Janet Evanovich - The Grand Finale

Jake’s mouth quirked into an embarrassed grin. “I have a confession to make. That was my neighbor’s cat in the tree. She gets up there all the time.”

Berry’s eyes opened wide. “You acted like I was a Peeping Tom.”

“Well? Were you peeping?”

“Only a little!”

She felt her blood pressure rise. It wasn’t her fault. She had been in that tree doing a good deed, and he’d practically flaunted himself at her. She sprang out of the chair and stood with her fists on her hips.

“What was I supposed to do? You got undressed right in front of the window. Don’t you believe in shades? What are you, some kind of exhibitionist?”

“I just moved in. I haven’t had time to put shades up. Anyway, there aren’t any neighbors for miles.”

Berry turned on her heel and glared at the three ladies who were “tsking” behind her. She frowned and gave a look that said, One word out of any of you and it’s back to the train station.

Jake held his hands up. “Wait. I didn’t come up here to discuss your voyeuristic tendencies.”

“Voyeuristic tendencies! Of all the… You are the most… I am not!”

Berry closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. She opened her eyes and made a flamboyant gesture with her arm, pointing to the door.

“Out!”

Jake took a seat in the vacant rocking chair and accepted a cup of cocoa from Mrs. Fitz. “Boy, she sure can get riled,” he said.

“Yeah, ain’t she a pip?”

That was the perfect description, Jake thought. Berry Knudsen was a pip. He’d dated lots of women and none of them had been exactly right, and now he realized none of them had been a pip.

Berry spun around and flapped her arms at Mrs. Fitz. “Mrs. Fitz, anyone can see this man is leaving. We don’t serve cocoa to men who are leaving.”

“Nonsense. He’s all settled in here.” Mrs. Fitz pressed her lips together in satisfaction. “Don’t he look nice and comfy.”

Mildred Gaspich brought him a plate of chocolate chip cookies. “We just baked these fresh tonight.” She turned to Mrs. Fitz. “Goodness, it’s nice to have a man in the house.”

“Makes me want to put on some fresh lipstick.” Mrs. Fitz laughed. “Too bad I haven’t got any.”

Miss Gaspich put her arm around plump little Lena Fitz. “That’s okay. Pretty soon you’ll have money to buy some lipstick.”

“Berry’s hired us,” Mrs. Fitz explained to Jake.

“We were just about scraping by on our social security checks, living in the Southside Hotel for Ladies, and then they decided to renovate the building and turn it into fancy condominiums. We couldn’t afford anyplace else. We looked real hard, but there just wasn’t a room cheap enough. Finally, they evicted us. We were temporarily holed up in the train station when we saw Berry’s ad in the paper.”

Mrs. Fitz grinned. She was five feet tall with short steel-gray hair that had been permed into two inches of frizz. She was apple-cheeked, with an ample chest and dimples in her elbows and stout knees.

“We know we’re a bunch of old ladies,” Mrs. Fitz said, “but we figured the three of us together might be able to hold down a job. Sort of a package deal.”

Miss Gaspich pulled a kitchen chair close to the rocker. “We walked all over town for days trying to get a job and then Berry hired us. We’d just about given up.”

“This business with the Jeep isn’t gonna change things, is it?” Mrs. Fitz worried. “How bad is the Jeep?”

“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men can’t put the Jeep back together again,” Berry told her.

Jake downed the last of the cocoa and stood to leave. “It’s okay, Mrs. Fitz. Berry’s going to use my car until she can replace the Jeep.”

Berry looked at him wide-eyed. “I can’t deliver pizzas in your car.”

Jake somberly chewed a cookie. “It was my cat that started this fiasco. I feel responsible.”

He leaned close to Berry and whispered in an aside, “Besides, I liked kissing you.”

Berry ignored the heat that burned in her cheeks. “I can’t deliver pizzas in a megabucks car!”

Mrs. Fitz whistled behind her. “You mean he looks like this, and he’s rich, too?”

“I invented Gunk.”

Mrs. Fitz’s eyes popped wide open. “That disgusting slimy stuff you can eat? I love that stuff.”

Jake turned to Berry. “My school is just three blocks from here. I’ll drop the car off on my way to work tomorrow morning.”

Berry looked at the stacks of pizza boxes and wondered how she was ever going to get them all into Jake Sawyer’s two-seater. Eighteen large pizzas and seven small, all due at Windmere Technicals by twelve-thirty. She groaned. If it hadn’t been for these lunch contracts she would never have accepted Jake’s offer. The car was too expensive, too powerful, too exotic. What if she scratched it? The car was perfect, for crying out loud. How could anything that old look so new? We aren’t talking about a two-hundred-dollar Jeep here. We’re talking about an outrageously extravagant toy in mint condition.

