“We weren’t gone that long,” Connie said. “How could such a little dog do all this damage?”

“Guess he was feeling anxiety,” Lula said. “Poor thing’s been through a lot, what with getting dognapped and everything. And look at him, he’s just a puppy. He might even be teething. At least he didn’t eat the flowers. It’s nice to come back to fresh flowers in the room.”

“They were sent by a serial killer! They’re death flowers,” I said.

“Well, yeah, but they’re still nice,” Lula said.

I looked at my watch. I had to pack. “Not a lot of time to take care of this mess,” I said.

“Here’s the plan,” Connie said. “We check out and it all goes on Vinnie’s bill.”

“See that,” Lula said. “This dog’s nothing but good luck. We get to stick it to Vinnie all because this dog was smart enough to eat the room. I think this here’s been a positive experience. That’s my new philosophy anyway. Nothing but positive experiences. That’s why I’m driving home from here.”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Connie said. “It’ll take you days.”

“Don’t matter. I’m not getting back on a plane. I’m done with planes. They aren’t any fun. All that searching and starving and standing around in lines. I don’t do lines. That’s another part of my new philosophy. No lines. And I can take Boo with me if I drive. Me and Boo can have a road trip. I’m starting to get real excited about this. I always wanted to have a dog when I was a kid, but I never had the chance. I was dog deprived.”

“Works for me,” Connie said. “If you take Boo we don’t have the hassle of crating him and getting him on the plane.”

I called valet parking and had the car brought around. I gave Lula the pepper spray and the stun gun and two hundred dollars. Connie contributed another hundred and fifty. It was all the money we had between us. We loaded Lula, Boo, and Lula’s luggage into the car and waved good-bye.

“I’m not sure if she’s the smart one or the dumb one,” Connie said.

There were only two of us now and we each had a loaded gun in our pockets. We stopped at the snack bar, got a bag of food, and returned to the room to finish packing.

My packing was simple. Take all the little complimentary soaps and shampoos from the bathroom and put them in my carry-on bag. Connie’s packing was more complicated.

“Oh shit,” Connie said, “look at this.”

She was holding up the wedding photo. It had a few dog tooth marks in the lower left corner.

“Do you suppose you actually got married?” I asked her.

“I don’t know. I don’t remember.” She closed her eyes and groaned. “Sweet Jesus, please don’t let me be married to an Elvis impersonator.”

“There must be some way you can find out,” I said. “There have to be records. Probably you can have it annulled.”