped and faced me. "Do we care?"

"Yes!"

Another sigh. "We were only in the bedroom for a couple minutes. He can't have gone far. I'll go look for him."

I crossed the room to the window and looked down into the parking lot. A car was leaving. It was hard to see the car in the rain, but it looked like Ziggy and Benny. Dark, American-made midsize. I grabbed my bag, locked my door, and ran the length of the hall. I caught up with Morelli in the lobby. We pushed through the doors to the lot and stopped. No Mooner in sight. The dark sedan no longer in view.

"I think it's possible he's with Ziggy and Benny," I said. "I think we should try their social club." I couldn't imagine where else they'd take Mooner. I didn't think they'd take him home with them.

"Ziggy and Benny and Chooch belong to Domino on Mulberry Street," Morelli said, both of us climbing into his truck. "Why do you think Mooner's with Benny and Ziggy?"

"I thought I saw their car pull out of the lot. And I have a feeling Dougie and DeChooch and Benny and Ziggy are all mixed up in something that started with the cigarette deal."

We wound our way through the Burg to Mulberry and sure enough, Benny's dark blue sedan was parked in front of the Domino Social Club. I got out and felt the hood. Warm.

"How do you want to play this?" Morelli asked. "Do you want me to wait in the truck? Or do you want me to muscle you in?"

"Just because I'm a liberated woman doesn't mean I'm a moron. Muscle me in."

Morelli knocked on the door, and an old man opened the door with the security chain attached.

"I'd like to talk to Benny," Morelli said.

"Benny's busy."

"Tell him it's Joe Morelli."

"He's still gonna be busy."

"Tell him if he doesn't come to the door right now I'm going to set his car on fire."

The old guy disappeared and returned in less than a minute. "Benny says if you set his car on fire he's gonna hafta kill you. And he'll tell your grandmother on you, too."

"Tell Benny he better not have Walter Dunphy in there because Dunphy is under my grandmother's protection. Anything happens to Dunphy and Benny gets the eye the eye."

Two minutes later the door opened for a third time and Mooner got pitched out.

"Dang," I said to Morelli. "I'm impressed."

"Dude," Morelli said.

We put Mooner in the truck and drove him back to my apartment. He got the giggles halfway there, and Morelli and I knew what kind of bait Benny had used on Mooner.

"How lucky was that," Mooner said, smiling and awestruck. "I stepped out for a minute to find some s.h.i.t, and the two dudes were right there in the lot. And now they like me."

FOR AS LONG as I can remember my mother and grandmother have gone to church on Sunday morning. And on the way home from church, my mother and grandmother stop at the bakery and buy a bag of jelly doughnuts for my father, the sinner. If Mooner and I timed it right we'd arrive a minute or two behind the doughnuts. My mother would be happy because I'd come to visit. Mooner would be happy because he'd get a doughnut. And I'd be happy because my grandmother would have gotten the very latest gossip relating to everybody and everything, including Eddie DeChooch.

"I've got big news," Grandma said when she came to the door. "Stiva got hold of Loretta Ricci yesterday and the first viewing's going to be tonight at seven. It'll be one of those closed-casket ones, but it should be worth something, anyway. Maybe Eddie will even show up. I'm going to wear my new red dress. There'll be a packed house tonight. Everybody'll be there."

Angie and Mary Alice were in the living room in front of the television with the sound turned up so loud the windows were vibrating. My father was in the living room, too, staked out in his favorite chair, reading the paper, his knuckles white with the effort.

"Your sister's in bed with a migraine," Grandma said. "Guess the cheerful thing was too much of a strain. And your mother's making cabbage rolls. We've got doughnuts in the kitchen and if that don't do it for you, I've got a bottle in my bedroom. This place is bedlam."

Mooner took a doughnut and drifted into the living room to watch television with the kids. I helped myself to coffee and sat at the kitchen table with my doughnut.

Grandma sat across from me. "What are you up to today?"

"I have a lead on Eddie DeChooch. He's been driving around in a white Cadillac, and I just got the owner's name. Mary Maggie Mason." I took the card frorn my pocket and looked at it. "Why does that name sound so familiar?"

"Everybody knows Mary Maggie Mason," Grandma said. "She's a star."

"I never heard of her," my mother said.

"That's because you never go anywhere," Grandma said. "Mary Maggie's one of them mud wrestlers at The Snake Pit. She's the best."

My mother looked up from her pot of beef and rice and tomatoes. "How do you know all this?"

