Before The Killing Starts (Dixie Killer Blues Book 1) Page 4

  'He said he wasn't working for your wife,' Dave said suddenly. He sounded pleased that he'd remembered something else.

  Dixie closed his eyes and let out a God give me strength sort of sigh.

  'I don't have a wife, Dave.'

  'Right.'

  'There's probably a whole bunch of other people he's not working for either. The President, the Pope, Father Christmas . . .'

  'Right.'

  That short word conveyed a lifetime of put downs by people who were smarter than he was. Dave's temporary enthusiasm had pretty much run its course.

  Dixie looked up at the sky in frustration. 'There's nothing else you can tell me about him?'

  'He had a photo of you. Well, half a photo.'

  Dixie was tempted to point out that you couldn't have half a photograph, just like you couldn't have half a hole or half a piece of string, but he knew it wasn't worth the effort.

  'What do you mean?' he said, trying to keep the growing irritation out of his voice.

  'It was a photo of you cut in half. It looked like you and a woman and the woman was cut off.'

  That was more interesting. 'Okay,' Dixie said, stretching the word out a couple of extra syllables as he took the information on board. 'That all?'

  'Yeah . . . Apart from the fact that he broke Charlie Watson's finger and busted up his nose pretty bad. I gotta say I was impressed.'

  Dixie laughed. 'Charlie's an inbred who doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. He probably deserved it. I bet he started it, too.' He heard Dave grunt in agreement. 'I think I like Mr Buckley already; my kind of guy. Give me the details on his card.'

  Dixie took down the address and cell phone number and ended the call. He walked slowly back to the car turning it over in his mind. Where had the guy got his name? More importantly, how had he known to start looking at Kelly's Tavern? And what the hell was that about a photo?

  He got back to the car but didn't get in. He stood and drummed his fingers on the roof as he tried to think it through. It came to him like a mini epiphany and he smiled to himself. It was the mention of the woman cut out of the photo. Ellie. It had to be. She must have asked Buckley to find him. She gave him the photo, told him where to go. The question was, why? Well, at least it made his job of finding her a whole lot easier. He'd worry about the why later.

  The smile slipped off his face. Before he did that, though, he had to go and talk to Alvarez. He knew it was a pointless exercise. It was all very well Chico saying talk to Alvarez. What was he going to say? Hey Alvarez, Chico wants to know if you took the drugs but kept the money for yourself. It was going to take some careful phrasing to avoid a slap, that was for sure, and there wouldn't be much help coming from Crispy's corner unless there were some heads needed punching.

  He rubbed the back of his neck and rolled his head, feeling the vertebrae pop, hoping to ease out the tension. It actually made it worse. Finding a diplomatic way of asking Alvarez if he was a double crossing, cheating beaner wasn't his biggest problem, either. He opened the door and climbed in. Getting rid of the idiot sitting in the driver's seat was. He couldn't be one hundred per cent sure, but he reckoned Chico had insisted he take Crispy along because he didn't trust him.

  He could hardly blame the guy.

  Chapter 9

  Out of the frying pan and into the fire was a phrase that crossed Evan's mind as he walked away from Kelly's Tavern. It appeared that he'd exchanged one barroom brawler with a pool cue for two serious looking Hispanics with . . . he didn't like to think what. As he'd suspected, one good kick had snapped the pool cue in half and the doors had burst open. Looking over his shoulder he'd been surprised to see it was the Hispanics who'd followed him out of the bar and not the inbreds. They were about fifty yards behind him.

  At first he'd been surprised—and grateful—when they'd helped him in the bar, but now he wasn't so sure. Their interest must be to do with him asking about Dixie, and he couldn't help but wonder if their concern to stop him being beaten up was driven by the desire to do a better job of it themselves. They didn't look like the types to use something as prosaic as a pool cue, either.

  He reached his car, jumped in and pulled out into the traffic. Behind him on the sidewalk the two guys started to run back to their car which was parked directly outside the bar, but facing the other way. It gave Evan a few seconds head start but traffic was light and in his rear view mirror he saw them make a u-turn before stamping on the gas.

