"I might know someone who could help you."

"I don't need help. I need my wife to come to her senses. This whole mess is the result of someone trying to help. Things were fine until some meddler stuck her big fat nose into my marriage. If I get hold of her I'll fix her good. It'll be the last time she meddles in someone's marriage."

"But if she was trying to help—"

"She didn't help. She made things awful." He chugged his drink, dropped a twenty on the bar, and stood. "I've gotta go."

"So soon?"

"Things to do."

"Where are you going? Are you going home?"

My eyes flicked to the bartender when he took the twenty and the empty glass. A beat later, I turned my attention back to Beaner, but he was gone.

"Where'd he go?" I asked the bartender. "Did you see him leave?"

"I saw him get off the stool, but then he got lost in the crowd."

I left money on the bar and went outside to Diesel.

"He's gone," I said. "We were talking, and he got agitated, and he split."

Diesel was lounging against my car. "I saw him for a second when he walked through the door. A couple people came out with him, and somehow he disappeared behind them before I could get to him." Diesel pushed off from the car, went to the drivers side door, angled himself in behind the wheel, and turned the key in the ignition. "Let's go."

"Wait a minute. This is my car. I drive."

"Everybody knows the guy gets to drive."

"Not in Jersey."

"Especially in Jersey," Diesel said. "The testosterone level in Jersey is fifteen percent higher than it is in any other state."

4

It was still early, so we stopped at a supermarket on the way home.

"What about the shopping cart?" I asked Diesel. "Do you have to drive that, too?"

"I'd get my nuts repossessed if I didn't drive the shopping cart."

A half hour later, we loaded our food onto the checkout belt, and Diesel gave his credit card to the checker.

"Boy, you've got lots of food," the checker said.

"A man's gotta eat," Diesel told her.

I took a peek at the card. "There's no bank name on this card," I whispered to Diesel.

"It's an Unmentionable card," he said. "Good in three solar systems."

I was pretty sure he was kidding.

I crammed the last of the food into my kitchen… lunch meat, beer, cheese, peanut butter, pickles, bagels, ice cream, cereal, milk, orange juice, apples, bananas, bread, cream cheese, coffee, half-and-half, crackers, cookies, chips, salsa, carrots, mixed nuts, and God-knows-what-else.

Diesel took a bag of chips and a beer into the living room and remoted the television on. "This is great," he said. "I can catch the end of the hockey game."

I settled next to him and reached into the chip bag. Bob had been sleeping in the bedroom, but the rustle of a chip bag was a Bob alarm, and in a beat Bob was up and expectantly standing in front of me. I fed him a couple chips, and he flopped down on the floor with his head on my foot.