“How’d it go?” Lula asked. “Did you have to get Briggs injected with happy juice?”
“No. Briggs was fine. We all watched the security videos together.”
“Who’s all?”
“Morelli was there. Pitch was his collar, and he’s not comfortable that Pitch might have walked away.”
“Oh boy,” Lula said. “You’re not gonna have to work with Morelli, are you? Last time you tried that he had to stop carrying his gun so he wouldn’t be tempted to shoot you. And remember the time he chained you to a pipe in his cellar?”
On the positive side, the possibility that I’d be set on fire was a lot slimmer when I was with Morelli.
“I don’t have much choice,” I said. “We’re after the same guy. And Morelli might be helpful. It’s not like I’m making a lot of progress on my own.”
“Long as I don’t get caught in the crossfire,” Lula said. “Where is he now? He in the Buick with Tiki?”
“He’s doing his own thing for a while.”
“How did the fitting go?” Connie asked me. “What does the dress look like?”
I squinched my eyes closed and smacked my forehead with the heel of my hand. “I forgot all about it!”
“That’s one of them subliminal things,” Lula said. “You keep forgetting because you don’t want to do it.”
This was true. “I’ll go now,” I said. “And then I’m going to Atlantic City to get the guy at the nudie beach.”
“I don’t want to miss either of those things,” Lula said. “I’ll go with you.”
The bridal shop was on Hamilton, not far from the Tasty Pastry bakery. I’d been there before on a couple other excruciating occasions when I was a bridesmaid. It was presided over and owned by Mary DeLorenzo. She had coal black hair pulled back in a bun. She was in her fifties. And she ate way too much pasta. She employed two cousins who served as seamstresses. They were imported from Italy and spoke no English beyond S’cusa me when they stuck you with a pin or pushed your breast out of the way to adjust the bodice.
The walls of the shop were lined with gowns in zippered plastic bags smushed together on racks. One side was bridal and the other bridesmaid. Mother of the bride was in a separate room.
“This might not be so bad,” Lula said, following me through the front door. “You got to look on the bright side. It could be a pretty dress. If I was getting married I’d have my bridesmaids in animal print. Zebra or leopard.”
Mary DeLorenzo rushed over to me, all smiles, hoping for a new bride. I explained who I was and the smile faded a little.
“Of course,” she said. “We’ve been expecting you. Let me get the dress. I’ll bring it to the dressing room at the back of the shop.”
Lula looked around at the cocooned dresses. “You want me to come back there with you? You might need a second opinion on this.”
“Whatever.”
“And remember to have a good attitude. You don’t want to prejudge stuff. You go in expecting it to be bad and that’s all you’ll see.”
“You’re right. I need an attitude adjustment. I need to look forward to this. It could be fun. I’ll be with Ranger. It’ll be a party.”
“Yeah. And I bet the dress is real classy. This is a pretty classy place in an Italian kind of way.”
Mary bustled back with a zippered bag and ushered me into the dressing room. “This is so beautiful,” she said. “We had to special order the fabric. And the bride was very specific about the color. She wanted something romantic.”
“Romantic is good,” I said. “Right?”
“Of course. It’s a wedding.” She pulled the dress out of the bag and fluffed it up. “This is going to be stunning on you.”
It was a floor-length Pepto-Bismol pink taffeta dress with big puffy cap sleeves, a huge bow at the waist in the back, and a bell skirt.
I felt my eyes get wide and my mouth drop open.
Have a good attitude, I told myself. It’ll look better once it gets off the hanger.
Lula was on the other side of the dressing room door. “How is it?” she asked. “Do you love it? Is it pretty?”
“I don’t have it on yet,” I said, swallowing down panic.
“Well, hurry up. I can’t wait to see it. This is exciting.”
Mary dropped the dress over my head and zipped it up. I had my eyes closed. I was afraid to look.
“Oh dear,” she gasped. “It’s just beautiful. It fits you perfect. It’s as if it was made for you.”
“Really?” I asked with my eyes still closed tight.