"Elaine Barkolowski and me go to The Snake Pit sometimes after bingo. On Thursdays they got men wrestling and they only wear little Baggies on their privates. They're not as good as The Rock, but they're pretty good all the same."

"That's disgusting," my mother said.

"Yeah," Grandma said. "It costs five dollars to get in but it's worth it."

"I have to go to work," I said to my mother. "Is it okay if I leave Mooner here for a while?"

"He doesn't do drugs anymore, does he?"

"Nope. He's clean." For a whole twelve hours. "You might want to lock up the glue and cough syrup, though . . . just in case."

The address Ranger had given me for Mary Maggie Mason was an upscale high-rise condo building that looked out at the river. I rode through the underground parking, checking out cars. No white Cadillac, but there was a silver Porsche with MMM-YUM on the license plate.

I parked in a slot reserved for guests and rode the elevator to the seventh floor. I was wearing jeans and boots and a black leather jacket over a black knit shirt, and I didn't feel dressed right for the building. The building called for gray silk and heels and skin that had been lasered and buffed to perfection.

Mary Maggie Mason answered on the second knock. She was wearing sweats, and her brown hair was pulled back into a ponytail. "Yes?" she asked, peering at me from behind tortoisesh.e.l.l gla.s.ses, a Nora Roberts book in her hand. Mary Maggie, the mud wrestler, reads romance. In fact, from what I could see beyond her door, Mary Maggie read everything. everything. There were books everywhere. There were books everywhere.

I gave her my card and introduced myself. "I'm looking for Eddie DeChooch," I said. "It's been brought to my attention that he's driving your car around town."

"The white Cadillac? Yeah. Eddie needed a car, and I never drive the Caddy. I inherited it when my Uncle Ted died. I should probably sell it, but it's nostalgic."

"How do you know Eddie?"

"He's one of the owners of The Snake Pit. Eddie and Pinwheel Soba and Dave Vincent. Why are you looking for Eddie? You're not going to arrest him, are you? He's really a sweet old guy."

"He missed his court date and he needs to reschedule. Do you know where I can find him?"

"Sorry. He stopped by one day last week. I don't remember which day. He wanted to borrow the car. His car is a real lemon. Always something wrong with it. So I loan him the Cadillac a lot. He likes to drive it because it's big and white and he can find it at night in a parking lot. Eddie doesn't see all that well."

It's none of my business, but I wouldn't be loaning my car to a blind guy. "Looks like you do a lot of reading."

"I'm a book junkie. When I retire from wrestling I'm going to open a mystery bookstore."

"Can you make a living selling mysteries?"

"No. n.o.body makes a living selling mysteries. The stores are all fronts for numbers operations."

We were standing in the foyer and I was looking around as best I could for evidence that DeChooch might be hiding out with Mary Maggie.

"This is a great building," I said. "I didn't realize there was this much money in mud wrestling."

"Mud wrestling doesn't pay anything. I stay alive with the endors.e.m.e.nts. And I've got a couple corporate sponsors." Mary Maggie glanced at her watch. "Yikes, look at the time. I have to go. I'm supposed to be at the gym in a half hour."

I pulled out of the underground garage and parked on a side street so I could make a few calls. First call was to Ranger's cell phone.

"Yo," Ranger said.

"Do you know DeChooch owns a third of The Snake Pit?"

"Yeah, he won it in a c.r.a.p game two years ago. I thought you knew."

"I didn't know!"

Silence.

"So what else do you know that I don't know?" I asked.

"How much time do we have?"

I hung up on Ranger and called Grandma.

"I want you to look up a couple names in the phone book," I said to Grandma. "I need to know where Pinwheel Soba and Dave Vincent live."

I listened to Grandma thumbing through pages, and finally she came back on the line. "Neither of them's listed."

Rats. Morelli would be able to get me the addresses, but Morelli wouldn't want me messing around with Snake Pit owners. Morelli would give me a big lecture about being careful, we'd get into a shouting match, and then I'd have to eat a lot of cake to calm down.

I took a deep breath and redialed Ranger.

"I need addresses," I told Ranger.

"Let me guess," Ranger said. "Pinwheel Soba and Dave Vincent. Pinwheel's in Miami. He moved last year. Opened a club in South Beach. Vincent lives in Princeton. There's supposed to be bad feelings between DeChooch and Vincent." He gave me Vincent's address and disconnected.

