So, here I was idling at the corner of Slater and Chambers with a pleasant, perfectly designed, color-coordinated Martha Stewart laundry basket on the seat beside me, filled with all the clean clothes I could find, a hamster cage wedged into the seat behind me… and no place to go.

I'd told Morelli I was going home to my parents' house, but it had been a fib. The truth was, I walked out without totally thinking the whole thing through.

My best friend Mary Lou was married and had a pack of kids. No room there. Lula lived in a closet. No room there either. The sun was setting, and I was feeling panicky. I could sleep in Rangers truck, but it didn't have a bathroom. I'd have to go to the Mobil station on the corner to use the toilet. And what about a shower? The Mobil station didn't have a shower. How was I going to get the drool out of my hair? And Rex? This was so pathetic, I thought. My hamster was homeless.

A flashy black Lexus SUV made its way up Slater. I slid low in the seat and held my breath as the Lexus rolled forward. Hard to see through the SUV's tinted windows. Could be anyone driving, I told myself. Could be a perfectly nice family in the Lexus. But in my gut I worried that they were Slayers.

The Lexus stopped in front of Morelli's house. The bass from the SUV stereo thumped down the street and beat against my windshield. After a long moment the SUV moved off.

Looking for me, I thought. And then I burst into tears. I was in emotion overload, feeling sorry for myself. A bunch of gang guys were out to get me. The police had Big Blue. And I'd moved out on Morelli… for the umpteenth time.

Rex had come out of his soup can and was hunkered down on his wheel, myopically surveying his new surroundings.

'Look at me.' I said to Rex. 'I'm a mess. I'm hysterical. I need a doughnut.'

Rex got all perky at that. Rex was always up for a doughnut.

I called Morelli on my cell and told him about the Lexus. 'Just thought you should know,' I said. 'Be careful when you go out of the house. And maybe you shouldn't stand in front of any windows.'

'They're not out for me,' Morelli said.

I nodded agreement in the dark truck and disconnected. I drove a half mile down Hamilton and pulled into the drive-thru lane at Dunkin' Donuts. Is this a great country, or what? You don't even have to get out of your car to get a doughnut. Good thing, too, because I looked a wreck. Besides the grass-stained, ripped-up clothes, my eyes were all red and splotchy from crying. I got a dozen doughnuts, parked in the back of the lot, and dug in. I gave Rex part of a jelly doughnut and a piece from a pumpkin spice doughnut. I figured pumpkin was good for him.

After eating half the bag I was sick enough not to care about Morelli or the gang guys. 'I ate too many doughnuts,' I said to Rex. 'I need to lie down or burp or something.' I checked out my shirt. Big glob of jelly on my boob. Perfect.

The engine was off and the only diode blinking was for the antitheft system. I turned the key and the dash lit up like Christmas. I touched one of the buttons and the GPS screen slid into place. After a few seconds a map appeared, pinpointing my location. Very slick. I touched the screen and a series of commands appeared. One of the commands was return route. I touched the screen and a yellow line took me from Dunkin' Donuts back to Morelli's house. Just for the hell of it I pulled out of the lot and followed the line.

Minutes later, I was at Morelli's house. Interesting thing is, the line didn't stop there. I continued to follow the line and after a couple blocks I got really excited because I knew where I was going. The line was taking me to the police station. And if the line led me to the police station, maybe it would also retrace the route Tank took when he brought the truck to me. If the computer stored enough information there was the possibility that it might take me to the Bat Cave.

Six

I reached the police station and sure enough the yellow line kept going. I was moving back toward the river, into an area of renovated office buildings and street-level businesses. Now I had a new problem. The yellow line could go on forever. It could go right past the Bat Cave, and I'd never know. And just as I was thinking this, the yellow line stopped.

I was on Haywood Street. It was a side street with minimal traffic, two blocks away from the noise and frustration of city center rush-hour gridlock. A series of four-story town houses ran along the north side of the street. A couple office buildings occupied the south side. I had no idea where to go from here.

None of the town houses had an attached garage and there was no on-street parking. I circled the block, looking for an alley with rear-access parking. None. This was a good central location, and one of the town houses would make a good Bat Cave, but I couldn't see Ranger parking his truck any distance from his house. I was idling in front of an office building with underground parking. Ranger could park in the underground garage, but even then he'd have to cross the street to get to the town house. Not a big deal for an ordinary person. Seemed out of character for Ranger. Ranger sat with his back to the wall. Ranger never left himself exposed.

The other possibilities weren't as much fun. The computer could simply have run out of allotted space, and Haywood Street meant nothing. Or Tank could have taken Rangers truck and parked it convenient to the Tank Cave.

Lights were on in most of the town houses. The office buildings were mostly dark. The building with parking was a relatively small seven-story structure. The foyer plus floors six and five were lit. I rolled back a couple feet, so I could see through the large glass double door. The foyer looked newly renovated. Elevators to the rear. Reception desk to one side. There was a uniformed guy behind the reception desk.

A two-lane entrance to the underground parking garage sat like a black gap in the building facade. I pulled into the parking garage entrance, but I was stopped by a machine that demanded a passkey. A heavy iron gate barred my way. I squinted into the dark interior and got a rush. I was pretty sure I was looking at a black Porsche parked nose-in to the back wall.

I hit my high beams, but the angle of the truck didn't splash a lot of light around the garage. Fortunately, Ranger carried a full array of bounty hunter toys. I retrieved a three-pound Maglite from the back seat, swung out of the truck and played the light across the expanse of the garage. The back wall held a stairwell and elevator.

There were four parking spaces in front of the elevator. The first two were empty. Ranger's Porsche Turbo filled the third. A Porsche

Cayenne filled the fourth. His Mercedes was missing. And I had the truck. Two black SUVs were parked on the side wall. It's the Bat Cave,' I said to Rex when I got back behind the wheel.

Kind of fun to finally have found it… but now what? Ranger was off somewhere, and I still didn't have a place to spend the night. I stared into the dark garage. I had no place to stay, and dollars to doughnuts, sitting in front of me was a building with a vacant apartment. Don't even think about it, I said to myself. That's like a death wish. This man is fanatical about protecting his privacy.

He won't be happy to find you've broken into his apartment and done the Goldilocks thing.

There was a part of my brain that was in charge of stupid ideas. When I was seven it told me to jump off my parents' garage roof to see if I could fly. It also encouraged me to play Choo Choo with Joe Morelli when I was a kid. Morelli was the originator of Choo Choo.

Morelli was the choo choo train, and I was the tunnel. And as it turned out it was necessary for the train to spend a lot of time under my skirt. Later in life the stupid idea part of my brain encouraged me to marry Dicky Orr. Orr was a slick talker who had a roving eye. Less than a year after the wedding, other body parts that belonged to Orr started roving as well. And that was the end of that marriage.