My mother stared at me. 'Are you still gaining weight? You look so big.'

I unzipped the sweatshirt. 'It's the vest. It's bulky. I was in a hurry and forgot to take it off.'

Everyone gaped.

'What is that thing you're wearing?' Rita wanted to know. 'It like squashes your boobs. It's very unflattering.'

'It's a bullet-proof vest,' Grandma said. 'She's gotta wear one of them on account of she's an important bounty hunter, and there's always people trying to kill her.'

'There's not always people trying to kill her,' Lula said. 'Just sometimes… and this is one of them times,' she added.

'Omigod!' Margaret said.

My mother squelched a groan and made the sign of the cross.

'The fudging vest wasn't in the fudging plan,' Sally said. 'What the fudge am I supposed to do with this? It's gonna fudging ruin the fudging line of the fudging gown.'

'It's a flak vest, not a chastity belt,' I told him. 'It comes off.'

'Cool,' he said.

'You should chill,' Lula told him. 'You're gonna get a embolism you keep that up.'

This is a fudging responsibility,' Sally said. 'I take my wedding planning seriously.' He took a gown off the rack and handed it over to me. This is yours,' he said.

Now it was my turn to gape. 'What happened to pumpkin?'

The other girls are wearing pumpkin. The maid of honor has to have a different color. This is eggplant.'

Lula gave a burst of laughter and clapped her hand over her mouth.

Eggplant. Great. As if pumpkin wasn't bad enough. I ripped my vest off and unlaced my shoes. 'Where do I go to try this on?'

There's a dressing room through the pink doorway,' Sally said, leading the way, carrying Valerie's gown, staggering under the weight of it.

Five minutes later we were all zipped up. Three pumpkins and an eggplant. And Valerie, who was wearing enough glaring white to make everyone snow-blind. Her breasts bulged out of the bodice neckline, and the back zipper valiantly struggled to hold the dress together. The skirt was bell-shaped, meant to disguise leftover baby fat. In actuality, the skirt emphasized her hips and ass.

Valerie tottered over to the three-way mirror, took a look at herself, and shrieked. 'I'm fat!' she yelled. 'My God, look at me. I'm a whale. A big white whale. Why didn't someone tell me? I can't go down the aisle like this. The aisle isn't even wide enough.'

'It's not so bad,' my mother said, trying to smooth away the fat bulge at the waistline. 'All brides are beautiful. You just need to see yourself with the veil.'

Maria came running with the veil, draping the gauze fabric over Val's eyes. 'See how much better it looks through the veil?' Maria said.

'Yeah, and if you want to really feel better, you should get a load of Stephanie in the eggplant,' Lula said.

It didn't seem that vegetable when we were looking at swatches,' Sally said, eyeing my gown.

'She needs a different makeup palette,' Loretta said. 'Some eggplant on her eyes to balance the dress. And then some glitter under the brow to open the eye. And more blush.'

'A lot more blush,' Lula said.

'What am I doing getting married anyway?' Valerie said. 'Do I really want to get married?'

'Of course you want to get married,' my mother said, the panic clear in her voice, her life flashing in front of her eyes.

'Yes,' Valerie said. 'But do I want to get married to Albert?'

'He's the father of your child. He's a lawyer, sort of. He's almost as tall as you.' My mother drew a blank after that and looked to Grandma for help.

'He's cuddle umpkins,' Grandma said. 'And oogieboogie bear and all them things. What about that?'

'I love this,' Lula said, big grin on her face. 'I thought I was gonna lose a thumb this afternoon, but here I am in the middle of cuddle umpkins' pumpkin patch.' Lula turned to Sally. 'What are you going to do? Does the wedding planner get to be an attendant, or something? Or do you just gotta be the wedding planner?'

I'm singing,' Sally said. 'I have a lovely russet satin gown. I thought it would continue the fall theme.'

'Maybe we should get the Trenton Times to cover this,' Lula said to me. 'Or MTV.'

Maria had been jumping from one gown to the next, pinning and tucking. 'All done,' she said.

Sally took me aside. 'You remember about the wedding shower, right? Friday night at the VFW hall.'

'Sure. What time?'

'Seven. And it's a surprise, so be careful what you say to Valerie.'

'My lips are sealed.'

'Let me see you make the zipper,' Grandma said. 'I always like when a person makes the zipper and throws the key away.'

I zipped my lips, and I threw the key away.

Lula swiveled in her seat. 'Ranger's guys are still back there.'

It was the second time I drove past the bar at the corner of Third and Laramie. Most of the street was residential, if you can call warehousing human misery in squalid brick cubes residential.

There were no public parking lots, and curbside parking was nonexistent. Half the cars parked at the curb looked like they hadn't been moved in years.

I double-parked directly in front of the bar, and Lula and I got out. I didn't bother to lock the Cayenne. Rangers men weren't going to let anything happen to his car. I had cuffs tucked into the back of my jeans. I was wearing the Kevlar vest under the sweatshirt.

I had pepper spray in my pocket. Lula was half a step behind me, and I didn't ask what she was carrying. Best not to know.

Heads turned when we entered the bar. This wasn't a place where women went voluntarily. We took a moment to allow our eyes to adjust to the dark interior. Four men at the bar, one bartender, a lone man sitting at a scarred round wood table. Jamil Rodriguez. He was easy to recognize from his photo. A medium-sized black man in a rhinestone do-rag. Cheesy mustache and goatee. A nasty scar etched into his cheek, looking like an acid burn.

He slouched back in his chair. 'Ladies?'

'You Jamil?' Lula asked.

He nodded his head yes. 'You got business with me?'

Lula looked at me and smiled. 'This fool thinks we're gonna buy some.'

I pulled a chair up next to Rodriguez. 'Here's the thing, Jamil,' I said. 'You forgot to show up for court.' And I slapped a cuff on him.

'You sit around and wait and good things come to you,' Rodriguez said. 'I been looking for a new thumb.' And he pulled a big Buck knife out of his pocket.

The four guys at the bar were paying attention, waiting to see the show. They were young, and they looked hungry for action. I suspected they'd jump in when it was the right time.

Lula pulled a gun out of her tiger-print stretch pants and leveled it at Rodriguez. And from the doorway there was the unmistakable ratchet of a sawed-off shotgun. I didn't recognize the guy in black, filling the doorway, but I knew he'd come from the SUV. Not hard to spot one of Ranger's men. Big muscles, no neck, big gun, not much small talk.

'You want to drop the knife,' I said to Rodriguez.

Rodriguez narrowed his eyes. 'Make me.'

Ranger's man blasted a three-foot hole in the ceiling over Rodriguez and plaster flew everywhere.

'Hey,' Lula said to Ranger's man. 'You want to watch it? I just had my hair done. I don't need no plaster in it. Next time just shoot a hole in this punk-ass loser, will you?'

Ranger's man smiled at her.

Minutes later, we had Rodriguez in the back seat of the Cayenne, cuffed and shackled, and we were on our way to the police station.

'Did you see that hunk of burning love smile at me?' Lula said.

'Was he hot, or what? Did you see the size of his gun? I'm telling you, I'm getting a flash. I could have a piece of that.'

'How about a piece of this?' Rodriguez said.