A flash of silver caught my eye and I looked up to see Mary Maggie zip around the corner in her Porsche. I pulled out after her. Not exactly following her, but keeping her in view. We were both going in the same direction. North. I stayed with her and it seemed to me she was going pretty far afield to get to a gym. I bypa.s.sed my turnoff and stayed with her through center city to north Trenton. If she'd been on guard she would have spotted me. It's hard for a single car to do a decent tail. Fortunately, Mary Maggie wasn't looking for a tail.

I dropped back when she turned onto Cherry Street. I parked around the corner from Ronald DeChooch's house and watched Mary Maggie get out of her car, walk to the door, and ring the doorbell. The door opened and Mary Maggie stepped inside. Ten minutes later, the front door opened again and Mary Maggie Mason came out. She stood on the front porch for a minute or two talking to Ronald. Then she got into her car and drove away. This time she went to a gym. I watched her park and go into the building and then I left.

I took Route 1 to Princeton, hauled out a map, and located Vincent's house. Princeton isn't actually part of New Jersey. It's a small island of wealth and intellectual eccentricity floating in the Sea of Central Megalopolis. It's an honest-to-G.o.d town awash in the land of the strip mall. Hair is smaller, heels are shorter, a.s.ses are tighter in Princeton.

Vincent owned a large yellow-and-white colonial set onto a half-acre lot on the edge of town. There was a detached two-car garage. No cars in the driveway. No flag proclaiming that Eddie DeChooch was in residence. I parked one house down on the opposite side of the street and watched the house. Very boring. Nothing happening. No cars cruising by. No children playing on the sidewalk. No metal blaring out of a second-story boom box. A bastion of respectability and decorum. And a little intimidating. Knowing it was bought with Snake Pit profits did nothing to alter the feeling of old-money snootiness. I didn't think Dave Vincent would appreciate having his peaceful Sunday disturbed by a bounty hunter looking for Eddie DeChooch. And I could be going out on a limb here, but I suspected Mrs. Vincent wouldn't take a chance on tarnishing her social standing by harboring the likes of Choochy.

After I'd done an hour of worthless surveillance a cop car crept down the street and pulled up behind me. Great. I was about to get rousted out of the neighborhood. If someone caught me sitting in front of their house in the Burg, they'd send their dog out to take a leak on my car wheel. Backup action would be a string of profanities yelled at me to get the h.e.l.l out of there. In Princeton they send a perfectly pressed, perfectly polite officer of the law to make an inquiry. Is this cla.s.s, or what?

There didn't seem to be anything gained by stressing Officer Perfect so I got out of my car and walked back to him while he was checking my plate. I pa.s.sed him my card and the bond contract stating my right to apprehend Eddie DeChooch. And I gave him the standard explanation of routine surveillance.

Then he explained to me that the good people in this neighborhood aren't used to being under surveillance, and probably it'd be best if I conducted my surveillance in a more discreet manner.

"Sure," I said. And then I left. If a cop is your friend he's the best friend you'll ever have. On the other hand, if you're not on intimate terms with a cop it's smart not to annoy him.

Watching the Vincent house wasn't going to do me any good, anyway. If I wanted to talk to Dave Vincent better to see him at work. Besides, it wouldn't hurt to take a look at The Snake Pit. Not only would I get to talk to Vincent, I'd also get another shot at Mary Maggie Mason. She'd seemed like a nice enough person, but clearly there was more to the story.

I took Route 1 south and on a whim decided to take another look around at Mary Maggie's garage.

I CRUISED INTO the garage and rode around looking for the Cadillac. I went up and down every aisle, but I didn't have any luck. Good thing, too, because I didn't know what I'd do if I found Choochy. I didn't feel capable of bringing him in on my own. And the thought of agreeing to Ranger's deal gave me an o.r.g.a.s.m on the spot, followed by a panic attack.

I mean, what if I spent the night with Ranger? What then? Suppose he was so amazing I got ruined for all other men. Suppose he was better in the sack than Joe. Not that Joe was a slouch in bed. It was just that Joe was mortal, and I wasn't sure about Ranger.

And what about my future? Was I going to marry Ranger? No. Ranger wasn't marriage material. h.e.l.l, Joe was barely marriage material.

And then there was the other side of it. Suppose I didn't measure up. I involuntarily squinched my eyes closed. Argh! It would be awful. Beyond embarra.s.sing.

Suppose he he didn't measure up! The fantasy would be ruined. What would I think about when it was just me and the shower ma.s.sage? didn't measure up! The fantasy would be ruined. What would I think about when it was just me and the shower ma.s.sage?

I shook my head to clear my brain. I didn't want to contemplate a night with Ranger. It was too complicated.