'It's a work relationship,' I told Marjorie.

'If he was in here any longer the chocolate would have melted off the eclairs.'

'I don't like this,' Lula said. 'I wanted to go after the pervert. I personally think it's a bad choice to go after the guy who likes guns.'

'He's got the highest bond. The fastest way to dig Vinnie out of the hole is to get the guy with the highest bond.'

We were in Lula's red Firebird, sitting across the street from Lonnie Johnson's last known address. It was a small clapboard bungalow in a depressed neighborhood that backed up to the hockey arena. It was close to noon and not a great time to roust a bad guy. If he's still in bed, it's because he's drunk and mean. If he's not in bed, it's most likely because he's at a bar getting drunk and mean.

'What's the plan?' Lula wanted to know. 'We gonna just bust in like gangsta bounty hunters and kick his ass?'

I looked at Lula. 'Have we ever done that?'

'Don't mean we can't.'

'We'd look like idiots. We're incompetent.'

'That's harsh,' Lula said. 'And I don't think we're completely incompetent. I think we're closer to eighty percent incompetent. Remember the time you wrestled that naked greased-up fat guy? You did a good job with that one.'

'Too early in the day to do the pizza delivery routine,' I said.

'Can't do the flower delivery either. Nobody believe someone sending flowers to this dope.'

'If you hadn't changed clothes you could do the hooker delivery routine,' I said to Lula. 'He would have opened the door to you in that gold thing.'

'Maybe we pretend we're selling cookies. Like Girl Scouts. All we gotta do is go back to the 7-Eleven and get some cookies.'