“It’s your color.”
“I don’t wear a lot of pink,” I said.
“It does wonders for your skin tone. Don’t you want to open your eyes and look at it?”
“No.”
“I want to look at it,” Lula said. “Open the door so I can see. I bet it’s ravishing.”
Mary opened the dressing room door for Lula. “Ta-da!”
“Holy cow,” Lula said. “That’s the ugliest dress I ever saw.”
“It’s from the Little House on the Prairie collection,” Mary said. “It’s very au couture this year. And it comes with a matching bow for her hair.”
I opened one eye and looked in the mirror. I bit into my lower lip and whimpered. The dress was two sizes too big, the bow made me look like I was starting kindergarten, and the color washed me out to vampire skin tone. It weighed about twenty pounds and it made swishing sounds if I moved.
“It’s lovely,” I said to Mary. “Is it fire retardant?”
“I don’t know,” Mary said. “No one ever asked that question.”
“That dress is just wrong,” Lula said. “You look like a pregnant flamingo.”
I blew out a sigh. “What about the positive attitude?”
“That was before I saw the dress. Now that I’m seeing the dress I’m thinking you want to come down with some bad contagious disease. Something gives you a rash and makes your brain melt.”
I smoothed the skirt out. “It isn’t that bad.”
“Yes, it is,” Lula said. “It’s an atrocity.”
“I’ll send Philomena out to make a few adjustments,” Mary said.
“Go babysit Tiki,” I said to Lula. “I’ll be done soon.”
Thirty minutes later we were on the road to Atlantic City.
“Don’t say another word about the dress,” I told Lula. “I don’t want to think about it.”
“I understand completely. That dress was a disaster.”
“Not another word!”
“My lips are sealed. Zipped them up and threw away the key.”
“This should be an easy apprehension,” I said to Lula. “He’s not a career criminal. Probably not armed.”
“Especially if he’s naked.”
EIGHTEEN
THE NUDIE BEACH was at the end of the strip and attached to a casino that looked like it used to be a Walmart. I parked in the two-story garage, left Tiki in the car, and Lula and I walked through the casino to get to the boardwalk and the beach. A chunk of the beach had been screened off so as not to offend the modest people who weren’t crazy about seeing eighty-year-old naked guys. There was a concession stand and a changing room that opened onto the beach. Admission was twenty dollars. I tried to badge my way through but the woman at the door wasn’t seeing it.
“No one gets through without a ticket,” she said. “I don’t care if you’re a cop, the tooth fairy, or Jesus Christ.”
“That’s blasphemy,” Lula said to her. “You better watch what you say or you’re going straight to hell. God don’t like people implying he needs a ticket.”
We went to the concession stand and bought hotdogs, French fries, fried dough for dessert, and two tickets. We gave our tickets to the woman at the door and were allowed into the women’s locker room. We were stopped when we tried to get onto the beach.
“This is an all nude beach,” we were told by a large woman in a casino uniform. “You can’t go out with clothes o
n.”
“I’ll only be a minute,” I said. “I’m looking for Arthur Beasley.”
“He’s the bartender at the Surf Bar,” she said, “but you still have to take your clothes off.”
I showed her my credentials. “He’s in violation of his bond. I need to return him to the court.”
“That’s all well and good,” she said, “but you’re gonna have to do it naked.”
Lula and I retreated back into the locker room.
“I’m not going out there naked,” I said.
“Yeah, I see the problem. It’s sort of awkward trying to arrest someone with your hoo-ha showing. Kind of takes away the dignity of the apprehension procedure.”
I looked at my watch. “We’ll have to wait until he goes off his shift. We can catch him when he leaves.”
“That might not be until five o’clock,” Lula said. “I can’t wait here that long. I got a big date tonight. I need to get ready. I don’t even know what I’m gonna wear.” Lula kicked her shoes off. “I’m going out there. I haven’t got time to mess around with this.”
