Read Explosive Eighteen: A Stephanie Plum Novel (Stephanie Plum Novels) for Free Online

bottle of red open.”
    My father went to the table shaking his head. “Vitiligo,” he said. “What next?”
    “Annie’s been helping Lorraine Farnsworth with her love life,” Grandma said, forking into a slice of hard cheese and prosciutto.
    My mother looked over at Annie. “Lorraine is ninety-one years old.”
    “Yes,” Annie said. “It’s time for her to make a decision. She’s been seeing Arnie Milhauser for fifty-three years. It might be time for her to move on.”
    My father had his head bent over his antipasto. “Only place she’s gonna move on to is the bone farm.”
    “She’s doing pretty good for her age,” Grandma said. “Sure, she rolls her share of gutter balls, but heck, who don’t.”
    “She’s doing better now that we got her the longer tubing to her oxygen tank,” Annie said.
    Grandma nodded. “Yeah, that helped. She was on a short leash before.”
    I had my phone clipped to the waistband on my jeans, and it beeped with a text message.
We need to talk to you. It’s urgent. Come outside
. It was signed
The FBI
.
    I texted back
no
.
    The next message was
Come outside or we’re coming in
.
    I pushed away from the table. “I’ll be right back,” I said. “I need to step outside for a moment.”
    “Probably got to let a breezer go,” Grandma said to Annie. “That’s always why I got to step outside.”
    My mother drained her wineglass and poured another.
    I went to the front door, and saw they were the fake FBI guys. They were standing at the curb in front of a black Lincoln. The bigger of the two, Lance Lancer, motioned me forward. I shook my head no. He pulled his badge out, held it up for me to see, and crooked his finger at me. I did another head shake.
    “What do you want?” I yelled.
    “We want to talk to you. Come here.”
    “Move away from the car. I’ll meet you halfway.”
    “We’re the FBI. You gotta come to us,” Lancer said.
    “You’re not the FBI. I checked. Besides, the FBI doesn’t ride around in big black Lincoln Town Cars.”
    “Maybe we got it on account of it was confiscated,” Lancer said.
    “What do you want?” I asked him.
    “I told you we want to talk, and I can’t be yelling to you. It’s confidential.”
    I moved out of the house onto the walk. “I’ll meet you halfway,” I said again.
    Lancer mumbled something to Slasher, and they marched over to where I was standing.
    “We want the photograph you got on the plane,” Lancer said. “Bad things are gonna happen if you don’t give it to us.”
    “I told you. I don’t have it.”
    “We don’t believe you. We think you’re fibbing to us,” Lancer said.
    Good lord. As if the vacation wasn’t disastrous enough, now I’m involved in God knows what.
    “I don’t have it. I’m not fibbing. Go away and bother someone else,” I told them.
    Lancer’s eyes opened wide. “Get her!” he said.
    I whirled around and jumped away, but one of them managed to snag my shirt. I was yanked back, clawing and kicking. There was a lot of swearing and ineffective bitch-slapping, and somehow my foot connected with Slasher’s boys. His faceinstantly went red and then chalk white. He doubled over, hands to his crotch, and he went to the ground in a fetal position. I ran into the house, locked the door, and looked out the window. Lancer was dragging his partner into the Lincoln.
    I straightened my shirt and returned to the dinner table.
    “Feel better?” Grandma asked.
    “Yup,” I said. “Everything’s good.”
    “Your digestion will improve when we get your romantic problems solved,” Annie said.
    Little alarm bells went off in my head and my scalp prickled.
We
? Did she say
we
? I had enough trouble going on with the men in my life without Annie getting involved. Annie was a sweet person, but she was only a few steps behind Morelli’s Grandma Bella in the Whacko of the Year competition.
    “Honestly, I haven’t got any romantic problems,” I told Annie. “It’s all peachy.”
    “Of