Morelli looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language. “Someone broke into your apartment and left you gunshot pictures. Don’t you think it’s serious?”

“I’m completely freaked out, but I was really hoping you’d tell me I was overreacting. I was going for the outside chance that you’d think this was someone’s idea of a joke.”

“I hate this,” Morelli said. “Why can’t I have a girlfriend who has normal problems . . . like breaking a fingernail or missing a period or falling in love with a lesbian?”

“Now what?” I asked.

“Now I call this in and get a couple guys out here to collect evidence and maybe look for prints. Do you have any idea what this is about?”

“No idea at all. Not a clue. Nothing.”

The phone rang and I went to the kitchen to answer it.

“I definitely think it might work between Ranger and me,” Valerie said. “You’re pals with him. You could fix me up.”

“Valerie, you’re nine months pregnant. This isn’t a good time for a fix-up.”

“You think I should wait until after I deliver?”

“I think you should wait until never.”

Valerie did a big sigh and disconnected.

Ranger on a fix-up date. Can you see this?

“You’re smiling,” Morelli said.

“Valerie wants to get fixed up with Ranger.”

Now Morelli was smiling. “I like it. Wear body armor when you tell Ranger.” Morelli opened the refrigerator, took out a piece of leftover pizza, and ate it cold. “I think it would be smart to get you out of this apartment. I don’t know what this is about, but I’m not comfortable ignoring it.”

“And I would go where?”

“You’d go home with me, cupcake. And there’d be benefits.”

“Such as?”

“I’d warm up your pizza.”

MORELLI LIVED IN a two-story row house he inherited from his Aunt Rose. It was about a half mile from my parents’ house with an almost identical floor plan. Rooms were stacked one behind the other . . . living room, dining room, kitchen. There were three bedrooms and a bath upstairs. Morelli had added a half bath downstairs. He was slowly claiming the house as his own. The wood floors were all newly sanded and varnished, but Aunt Rose’s filmy old fashioned curtains remained. I liked the mix and in an odd way would be sorry to see the house turn over entirely to Joe. There was something comforting about the curtains enduring beyond Aunt Rose. A tombstone is okay, but curtains are so much more personal.

We stood on the small front porch and Morelli cautioned me as he unlocked his door. “Brace yourself,” he said. “Bob hasn’t seen you in a couple days. I don’t want you knocked on your ass in front of the neighbors.”

Bob was a big scruffy red-haired dog that Morelli and I shared. Technically I suppose it was Morelli’s dog. Bob had originally come to live with me, but in the end had chosen Morelli. One of those guy things, I guess.