Hard Eight by Janet Evanovich

bill.”
    “And?”
    “That’s it.”
    “Good thing you brought a pizza.”
    “Actually, it’s a tomato pie. In the Burg they call it a tomato pie.”
    “Sometimes. You know anyone at the phone company? Anyone in the billing department?”
    “I figured
you’d
have the contacts. See, that’s why we’re such a good team. I have the ideas. And you have the contacts. Bounty hunters have contacts, right?”
    “Right.” Unfortunately, not in the phone company.
    We finished the pizza, and I brought out the bag of frozen cookies for dessert.
    “I heard you get cancer from eating raw cookie dough,” Kloughn said. “Don’t you think you should bake this?”
    I ate a bag of raw dough a week. I considered it to be one of the four major food groups. “I always eat raw cookie dough,” I said.
    “Me, too,” Kloughn said. “I eat raw cookie dough all the time. I don’t believe that stuff about the cancer.” He looked into the bag and tentatively took out a frozen lump of dough. “So what do you do here? Do you, like, nibble on it? Or do you put it all in your mouth at once?”
    “You’ve never had raw cookie dough, have you?”
    “No.” He took a bite and chewed. “I like it,” he said. “Very good.”
    I glanced down at my watch. “You’re going to have to go now. I have some unfinished business to take care of.”
    “Is it bounty hunter business? You can tell me. I won’ttell anybody, I swear. What are you doing? I bet you’re going after someone. You were waiting for nighttime, right?”
    “Right.”
    “So who are you going after? Is it anyone I know? Is it, like, a high-profile case? A killer?”
    “It’s no one you know. It’s domestic abuse. A repeat offender. I’m waiting until he passes out in a drunken stupor, and then I’m going to capture him when he’s unconscious.”
    “I could help you—”
    “No!”
    “You didn’t let me finish. I could help you drag him to the car. How are you going to get him to the car? You’re going to need help, right?”
    “Lula will help me.”
    “Lula has class tonight. Remember she said she had to go to school tonight. Do you have anyone else who helps you? I bet you don’t have anyone else, right?”
    I was getting an eye twitch. Tiny, annoying muscle contractions below my right lower lid. “Okay,” I said, “you can come with me, but you can’t talk.
No talking
.”
    “Sure. No talking. My lips are sealed. Look at me, I’m locking my lips and throwing the key away.”
     
    I parked half a block from Andy Bender’s apartment, positioning my car between pools of light thrown by overhead halogens. Traffic was minimal. Vendors had closed up shop for the day, switching to nighttime pursuits of hijacking and shoplifting. Residents were locked behind closed doors, beer can in hand, watching reality television.A nice break from their own reality, which wasn’t all that terrific.
    Kloughn gave me a look that said
now what?
    “Now we wait,” I told him. “We make sure nothing unusual is going on.”
    Kloughn nodded and made the zippered mouth sign again. If he made the zippered mouth sign one more time I was going to smack him in the head.
    After a half hour of sitting and waiting I was convinced that I didn’t want to sit and wait anymore. “Let’s take a closer look,” I said to Kloughn. “Follow me.”
    “Shouldn’t I have a gun or something? What if there’s a shoot-out? Do you have a gun? Where’s your gun?”
    “I left my gun home. We don’t need guns. Andy Bender has never been known to carry a gun.” Best not to mention he prefers chain saws and kitchen knives.
    I approached Bender’s unit as if I owned it. Bounty hunter rule number seventeen—don’t look sneaky. Lights were on inside. The windows were curtained, but the curtains were a skimpy fit, and it was possible to look around the fabric. I put my nose to the window and stared in at the Benders. Andy was in a big, overstuffed recliner, feet up, open bag of chips on