And what about Jake Sawyer? Another extravagant toy, Berry thought. Too powerful, too expensive, too exotic… and in mint condition. She’d spent half the night reviewing his kiss and knew it was in her best interest to not have a repeat performance. Berry had interrupted her education once for a man, and she wasn’t about to make the same mistake again. She would borrow Jake’s car only until she could find a better solution to her problem, and she would steer clear of its owner.

She speared the car keys with her pinky finger and pushed through the front door, balancing six large pizza boxes in her outstretched arms. She squinted into the light drizzle, wondering where Jake had parked. He’d said the car was directly in front of the Pizza Place. Berry held the door open with her foot.

“Mrs. Fitz,” she called over her shoulder. “You took the keys from Jake this morning. Where’d he park the car?”

Mrs. Fitz wiped her hands on her big white apron and shook her head. “Goodness’ sakes, child, the car’s right in front of you. It’s right here in front of the store.” Mrs. Fitz walked to the front of the store, and her eyes opened extra wide. “Where’s the car?”

“Maybe Jake moved it. Maybe he changed his mind.”

“I don’t think so. We’ve got his keys.”

Berry felt her heart stutter. Jake’s expensive car was missing.

“There’s probably a simple explanation,” she said.

“Yup,” Mrs. Fitz said. “The explanation is simple all right. Someone stole Jake’s car.”

Berry staggered back into the store and deposited the pizza boxes on the counter. The car was stolen! She’d had possession of it exactly three and a half hours, and it now had gotten itself stolen. How was that possible? Why hadn’t they seen it happening?

“Jake’s not gonna be happy about this,” Mrs. Fitz said, shaking her head.

“One minute it was there, and then the next minute… poof!” Berry said.

“It was like aliens took it,” Mrs. Fitz said. “Like they just beamed it up. Right out from under our noses.” Mrs. Fitz dialed a number. “I’m calling a taxi so I can deliver the pizzas. You stay here and call the police. Maybe they’ll get the car back before Jake gets out of school.”

Berry’s face brightened. That was a hopeful thought. It wasn’t exactly run-of-the-mill. The police would probably have an easy time finding it.

Four hours later, Mrs. Fitz placed a plate of cookies and a glass of milk in front of Jake. “It’s not so bad. Nobody’s been hurt. You just lost your car for a while.”

Jake stared glassy-eyed at the cookies, mumbling things Berry couldn’t quite catch. Things that might sound like… I knew I was doomed the minute I saw her.

Mrs. Dugan patted his hand. “We filed a police report. The officers said they’d be sure to find an unusual car like that.”

“It’s unique. I had it specially restored. There’s not another one like it in the whole world.”

Be sympathetic, Berry thought. Remember how devastated you were when your car jumped off that cliff?

Yes, she answered herself, but I needed that car to exist. This car was a toy. And this car was insured.

Berry, Berry, Berry, she chanted. Men love their toys. And everyone knows there’s this whole complicated connection between men and their cars and their cock-a-doodle. Although from what she’d seen, Jake’s cock-a-doodle really didn’t need automotive fortification. Still, it was hard to be sympathetic when there was that business with him mumbling about being doomed. She suspected he was mumbling about her… as if she was a disaster or something.

She pounded pizza dough on the large wooden counter behind Jake. I am not a disaster, she thought. Okay, so I fell out of a tree. Big deal. It could happen to anyone. And then my Jeep committed suicide. I don’t really see where that was my fault. Finally, did I ask him to loan me his car? No! Did I tell him to park it on this street? No! And I didn’t ask him to kiss me, either!

Mrs. Fitz peered across the counter at Berry. “Good heavens, child, you’re just about beating that poor dough to death.”

Berry blew out a sigh. For a full year after her divorce she’d taken her frustrations out on pizza dough. If it hadn’t been for pizza dough she might have turned into a homicidal maniac. Then little by little her life had fallen into place, her sunny disposition had returned, peace and purpose had replaced the disorder of disillusionment.

Berry poked at the massacred lump. She’d known Jake Sawyer for less than twenty-four hours and here she was smashing innocent pizza dough again. The man was a threat to her sanity. He gave her an upset stomach. He made her act like a boob, blushing and stammering and falling out of trees.

You don’t need this, Berry thought, taking a vicious swipe at the dough with her wooden rolling pin. Someday she would be ready for another relationship-but not now. First, she had to get the Pizza Place on its feet. Second, she’d get her bachelor’s degree. Third…