Explosive Eighteen: A Stephanie Plum Novel (Stephanie Plum Novels)

Schwartz. The Schwartz marriage ended after three years when Schwartz emptied his medicine chest into the blender along with half a pint of vodka and drank himself into a blissful final slumber.
    When Brenda married Schwartz, he owned thirty-five car washes spread throughout the state. When he killed himself, he owned four, and they were in foreclosure. He’d lost his house a couple months before. I had no idea if or how this related to the photograph, but it seemed like something to file away.
    I got out of the search program and checked my email. Mostly spam. I gingerly touched my lip and my nose. Tender. I went to the bathroom and took another look. Not good, but at least I didn’t have a foot-long, inch-deep gash in my thigh. I hoped Razzle Dazzle was in a lot of pain. And I really wouldn’t mind if the cut got infected and his leg fell off.
    My cell phone rang, and I was hoping for Joyce so I could tell her I had the key, but it was my parents’ number that came up on the display.
    “The Korda viewing is at seven o’clock tonight,” Grandma said. “I figure you want to go and snoop around, and I was hoping I could have a ride.”
    “Sure.”
    “Are you coming for dinner? Your mother’s making chicken and rice.”
    My mother would have a coronary incident if she saw my face. “I’m going to skip dinner,” I said.
    “Okay, but make sure you’re not late. There’s gonna be a crowd tonight, and I don’t want to get muscled to the back of the room. All the action’s gonna be up by the casket.”
    I said good-bye to Grandma, and I went to get ice. Lots of ice, I thought. The more the better.
    By six-thirty, it was clear there was only so much improvement I could expect from ice. I got dressed in a black pencil skirt, black heels, a cream sweater with a low scoop neck and matching cardigan. I wore my hair down and fluffed out, hoping it would distract from my monster bruise and cut lip. I smeared on a lot of concealer, tried to balance out the black eye with extra blush, and I was wearing my push-up bra for maximum cleavage. I took one last look in the mirror and thought this was as good as it was going to get.
    I dropped my new Glock into my purse, along with the stun gun on steroids. I was wearing the GPS watch, pearl earrings, a Band-Aid where the knife had knicked my neck, and a huge Band-Aid on my skinned knee. I was the All-American Girl.

FIFTEEN
     
    GRANDMA WAS AT THE DOOR, waiting for me. I pulled to the curb, and she hustled over to the truck. She was wearing chunky black heels, a lavender suit with a white blouse, and she was carrying the black leather purse that I knew was big enough to hold her .45 long barrel.
    She hoisted herself up and into the truck, buckled her seat belt, and looked over at me.
    “Don’t you look pretty,” Grandma said. “That’s such a nice sweater set.”
    No comment on my face or the various Band-Aids.
    “Anything else?” I asked her.
    “I like your hair down like that. I hardly ever see it down anymore.” Grandma looked at her watch. “We gotta get a move on.”
    “What about my face?”
    “What about it?”
    “For starters, I have a black eye.”
    “Yeah, it’s a pip,” Grandma said, “but I’ve seen you with worse. Remember that explosion that burned your eyebrows off?”
    Good lord, this is what it’s come to, I thought. My own grandmother isn’t shocked to see me with a black eye. I might as well admit it. I’m a train wreck.
    “Is there a good story that goes with the shiner?” Grandma asked.
    “I slipped in a parking garage.”
    “Too bad,” Grandma said. “I could use something juicy for conversational material. Do you mind if I make something up?”
    “Yes, I mind!”
    I drove the short distance to the funeral home, off-loaded Grandma at the entrance, and trolled for a parking place. The small funeral home lot was full, but I found parking on the street a block away. Grandma had been right about the viewing. The building was packed. At three minutes after seven, the people were already spilling out the door onto the large wraparound front porch.
    I kept my head down as I inched my way through the crowd, hoping not to attract attention. I was in the lobby, about to enter Slumber Room #1, and I got a call on my cell phone.
    “I knew you would go to the viewing,” Joyce said.
    “Where are you?”
    “I’m outside. And don’t come out looking for me. You’ll never find me. I’m dying to come in and check it all out, but