Sizzling Sixteen

Janet Evanovich

Sizzling Sixteen

Book 16 in the Stephanie Plum series, 2010

Thanks to Laura A. Koppe for suggesting the title for this book.

ONE

MY UNCLE PIP died and left me his lucky bottle. I suppose I’m fortunate, because he left my Grandma Mazur his false teeth. So I’ve got this bottle now, and I don’t exactly know what to do with it. It’s not like I have a mantel. My name is Stephanie Plum, and I live in a bare-bones apartment on the outer edge of Trenton, New Jersey. I share the apartment with my hamster, Rex, and he doesn’t know what to do with the bottle, either. The lucky bottle is the size and shape of a beer bottle. The glass is red, and it looks hand blown. It’s not entirely ugly, especially if you like beer, but it’s also not exotically pretty. And so far, it hasn’t been very lucky. I have the bottle sitting on my kitchen counter, between Rex’s hamster cage and the brown bear cookie jar that holds my gun. It was Monday morning, halfway through June, and Lula was in my apartment doing a pity pick up because my hunk-of-junk car was dead and I needed a ride to work.

“Hunh,” Lula said. “What’s that red bottle on your counter?”

“It’s my lucky bottle.”

“Oh yeah, what’s so lucky about it? It don’t look too lucky to me. Looks like one of them designer beer bottles, only it’s got a fancy glass stopper in it.”

“It’s my inheritance from Uncle Pip.”

“I remember Uncle Pip,” Lula said. “He was older than dirt, right? Had a big carbuncle on his forehead. He was the one wandered out of the senior complex a couple weeks ago during that thunderstorm, pissed on a downed electric wire, and electrocuted himself.”

“Yep. That was Uncle Pip.”

I’m a bond enforcement agent, working for my cousin Vi

I’m a couple inches taller than Lula, and where her body is overly voluptuous, mine is more 34B. My idea of fashion is a girl-cut stretchy T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. My skin is nowhere near chocolate, my shoulder-length, naturally curly hair is plain ol’ brown and often pulled back into a ponytail, my eyes are blue, and I’m still trying to find my attitude.

I hung my purse on my shoulder and pushed Lula to the door. “We need to move. Co

“What’s with that?” Lula said. “Last time Co

Co

I live ten minutes from the office on a day without traffic. This wasn’t one of those days, and it took Lula twenty minutes to get her red Firebird down Hamilton Avenue. Vi

Lula parked at the curb, and we pushed through the door into the front room. Lula plunked herself down on the brown fake-leather couch that was positioned against the wall, and I settled into an orange plastic chair in front of Co

“What’s up?” I asked Co

“Mickey Gritch snatched Vi

“I know that corner,” Lula said. “That’s Maureen Brown’s corner. Maureen and me used to hang out back when I was a ’ho. She wasn’t as good a ’ho as me, but she wasn’t no skank ’ho, either.”

Lula worked Stark Street prior to her job as file clerk. She had a rocky begi

“Anyway, I guess Vi

“Whoa,” Lula said. “That’s a lot of money.”

“Some of it’s interest,” Co

Mickey Gritch has been Vi

“Mickey Gritch works for Bobby Sunflower now,” Lula said. “You don’t want to mess with Bobby.”

“Is this serious?” I asked Co

“Times are tough, and Mickey wants his money,” Co

“Bobby Sunflower would do it,” Lula said. “He made Jimmie Sanches disappear… permanently. Lots of other people, too, from what I hear.”

“Have you gone to the police?” I asked Co

“The police aren’t my first choice. Vi

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

Vi

“Gritch already went to Harry. Not only won’t Harry fork up the money to spring Vi

“Well, that settles it then,” Lula said. “I guess it’s adios, Vi

“If there’s no Vi

“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,” Co

Vi