She peeled her tank top off and shimmied out of her spandex skirt. She stuck her thumb into the waistband of her thong, and I clapped my hands over my eyes.
“What the heck are you doing?” she asked.
“Giving you some privacy.”
“Girl, I’m taking my bare ass out onto that beach. I don’t think you gotta worry about my privacy.”
I uncovered my eyes but I looked down at the floor. I wasn’t ready to see Lula naked.
“Uh-oh,” Lula said. “I got a problem. Where am I gonna hide my handcuffs and stun gun?”
“You can’t take your stun gun out there. Stun guns are illegal. You’ll get arrested if you use it out in the open. You can hide the cuffs in a towel. They have a stack of towels by the door.”
“Okay, here I go,” Lula said. “I’ll be right back with the little runt.”
I sat on a bench and waited for Lula. Ten minutes went by. Fifteen minutes. Finally the door opened and Lula walked in all by herself.
“I couldn’t get him,” Lula said. “He didn’t want to cooperate.”
“What took you so long?”
“Well, first he was making drinks for everybody so I had to wait in line. And then it was hot out there, and I got thirsty, so I had a mojito. And what it comes down to is you gotta help catch him. He kept dancing away from me. I figure if one of us distracts him, the other one can sneak up from behind and cuff him.”
“No way.”
“It’s not so bad. Once you get used to being naked you get to like it. It’s real liberating. And there’s parts of you feeling the ocean breeze that never felt the ocean breeze before. I might come back here on my own someday except I’m not sure it’s worth twenty dollars. I might come back if they have a discount day.”
“Someone will take my picture with their cellphone, and I’ll be on YouTube.”
“They don’t let you take a cellphone out there. Anyways if you want this loser you’re gonna have to get your clothes off.”
I squinched my eyes shut and grunted. “Great. Fine. No big deal.” I kicked my shoes off, ripped my T-shirt over my head, and shoved my jeans down to my ankles. I took the rest of my clothes off and rammed them into a locker along with our purses. I turned the key in the lock and slipped the rubber bracelet with the key onto my wrist. Lula and I each had cuffs.
“Maybe you should take your pepper spray,” Lula said. “Just in case.”
“The towels aren’t that big. I can’t carry everything. It’s not like I have pockets.”
“You could hide it in your you-know-what,” Lula said. “It’s just a little canister.”
“Are you serious?”
“Just thinkin’,” Lula said.
“Well, stop thinking. I have enough problems without you thinking.”
“Boy, you get cranky when you take your clothes off. I’m not sure I want to go out there with you and have you ruin my good experience.”
“We’re working,” I said. “We’re not here to have a good experience.”
I took a deep breath and stepped out of the locker room onto the beach. It was a beautiful blue-sky day and the surf was up. The beach was dotted with people sitting in beach chairs and stretched out on blankets.
“We must be at least thirty years younger than everyone out here,” I said to Lula.
“Yeah,” she said, “it’s like someone sprinkled the beach with a bunch of raisins and a couple prunes. I never saw so much shriveled skin. This group makes Grandma Mazur look like a teenager.”
The sand was hot under my bare feet and the sun felt warm on my skin. “You’re right,” I said to Lula. “It does sort of feel good to be out in the fresh air.”
“Yeah, I love the shore. I wouldn’t mind having a house here someday. I could look at the ocean all day long and listen to the waves.”
I shielded my eyes from the sun and looked down the beach. “Where’s the bar?”
“It’s over at the far end, under that thatched roof. You have to fight your way through the crowd to get to it. Old people like to booze it up.”
“Is Beasley naked?” I asked her.
“Sure he’s naked. Everyone’s naked here.”
We walked closer and I eyed the bar and the people milling around it. “We need a plan. Do you want to be the distractor or the cuffer?”
“I gotta be the distractor,” Lula said. “He already knows what I’m up to and he’ll be on guard if I try to sneak behind him. I figure I’ll walk right up to him and he’ll keep his eye on me. It’s hard to miss all my big brownness.”
