Jeff Shelby - Wicked Break

“You seriously alright?” he asked.

“Fine.”

Mike stared at me for a second, then shrugged. He waved at the bartender, pointed at his beer and then the empty space in front of me.

“Thanks for meeting me,” I said after the beer arrived.

“Hey. Thanks for coming here,” he said. “I’m meeting a date here in a little bit.”

“Don’t let me get in the way.”

He grinned, exposing bright white teeth. “Don’t worry. I won’t.”

Mike lived a serious bachelor’s life and liked it that way. His good looks, charm, and wit made it easy for him.

I took a drink from the beer and set the glass on the oak bar. “Guy came to see me. Said you sent him.”

He finished pulling the tie from his shirt. He folded it up and shoved it in his pocket. “Pete?”

“Pluto, yeah.”

Mike raised eyebrows. “He actually came to see you, huh?”

“Yep.”

He took a drink from his beer. “I wasn’t sure if he was serious or not.” He shrugged. “Yeah, I gave him your name.”

I looked toward the mass of working stiffs gathering after a day of depositions, day trading, and number crunching. “You know him well?”

He shrugged. “Enough. I handled his mother’s estate when she died. Seems like a decent guy.”

“You know the brother?”

Mike smirked and rolled his eyes. “Linc? Sort of. He was kind of a little prick the two times he came to my office. I tried to chalk it up to the fact that he’d just lost a family member, but I got the feeling it was a regular thing with him.”

As I watched the overpaid yuppies laugh and talk, I thought of Peter Pluto’s body in the canyon. Liz hadn’t released his name yet, so I didn’t feel ready to mention it to Mike.

“What’s Peter do for a living?” I asked.

Mike thought about that for a second. “Was selling real estate when I first met him. Assume he’s doing it still.” He grabbed his glass off the bar. “What’s going on, Noah?”

“I’m not sure,” I said. “Any idea where the kid would go?”

“No clue,” he said. “Pete just said he couldn’t find his brother and he was worried. I gave him your name.” He paused, stared at me a little harder for a moment. “This have anything to do with the way you look?”

I laughed. “You’re not fond of my new appearance?”

“No. It looks like you really pissed off the wrong guy.”

I nodded and looked back at the crowd. “Something like that.”

“Hey, Noah, if this guy’s into something you don’t want any part of, don’t feel obligated because of me.”

I looked back at him. “My curiosity’s been piqued.”

Mike smiled and drained the rest of his beer. “Fair enough. Well, from what I know, Pete’s a good guy. But I really only know him from the estate and trust work I did for him. He was pretty straightforward and completely hassle-free.” He set the empty glass back down on the bar. “Like I said, Linc to me was a little bit of a punk. But most of my dealings were with Pete.”

“Any way I could find out about that trust left to Linc?” I asked.

He frowned. “Come on. You know that’s confidential.”

I finished my beer and nodded. “Yeah, but look at my face.”

His frown morphed into a reluctant smile. “I don’t think there’s much there, but I’ll see what I can get you.”

“Peter said Linc had hooked up with the wrong crowd at some point. Any clue as to what he meant?”

He thought about it, then nodded. “Yeah. Pete tell you anything about the father?”

“He got pretty upset when I asked, so I didn’t push it.”

Mike nodded, as if that sounded right. “Not surprised. He was into the white supremacy thing. And Linc got into it, too. I’d assume that would be the wrong crowd Pete was talking about.”

I thought of Lonnie and Mo. “How involved was Linc?”

“Not really sure,” Mike said. “Pete didn’t go into it much. I think he was embarrassed by it. I just knew he was worried about him.”

“Peter wasn’t into it?” I asked.

“I don’t think so. Like I said, I don’t know Peter all that well. But I highly doubt he’s involved with white supremacists. He got visibly upset when he told me that Linc was into it.”

It seemed like Linc had been keeping company with a pretty volatile group of friends and I wondered if it had become too much for him to handle.

Mike looked over my shoulder. “And now, if you’re finished with me, my date for the evening has arrived.”

I laughed and stood. “I said I wouldn’t get in the way.”

“You are a friend.”

“I try.”

Mike stood up and waved. “Actually, I think you know her. We were all in court together one time, if memory serves me.”

“Really?” I said, and turned around.

The bar was crowded now, people stacked four deep at the railing. The tables in the restaurant were filled completely. Mike could’ve been waving at anyone in the place, trying to get the attention of any of the gorgeous women in the room.

But it was clear that he was waving at the best-looking woman in the bar.

He was waving at Liz.

She froze for a moment when she spotted me, her expression indicating she was as surprised to see me as I was to see her. But then it was gone and she made her way over to us.

Mike stepped around me. “Liz, you know Noah, right? His eyes were probably different last time you saw him.”

She wore a blue blouse and tailored skirt, her hair piled on top of her head. The makeup around her eyes was a little darker than normal, the blue in her eyes a little brighter. She smiled nervously. “Yeah. Hey.”

“Hey yourself.” I looked at Mike. “I gotta run. I’ll call you, alright?”

I didn’t wait for an answer. I pushed past them, through the crowd and out the front door, feeling as if I’d taken a beating all over again.

I turned up Johnny Lang in the CD player, gripped the steering wheel of the Jeep, and stepped on the accelerator, driving away from the Columbia Street Brewery, Mike, and Liz as fast as I could.

As I forced my way through the traffic headed north on I-5, I unclenched my jaw and tried to relax. Liz and I weren’t together. We weren’t anything. I didn’t have any right to get upset with what she was doing in her personal life, yet my gut felt like it was filled with jagged stones.

I took the I-8 westbound exchange behind the old Sports Arena and past Sea World, exiting at West Mission Bay Drive, and headed into Mission Beach as I thought about my anger. I wasn’t ready to admit that Liz was over me. I’d imagined our relationship as one of those like you see on television, where the couple is apart until no one can take it any longer and then they end up back together. You just have that feeling that two people are supposed to be together.

I had that feeling about Liz and me, but she apparently didn’t watch the same shows.

I parked the Jeep in the alley outside my house and walked the five blocks up Mission to the SandDune. My legs were stiff and heavy and the walk helped bring them back to life. The bar was half filled; a quiet buzz of conversation mixed with the overhead television monitors.

I slid onto the first stool and waved at Marsha behind the bar. She was wearing a tight black T-shirt cut just above her navel and her blond hair hung straight to her shoulders.

She strolled over and winced. “Who danced on your face?”

“Guy with big feet,” I said, leaning against the bar, breathing harder than I would’ve liked. “Shot of Cuervo and Red Trolley on the back.”

She nodded and pulled the bottle of tequila from below the counter. She turned up a shot glass in front of me and filled it with the liquor.