Jeff Abbott - A Kiss Gone Bad

Velvet practiced pulling the automatic from her purse for ten more minutes until the motion felt fluid and natural and the gun didn’t feel so alien in her grip. If Junior Deloache became a problem, she thought, she’d have to fire without flinching. She imagined shooting him in the stomach – clearly the biggest target on him – and tried not to think about how much blood might explode from his guts.

Him or you. Just think of it as him or you if it comes to that. Junior was, she thought, most likely full of bluff, and he might even be useful to her.

Her fantasies shifted from gunning down a hot-breathed Junior Deloache to placing the cool barrel of the Sig against Faith Hubble’s head and forcing that snide bitch to sing the truth. Yes, I killed him, I killed him, please don’t hurt me…

A gentle knock rapped on the door. She went and peered through the peephole. Faith Hubble stared back at her through the security hole, arms crossed, frowning like she wanted to bite the world in half.

‘Velvet? You there?’ Faith called. She knocked again.

Velvet hurried back to her purse. She clicked on the recorder and found the ammunition in the bottom of the bag.

‘You’re stupider than I thought,’ Gooch said.

Whit nursed his beer. He and Gooch sat in a deserted corner at Georgie’s bar at the Shell Inn. Being a Tuesday night, the bar was mostly empty, only a few figures quaffing down liquid forgetfulness in the shallow light. The tarpons on the wall, mounted over draped netting, caught the glow of the television along their preserved curves. Georgie sat at the bar, smoking a cigarette and working the New York Times crossword puzzle with a bloodred pen.

He had just confessed to Gooch about his affair with Faith and was now receiving a quota of due lashings.

‘What do you think Buddy Beere might make of this, Whitman?’ Gooch rattled the ice in his near-empty glass of bourbon. ‘He’ll fry you into political hash.’

‘Buddy doesn’t have to know. And Pete’s her longtime ex. I don’t think there’s a professional conflict in me handling the case.’

‘Buddy will. And no secret in this county gets kept forever,’ Gooch said. ‘There’s too many big mouths and prying eyes and booze.’ He finished his drink with a toss and signaled to the vapid barkeep for a refill. She didn’t see him, giggling with Eddie Gardner at the bar. Whit watched Gardner, who had pointedly ignored him. If Claudia was slaving over the Hubble case tonight, Gardner wasn’t.

‘I’ve discovered the silver lining. You blow the election, you can work for me,’ Gooch mused. ‘I’m thinking of buying a much bigger boat, you know, a serious party barge. If I do it, you can wriggle out from under Babe’s wing and grab a real life.’

‘Yeah. Scrubbing decks, gutting fish, keeping drunks from going overboard. And best of all, taking orders from you. My life’s dream.’

‘You ain’t got room for snooty.’ Gooch finally got the bartender’s attention when she turned from laughing at a joke of Gardner’s. She nodded and brought Gooch his drink. Whit watched the young woman hurry back to Gardner, intent on not leaving him shifted in neutral too long.

‘Why do cute girls like a greaseball like Gardner?’ Whit wondered.

Gooch shrugged. ‘You ask this while diddling Faith Hubble.’

Whit considered. ‘She’s fun.’

‘And willing. Is that all you require?’

‘No.’

‘What else? Breathing?’ Gooch put a hand over his heart in mock horror. ‘God help us, you’re not in love with her, are you?’

‘Of course not,’ Whit said.

‘So she’s just someone you sleep with?’

‘She’s…’ Whit stopped. Lover implied more emotional depth than either he or Faith had yet brought to the bed. One-night stand was logistically incorrect. Sexual release carried all the warmth of freezer burn. He just liked her; he still liked her. ‘We’re in a shadowy area.’

His map of Faith’s heart consisted of the roughest sketch. He knew Sam was her north star, her everything, with perhaps Lucinda and her political career a near second. But when they were together – from the first time – she had shown an openness toward him that he suspected few others saw. He didn’t believe her capable of sticking a gun in a man’s mouth and pulling the trigger.

He was pretty sure. Fairly sure.

He finished his beer. Crap. Not sure at all, even though he’d tasted her skin, felt the broad warmth of her back pressed up against his chest, explored the shape of her mouth, smelled chamomile in her hair, knew which ribs produced ticklish laughter. He didn’t know the shape and size of her heart.

And Claudia. She’d greeted Faith with all the friendliness of a mongoose eyeing a swaying cobra. Claudia sure hadn’t believed it was a simple interview. Miss By-the-Book would blow a mighty shrill whistle on him in two seconds flat if she smelled a conflict of interest. And he couldn’t blame her.

Just then Whit noticed a chunky blond man lumber up from a darkened corner of the bar, wearing a gaudy-awful tropical shirt, and head out the door. He bumped into an older man entering the bar and said, ‘Watch it, old fart.’ The old man, already drunk, ignored him.

Whit said, ‘Come on,’ to Gooch, tossed dollars on the bar to settle the tab, and followed.

As they went out, the man clambered into a red Porsche. Grit and bird-guano splatters dusted the car. The Porsche jerked out of its slot and revved onto Main Street.

Whit ran to his Explorer, Gooch following.

‘Explaining soon?’ Gooch said.

‘Heavy. Blond. Loud. He looks like the dirtbag Ernesto described. And he’s driving a messy Porsche, just like Ernesto said.’

Whit tailed the filthy Porsche down Main Street, past the shopping district where seasonally challenged store owners had already hung Christmas decorations and dangled sprays of light in the palm and red bay trees. On his left was the bay, with rental condo developments lining the shore. Most had been built in the 1970s during a last-gasp oil boom and retained the unfortunate, granola-esque architecture of the time – boxy, with diagonally layered strips of wood for siding and balconies ringed with thick oak beams.

They drove past the Port Leo city limits for a half mile and the Porsche wheeled into a condo resort called Sea Haven. Its name was written in cursive rope for that authentic nautical air. Missing windows and sawhorses suggested renovations were under way.

The Porsche parked next to a flooring company’s van, and the driver unfolded himself from the car. Big, with terminally moussed hair and pimp-bright clothes: a crimson tropical shirt adorned with purple parrots, bright yellow golfing pants, snow-white high-top sneakers. He straightened his britches with a decisive yank as he ambled toward the building.

Whit drove past, U-turned, and circled back. The man still stood in the yard, talking to an elderly man in a motorized wheelchair.

‘Stop and talk to them or go on?’ Gooch asked.

‘Carpe diem and all that crap,’ Whit said. ‘Let’s stop.’

The old man watched them park and raised a hand to silence the young man. Whit was suddenly conscious of the KEEP JUDGE MOSLEY megasize magnetic sign on the side of his Explorer. He and Gooch walked toward them. The steely scowl on the old man’s face deepened.

‘Hello,’ Whit said. ‘I’m Whit Mosley and I’m the justice of the peace here in Encina County.’

‘I see.’ The old man nodded toward the garishly patriotic vote-mobile, bright under the streetlights. ‘I’m Anson Todd.’

Whit recognized the name from the marina manager; Todd was the man who’d made the docking arrangements for Real Shame. ‘This is Leonard Guchinski,’ Whit said.