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Janet Evanovich’s daring new novel

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“Where you going?” Lula wanted to know. “It’s almost lunchtime. I don’t suppose you’re gonna be passing by some place I could get a meatball sub. I could use a meatball sub on a nasty day like this.”

“I’m going downtown,” I told her. “I need to talk to Dickie.”

“Say what?” Lula was up on her feet. “Did I hear you right? Is this the Dickie that called the police on you last time you were in his office? Is this the Dickie you told to go screw hisself? Is this the Dickie you were married to for fifteen minutes in another life?”

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“Yep. That’s the Dickie.”

Lula grabbed her coat and scarf from the chair. “I’ll ride with you. I gotta see this. Hell, I don’t even care about the meatball sub anymore.”

“Okay, but we’re not making a scene,” I said to Lula. “I need to talk to Dickie about a legal issue. This is going to be non-confrontational.”

“I know that. Non-confrontational. Like two civilized people.”

“Hold on. I’m going too,” Connie said, getting her purse from her bottom desk drawer. “I don’t want to miss this. I’ll close the office for a couple hours for this one.”

“I’m not making a scene,” I told her.

“Sure, but I’m packin’ just in case it gets ugly,” Connie said.

“Me too,” Lula said. “It isn’t diamonds that’s a girl’s best friend. It’s a .9mm Glock.”

Connie and Lula looked at me.

“What are you carrying?” Connie asked.

“A brand-new can of hairspray and this lip gloss I’ve got on.”

“It’s a pretty good lip gloss,” Lula said, “but it wouldn’t hurt to have a piece as a backup.”

Connie stuffed herself into her coat. “I can’t imagine what legal problem you’d want to discuss with Dickie, but it must be a bitch to get you out in this weather.”

“It’s sort of personal,” I said, relying on the one really decent bounty hunter skill I possessed . . . the ability to fib. “It dates back to when we were married. It has to do with . . . taxes.”

We all went head-down into the cold. Connie locked the office door, and we got into Lula’s red Firebird. Lula cranked the engine over, hip-hop blasted out of the CD player, and Lula motored off.

“Is Dickie still downtown?” Lula wanted to know.

“Yes, but he’s in a new office. 3240 Brian Place. His firm is Petiak, Smullen, Gorvich, and Orr.”

Lula cruised down Hamilton and turned onto North Broad. The wind had cut back, and it was no longer snowing, but there was still a thick cloud cover overhead. At best, the weather could now be described as grim. I was silently rehearsing my fake speech about how I needed information for an audit. And I was making promises to myself as performance incentive. I was seeing macaroni and cheese in my near future. Butterscotch Tastykakes. Onion rings. Snickers bars. Okay, so this had all the makings of a cluster pile of crap, but there was a Dairy Queen Oreo CheeseQuake Blizzard waiting for me somewhere.

Lula took a left at Brian and found a parking place half a block from Dickie’s office building.

“I’m gonna smack you on the head if you don’t stop cracking your knuckles,” Lula said to me. “You gotta chill. You need some tax information, and he’s gotta give it to you.” Lula cut her eyes to me. “That’s all there is to it, right?”

“Pretty much.”

“Uh oh,” Lula said. “There’s more, isn’t there?”

We all got out of the Firebird and stood huddled against the cold.

“Actually, I have to plant a couple bugs on him for Ranger,” I told Lula. There it was, out in the open, swinging in the breeze . . . the favor from hell.

Excerpted from “Lean Mean Thirteen” by Janet Evanovich. Copyright © 2007. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

© 2009 MSNBC Interactive.  Reprints

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