  Evan accelerated until he was alongside a semi-trailer truck lumbering along. He looked in his mirror and saw the two guys right behind him. He saw a turning on his right just up ahead. He waited to the last second and wrenched the wheel hard, swinging the car in front of the semi-trailer and into a narrow side street, missing the truck's fender by inches. There was a blast on the horn and the angry squeal of rubber as the truck slammed on its brakes and the two guys shot past it. Evan glanced in his mirror again and saw the side of the semi-trailer completely blocking the entrance to the street. He was in the clear.

  He goosed the gas and shot forward between the cars parked either side of the narrow street. Another quick look in the mirror and he was still in the clear. Eyes snapped front again, he did a double take and stamped on the brakes. He couldn't believe his eyes. In front of him a Fedex delivery truck had reversed into the street and was coming towards him. He twisted in his seat and looked over his shoulder. Behind him the semi-trailer was on the move again. He hit the horn but the truck in front of him kept on coming. He leaned right into it and the truck stopped. The driver jumped down from the cab and made his way round to the back. Evan hit the horn again and the driver held up his hand, fingers splayed—five minutes.

  He turned in his seat again and saw the back end of the semi-trailer clear the end of the street and disappear from view. Behind it, the two guys had reversed and were waiting as it finally got out of their way. They pulled into the street and stopped. Evan was boxed in.

  In front of him the delivery driver had opened up the back of the truck and was climbing out again, a stack of boxes in his arms. He looked towards Evan, smiled apologetically at him, and then looked past him. Evan watched him go rigid for a split second, an incredulous look on his face, then throw the boxes away from him as if he'd just been told they were radioactive. Then he turned and ran.

  Evan looked behind him and saw the two guys were out of their car and striding towards him, guns in their hands. The driver made it to the cab and scrambled in, dropping the keys in his panic. He half jumped, half fell out and snatched them up again. But he didn't get back in. He looked back at the two guys, then at Evan and then the two guys again. He was wasting too much time. Evan knew he was thinking of forgetting the truck and making a run for it.

  He pulled forward until he was almost under the truck's loading ramp. He couldn't see the driver any more. There was a sudden cough of black smoke as the truck's engine fired. It jerked forward and stopped again. The idiot had stalled it. The engine turned over and over but it wouldn't catch. Evan looked in the mirror—the guys had quickened their pace and were only yards away. The truck's engine fired again but still it didn't move.

  What the hell was the guy doing? Finishing up his paperwork?

  Evan hit the horn again and the truck started to crawl forward. The two guys broke into a run. Evan inched the car after it, his palms slick on the wheel. The truck made it to the end of the street and stopped, waiting for a break in the traffic.

  Too late.

  Evan's door flew open and the guy who'd helped him in the bar leaned in and tried to pull the keys out of the ignition. Evan knocked his hand away. Then the passenger door opened and the other guy threw himself into the passenger seat, his gun trained on Evan's chest. The first guy stepped back and motioned for Evan to get out. In front of him the Fedex truck started moving again, made a right and was gone. The street ahead was clear, but the truck might as well have still been parked in front of him for all the good it did him. There was no way he
could drive off without getting shot.

  Evan climbed slowly out of his car and wiped his hand on the side of his pants, his heart banging away in his chest. The second guy came around the front of the car and stood behind him. He was trapped between them. He took a closer look at the guy in front of him. He was heavyset and a couple of doors down from good looking with a bandit's mustache and the sort of eyes you didn't want to catch if you knew what was good for you.

  'Thanks for stopping that guy in the bar,' Evan said and grinned nervously.

  'No problem,' the guy said and grinned back, not so nervously.

  'I don't suppose you've chased me because I forgot to say thanks,' Evan said hopefully.

  The guy dropped his eyes and worked a small, sad smile onto his face. 'It was quite rude,' he said, 'but, you're right, there is something else.'