Lula set off, plowing through the sand, and I circled around, hugging the perimeter. I was inside the bar area and directly behind Beasley when Lula elbowed her way up to the bar and got his full attention. I opened a bracelet and click it was on him. I went for the second wrist, he yelped, and threw a drink in my face. I blinked and swiped at my eyes. I felt him shove me aside and by the time I recovered he was outside the bar and running.
I sprinted after him, both of us having a hard time in the deep sand. He was distracted by the metal bracelet attached to his wrist, I took a flying leap, and snagged him by the ankle. We both went down face-first. I was holding tight to his foot, and I heard Lula yell “INCOMING!” I let go and scooted away just in time to see Lula hurtle over me, casting a massive shadow, and land on Beasley. “WOOF!” Beasley exclaimed on an explosion of air. And then he was completely still with Lula on top of him.
Lula climbed off, I cuffed him, and we rolled him over. His eyes were open, but I wasn’t sure he was breathing.
“Sometimes it takes them a while to get air after I pounce,” Lula said. She looked down at Beasley. “Are you okay?”
“Unh,” Beasely said.
“He’s okay, folks,” Lula said to the crowd that had gathered. “You could go back to your sunnin’ and drinkin’. Bar’s open. Self-serve.”
Beasley wasn’t looking like he was going to get up anytime soon, so Lula and I each took a foot and dragged him to the locker room.
“This is the ladies’ locker room,” the attendant said. “You can’t bring him in here.”
“Wait here,” I said to Lula.
I went to our locker and got dressed in record time. I took twenty dollars out of my purse, gave it to the attendant, and she happened to be looking the other way when we dragged Beasley into the locker room.
Lula got dressed, and we stood there looking at Beasley. We couldn’t take him out onto the boardwalk or through the casino naked, and we didn’t want to go into the men’s locker room to get his clothes.
“Only thing we got here is towels,” Lula said. “We could make him a diaper but I don’t know how to hold it together.”
“Garbage bag,” I said. “Have the attendant open the broom closet and give you a big green trash bag.”
Lula came back with the garbage bag, we tore a hole in the top, got Beasley up on his feet, and pul
led the bag over his head. It came to about two inches below his privates.
“Lucky for us he’s not hung like some of the old folks out there,” Lula said. “Some of them would need a bag that comes to their knees.”
We walked Beasley to the car and strapped him in next to Tiki.
“I got sand in my lady parts,” Lula said. “Whoever thought a naked beach was a good idea never sat in one.”
NINETEEN
I BROUGHT BEASLEY into the police station and ran into Morelli.
“I was just going to call you,” Morelli said.
“I’ve been busy.”
“So I see. Your FTA’s dressed in a garbage bag, you have sand in your hair, and you smell like a piña colada.”
“The guy I just handed over was a bartender at a nudie beach, and he threw a drink at me.”
“You took him down on a nudie beach?”
“Yeah. Lula and me.”
Morelli grinned. “Did you and Lula join in the fun?”
“We didn’t have much choice. They wouldn’t let us on the beach with our clothes on.”
“Both of you full monty?”
“Yep.”
“I’m a little turned on,” Morelli said.
“I hate to disappoint you but it wasn’t all that sexy. I have sand everywhere.”
Someone stuck his head out of a room down the hall and yelled for Morelli.
“Coming!” Morelli yelled back. “I’ll pick you up at your apartment at six o’clock,” he said to me. “We can catch a fast burger and then talk to Mickey Zigler.”
I dropped Lula at the office and continued on home. I brought Tiki into the apartment with me, set him on the couch, and turned the television on. I got into the shower and realized I’d turned the television on for a chunk of wood.
At a little before six I went downstairs to wait for Morelli. I stood in the lobby, where I felt relatively safe, and I called Ranger.
“Just checking in,” I said. “I got another note tacked to my door this morning. Anything new with you?”
“More messages. This freak has a lot of anger.”
“Me too,” I said. “I tried my bridesmaid dress on today. It’s pink. And it has a big bow over my ass.”