same time no smoking

"The sky was overcast and the air was cooler than it had been in Trenton. Bob tipped his nose into the wind and looked all perky, and I buttoned my jacket up to my neck and wished I'd brought something warmer to wear. Most of the big, expensive houses that sat on the dunes were shuttered and unoccupied."
[excerpt, Hot Six, by Janet Evanovich.
Copyright 1994. St. Martin's Press, Fifth Avenue, New York, New York.]

---------------
Janet Evanovich and Sue Grafton are two authors whose books I read, each as it comes out. Sue Grafton's are "alphabet" titles: "A" Is For Alibi, "B" Is For Burgler, etc. She's up to about "U" I think -- have a feeling it might be "U" Is For Undertaker...?! But at any rate, it's like there's an end-point: "Z."

Janet Evanovich, on the other hand, used numbers --
One For The Money, Two For The Dough, Three To Get Deadly, Four To Score, High Five, etc. (A couple of weeks ago, zapped through Sizzling Sixteen... and -- you know -- there's no end point because numbers are infinite...!

Evanovich's "I" first-person narrator is Stephanie Plum, a bounty hunter.
"Ramos," in Hot Six, is a Greek guy who's in the gun business...
------------------------
{excerpt} I need you to take a look at the back of the house in Deal. Everyone else on the team would be suspect, but a woman walking her dog down the beach won't feel threatening to Ramos's security. I want you to catalogue the house. Count off windows and doors."

[space in the text]
There was a public-access beach about a quarter-mile from the Ramos compound. I parked on the road, and Bob and I crossed a short stretch of low dunes. The sky was overcast and the air was cooler than it had been in Trenton. Bob tipped his nose into the wind and looked all perky, and I buttoned my jacket up to my neck and wished I'd brought something warmer to wear. Most of the big, expensive houses that sat on the dunes were shuttered and unoccupied. Frothy gray waves came whooshing in at us. A few seagulls ran around at the water's edge, but that was it. Just me and Bob and the seagulls.

The big pink house came into view, more exposed on the beach side than to the street. Most of the first floor and all of the second story were clearly visible. ...

I continued to plow through the sand, not wanting to seem overly curious as I counted off the windows and doors. ... I had binoculars with me but I was afraid to use them. I didn't want to arouse suspicion. It was impossible to tell if I was being observed from a window. Bob raced around me, oblivious to everything but the joy of being outdoors. I walked several houses farther, drew myself a diagram on a piece of paper, turned, and walked back to the public-access ramp where Blue was parked. Mission accomplished.

Bob and I piled into Blue and rumbled down the street, past the Ramos house, one last time. When I paused at the corner, a man in his sixties jumped off the curb at me. He was wearing a running suit and running shoes. And he was waving his hands.

"Stop," he said. "Stop a minute."

I could have sworn it was Alexander Ramos. No, that was ridiculous.

He trotted to the driver's side and rapped on my window. "Have you got any cigarettes?" he asked.
"Gee . . . uh, no."
He shoved a twenty at me. "Drive me to the store for some cigarettes. It'll only take a minute."
Thick accent. Same hawklike features. Same height and build. Really looked like Alexander Ramos.
"Do you live around here?" I asked him.
"Yeah, I live in that piece-of-shit pink monstrosity. What's it to you? Are you gonna drive me to the store, or not?"

My god! It was Ramos. "I don't usually let strange men in my car."
"Give me a break. I need some cigarettes. Anyway, you got a big dog in the backseat, and you look like you drive strange men around all the time. What'd ya think, I was born yesterday?"
"Not yesterday."
He wrenched the passenger door open and got in the car. "Very funny. I have to flag down a comedian. ...Turn the corner here. There's a store about a half-mile down."

"If it's just a half-mile away why don't you walk?"
"I have my reasons."
"Not supposed to be smoking, huh? Don't want anyone to catch you going to the store?"
"Goddamn doctors. I have to sneak out of my own house just to get a cigarette."
...

I stopped at the store, and he jumped out of the car. "Don't go away. I'll be right back."

Part of me wanted to flee the scene. That was the cowardly part. And part of me wanted to go Yippee! That was the stupid part.
In two minutes he was back in the car, lighting up.
"Hey," I said, "no smoking in the car."
"I'll give you another twenty."
"I don't want the first twenty. And the answer is no. No smoking in the car."
"I hate this country. Nobody knows how to live. Everybody drinks fucking skim milk." He pointed to the cross street. "Turn up there and take Shoreline Avenue."
"Where are we going?"
"I know this bar."

...Without asking, the bartender brought Ramos a bottle of ouzo and two shot glasses. Nothing was said. Ramos drank a shot; then he lit up and dragged the smoke deep into his lungs. "Ahh," he said on the exhale.

...Ramos poured himself a second shot and tipped the bottle in my direction.
"No thanks," I said. "I'm driving."
He shook his head. "Sissy country."
...
I dropped him off a block from his house.
"Come back tomorrow," he said. "Same time."
---------- {end excerpt. Hot Six, Evanovich, St. Martin's Press.}

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