  Evan nodded. 'I thought so.'

  'Why are you asking about Dixie?'

  'Why don't you tell me who you are first?'

  The guy smiled. 'Sure. I'm Juan and this is José,' he said with a sweep of his arm towards his friend. José gave a slight nod of his head.

  Evan looked past Juan to where their car was parked. Juan saw him looking and shook his head. 'Don't be silly.' He needn't have worried. Evan wasn't about to put himself at risk. He'd already done more for Ellie than she deserved. He wasn't thinking of making a run for it anyway; he just wanted to get a look at their license number.

  'So, now you know who we are, why are you looking for Dixie?'

  'A client asked me to try to find him.'

  Juan nodded. 'What are you? Some kind of investigator?'

  Evan nodded back.

  'So who's your client?'

  'You probably wouldn't know them.'

  Juan smiled again. 'Try me. I know a lot of people.'

  'His name's John Thomas.'

  Juan cocked his head at that, his eyes diminishing to slits as he gave it some thought. 'You're right—I never heard of him. If he exists that is.'

  He nodded to José standing behind Evan who stepped up and slammed the barrel of his gun into the side of Evan's head. Evan let out an involuntary gasp and staggered sideways against one of the parked cars. A trickle of blood wound its way down the side of his face.

  Wrong answer, obviously.

  'Let's try another one,' Juan said as if nothing had happened. 'Why does this John Thomas want to find Dixie?'

  Damn. Evan knew another bang on the head was on its way whatever he said. Should he make something up? The truth—that he didn't know—was guaranteed to annoy them.

  'He didn't say,' Evan said, glancing round at José behind him. 'That's the truth, by the way. Said I didn't need to know.'

  There must have been something about the resignation is his voice that stopped them from hitting him immediately. Juan cocked his head to one side again and studied Evan's face, trying to make up his mind whether further motivation was called for. It didn't take long. He nodded and José obliged with another clout on Evan's ear.

  'That might teach you to take a fuller brief from your client,' Juan said. He grinned again and José chuckled.

  'Thanks for the advice.'

  Juan gave a no-problem flick of the hand. 'My pleasure.'

  He didn't say anything more for a moment. Maybe he was all out of questions.

  'Well, if that's it, I think I'll run along now,' Evan said, and gestured with his chin towards his car.

  José stepped forward and drew his arm back to give him another whack when a noise in the distance made them all freeze. The sound of police sirens. The delivery driver must have called it in. Evan managed to keep the grin off his face but Juan saw it in his eyes nonetheless.

  Juan gave a small shrug and pointed directly at Evan's face. 'You're a lucky man. If I were you, I'd drop this.'

  The sound of the sirens was quite close now. They couldn't be more than a block away. It didn't seem to worry him.

  'Tell your client that you couldn't find Dixie. Give him his money back. Whatever. Just drop it,' he said and patted Evan's face a couple of times.

  Then the two of them turned and jogged back to their car. They reversed out into the main street and drove off just as the first police cruiser pulled across the other end of the street. Evan got another look at their license plate then turned towards the police and raised his hands above his head.

  The police didn't take long with him. With the delivery driver's story to back him up, he managed to convince them it had been a mugging that went wrong. They probably didn't believe him but they let him go anyway, which was the main thing, with a promise to come in and give a full statement in the next couple of days.

  As soon as they'd gone Evan got back in his car and made a couple of calls.

  Chapter 10

  Ellie rested her head on the steering wheel and tried to think what to do next.

  She'd followed Evan to Kelly's bar and waited in her car to see what happened. She didn't know what she'd expected but it seemed like Evan must have stirred things up in there. She'd watched him back out through the door, ass first, before jamming a pool cue through the handles. A couple of seconds after that the doors had bulged outwards, the cue had snapped and two beaners had come rushing out and chased after him. She'd felt an adrenal spike of fear quickly followed by a sweaty giddiness as relief flooded her body. Thank God she'd sent Evan in there. To think she might have just walked in herself, straight into their hands.

