“You don’t look so good,” Lula said when I got into the car. “You got big bags under your eyes. And your eyes are all bloodshot. You must have really had a good time last night to look this bad this morning.”

“I was shot with a tranquilizer dart last night and I had a killer hangover from it until about four this morning.”

“Get out! What were you doing getting shot with a tranquilizer dart?”

“I wasn’t doing anything. I was walking from my car to my apartment building and someone shot me in the back.”

“Get out! Did you find out who did it?”

“No. The police are investigating.”

“I bet it was Joyce Barnhardt. Joyce would do something like that, trying to even the score for all the times we zapped her with the stun gun and you let Bob poop on her front lawn.”

Joyce Barnhardt. I’d forgotten about Joyce Barnhardt. She’d be a prime contender, too, except for the Howie shooting. Joyce wasn’t a killer.

I went to school with Joyce and she’d made my life a misery. Joyce publicized secrets. When she didn’t have a secret she fabricated stories and started rumors. I wasn’t the only one singled out, but I was a favorite target. A while back, Vinnie hired Joyce to do some apprehension work and once again Joyce and I crossed paths.

“I don’t think it’s Joyce,” I told Lula. “I think the tranq incident is related to the Howie shooting.”

“Get out!”

If Lula said get out one more time I was going to choke her until her tongue turned blue and fell out of her head.

“And you’re probably in danger when you hang with me,” I told Lula. “I’d understand if you wanted to bail.”

“Are you shitting me? Danger’s my middle name.”

SEVEN

WE WERE OUT of Joe’s neighborhood and moving across town. Lula had Eminem cranked up. He was rapping about trailer park girls and how they go round the outside, and I was wondering what the heck that meant. I’m a white girl from Trenton. I don’t know these things. I need a rap cheat sheet.

I was checking the rearview mirror now. I didn’t want a second dart between the shoulder blades. It was time to be vigilant. I had no indication that the creep who was stalking me knew I was living with Joe. And I was riding in Lula’s car. So maybe today would be uneventful.

We hit Route 1 and I noticed there was a cooler on the backseat. “Are you still on the diet?” I asked. “Is the cooler filled with vegetables?”

“Hell no. That was a bogus diet. You could waste away and die on that diet. I’m on a new diet. This here’s the all-protein diet that I’m on. I’m going to be a supermodel in no time on this diet. All I have to do is stay away from the carbs. Carbohydrates are the enemy. I can eat all the meat and eggs and cheese I want, but I can’t eat any bread or starch or any of that shit. Like, I can have a burger but I can’t eat the roll. And I can only eat the cheese and grease on the pizza. Can’t eat the crust.”