“Have you gone to the police?” I asked Connie.

“The police aren’t my first choice. Vinnie owes this guy for illegal gambling. Knowing Vinnie, it’s possible some of the money came out of the business. We used to be owned by Vinnie’s father-in-law, you know, but last year we were sold to a venture capital company based in Trenton. The venture capitalists aren’t going to tolerate Vinnie’s gambling with their money. If this gets out, we could all be out of a job.”

“What about the father-in-law?” Lula asked. “Everyone knows he got a lot of money. Plus, he could squeeze Bobby Sunflower.”

Vinnie’s father-in-law is Harry the Hammer. As long as Vinnie does right by Harry’s daughter Lucille, it’s all good, but I suspect Harry wouldn’t be happy to hear Vinnie got snatched while he was boffing a Stark Street ’ho.

“Gritch already went to Harry. Not only won’t Harry fork up the money to spring Vinnie, if Vinnie gets out of this alive, Harry will bludgeon him to death,” Connie said.

“Well, that settles it then,” Lula said. “I guess it’s adios, Vinnie. Personally, I could use one of them breakfast sandwiches from Cluck-in-a-Bucket. Anyone interested in a Cluck-in-a-Bucket run?”

“If there’s no Vinnie, there’s no bail bonds office,” Connie said. “No bail bonds office means we don’t get paid. We don’t get paid, and there’s no Cluck-in-a-Bucket for anyone.”

“That’s not good,” Lula said. “I’m used to a certain standard of living. Cluck-in-a-Bucket is one of my first food choices. Not to mention I got bills. I charged a fabulous pair of Via Spigas last week. I only wore them once, so I guess I could take them back, but then I don’t have shoes to wear with my new red dress, and I got a date Friday worked around the dress.”

“We don’t have a lot of options,” Connie said. “We’re going to have to do this ourselves.”

Vinnie was like a fungus on my family tree. He was a good bail bondsman, but a slimeball in every other aspect of his life.