  Evan had made it to his car and taken off, making the two guys double back for theirs. She'd lost sight of them all after that.

  Her phone rang. She fished it out of her bag—it was Evan.

  Looks like he must have got away from them.

  'Where are you?' he asked without bothering to say hello. He sounded pissed, but that was hardly surprising—not that she was supposed to know anything about it.

  'What's wrong?' she said, trying hard to get the right balance between concern and surprise.

  'I'll tell you when I see you,' he snapped. 'Where are you?'

  She had no idea where he might be and she didn't want him to know that she'd followed him. In the phone she could hear a siren in the background wherever he was. Then she heard it faintly through her window. She wound it down and listened. The two sounds were perfectly synchronized; they had to be the same, That meant he was still somewhere nearby. How far did a siren carry? Two blocks? Three? She had no idea. She turned away from the window, towards the sidewalk, and hunched over the passenger seat as if she'd dropped something on the floor.

  'Ellie?' He made no effort to conceal his irritation.

  'I'm . . . at my hotel. Why?'

  'What's that noise? I can hear sirens. Are you sure?'

  She felt a rush of panic. 'Of course I'm sure. I've got the window open. Hang on a sec.' She wound the car window up. 'There, is that better?'

  'Okay' He didn't sound convinced. 'Stay there. I'm coming over. We need to talk.'

  'You can't,' she said, the words bursting out of her mouth a little too quickly. She didn't know if he was two or three blocks closer or further away than she was? He might get there first. 'I'm just about to go out.' It sounded so lame in her ears. He was bound to be suspicious now. But it seemed his annoyance was getting in the way.

  'Ellie,' he snapped, almost shouted, 'this is important . . .'

  'What do you need to say that you can't say over the phone anyway? If it's that important, tell me now. If not, it can wait.'

  She allowed herself a gotcha smile. There wasn't a lot he could say to that. On the other end of the line she heard him take a couple of deep breaths. Take as many as you like.

  'Evan?'

  'Yeah, I'm here.' That was more like it. There was a satisfying amount of defeat in his voice. 'What time will you be back?'

  She relaxed a little.

  'Why don't you come over around six?' she said in an encouraging tone, like she was offering him the last slice of pie.

  'Okay. See you then.'

&
nbsp; The phone went dead. He really was pissed. With any luck he'd have calmed down by the time he came over—another reason not to meet him straight away. She didn't want to be on the receiving end of all that testosterone. She dropped the phone back in her bag and straightened up. She better get back to the hotel just in case he went there anyway, the suspicious prick. A movement registered in the periphery of her vision. She turned and looked out the window and her hand flew to her mouth, an involuntary shriek escaping through her fingers.

  Chapter 11

  'Talk about a lucky break,' Juan said to José, shaking his head as he backed the car out of the narrow side street. There was a screech of tires and a long, indignant blast on a horn as the car they'd backed out in front of made an emergency stop. He raised his arm lazily and gave the driver the finger in the rear-view mirror as he straightened up. Asshole shouldn't have been driving so fast in the first place.

  'So what are we going to do now?' José said.

  The car behind jerked into life, pulled around them and drew up alongside. A large guy with a very red face waved his fist and shouted abuse at them through the window. Specks of spittle spattered the glass.

  José leaned forward in his seat and the two of them turned to see what all the fuss was about. Oddly enough, the guy had a quick change of attitude. Something about the sight of the two of them staring back at him, their dark eyes predatory and mischievous, made him remember what a hurry he'd been in. He stopped shouting like somebody had pulled the plug, snapped his eyes front and did his best to put his foot through the floor. The car shot forward and disappeared down the road.

  'How about we go after that asshole,' José said. 'He called you a wetback.'

  Juan turned towards him and wagged his finger as if to say: liar, liar, pants on fire.

  'How d'you know. You couldn't hear him.'

  José grinned. 'I read his lips.' He mouthed the word a couple of times putting the emphasis on the 'w' and the 'b'. 'You can see it a mile off.'