Jonathon King - Shadow Men
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- Название:Shadow Men
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"Your truck has been bugged and shot. You've been followed by vans and a helicopter. You've been warned off and Billy's been offered a bribe. And you still don't have anything more to go on but a few old letters and a bunch of old Everglades campfire stories," she said, trying to rake it together.
"I'd offer some advice, Max. But imagine spilling out that missing-person's case onto a detective squad's table: 'Well, sir. We think we've got an eighty-year-old murder case going here in which a multibillion-dollar development corporation is trying to cover up the forced labor and assassination of its own reluctant workers. All we need to do is find the remains of one of these bodies somewhere along the sixty miles of road that cuts through the middle of the Glades and hope he's got a pay stub in his pocket and a detailed note identifying his killer."'
"It might still be premature to call in any official inquiry," I said.
My legs and arms were rubbery from fatigue. My head was equally spent. I'd like to say I remembered getting up and making it to her bed. I'd like to say I remember lying with her, curled up like spoons under a single sheet in the soft breeze of the ceiling fan. I'd like to say I was aroused by the smell and touch of her warm skin. But I fell asleep, stone asleep, and did not wake until nearly noon the next day, by which time she had long ago left for work. She'd left me a note saying she'd call a detective friend in Collier County on the west coast where the other side of the Tamiami Trail first enters the great swamp. She described him as an "old-timer who might have collected some rumors of his own." I dressed and went outside. The sun was already warm in the trees and when I opened the truck cab the huff and odor of sweat and salt and tracked muck spilled out. In the daylight I could see the sprinkle of glass on my front seat and without too much trouble I found the flattened slug that had passed through the windshield and probably ricocheted off the back cab wall and ended up on the floor behind my seat. It was misshapen, and I had to guess that the caliber was anything from a.38 to a.45. Not hunting rifle material. I picked it up with a paper towel and put it into a plastic Baggie from my glove box and stored it away. I then drove over to Federal Highway with the windows rolled down to make a call to Billy on a pay phone. I no longer trusted the cell and refused to use Richards's home phone again. Inside a convenience store I got Billy at his office and told him I would stop at his apartment and then meet him for dinner at Arturo's on Atlantic about eight. He said I might be getting too paranoid, and I might have believed him, but out of the store's plate-glass window I watched a squad car pull up behind my truck and stop, blocking my way out.
"I'll see you at eight, or call you from jail," I said to Billy, and before he could ask, I hung up. I bought a large coffee and a box of plain doughnuts and went outside.
Both officers were out of the car. One was leaning his rump against the trunk, while the other was checking the contents of my truck through the driver's-side window. I walked up and unlocked the passenger side and leaned in, making eye contact with the younger one through the glass. I was smiling. He was not.
"You Mr. Freeman?" he asked. I slid back out and we reestablished the sight line over the hood. His right hand was now on the butt of his holstered 9 mm.
"Yes," I said. "How you doin'?" I set the doughnuts on the hood, halfway across. He stared at them for a couple of beats and his face got grumpy.
"You the owner of this vehicle, Mr. Freeman?"
"Sure. Isn't that what the tag check came back with?"
The other cop, the older one, was now on his feet. He had a black enameled riot stick in a metal loop on his belt. I'd recognized him even before he took off his sunglasses. It was the patrol cop who'd confronted Richards in the parking lot, the one I knew was slapping Richards's friend around, even if she hadn't admitted it yet.
"Can I see your license and registration, Mr. Freeman?" the young one asked. I fished out the paperwork and put it on top of the doughnut box.
"This windshield damage," he said, looking at the license and deliberately not finishing his question, expecting me to take it up and be defensive. I stayed quiet and he finally looked up, his eyebrows raised. I raised my own.
"Do you know what caused it?"
"Hunting accident," I said.
The wife-beater had taken up another position on my side, leaning against the truck bed, but his feet were planted firm on the parking lot macadam.
"Anybody hurt?" said the younger one.
"Not that I know of."
The kid had had enough of my attitude. I probably would have, too.
"Well, Mr. Freeman. It's a violation to be driving this vehicle in this condition," he said, taking out his ticket book. "I could write you a summons and have the truck impounded, if that's…"
He stopped when he realized I wasn't paying any attention to him. I was looking at the partner, who was wearing one of those smirks we used to snap off the faces of the football players who used to walk into O'Hara's Gym in South Philly. Most of them had never seen a professional jab thrown by someone who knew what they were doing. This guy hadn't either, I was willing to bet.
"Mr. Freeman knows it's a violation, Jimmy," the older one said, not willing to be stared down. "Mr. Freeman was a cop up north. One of the Philly brotherhood, right Mr. Freeman?"
Again I stayed silent and held his eyes. It's the one thing a true street cop can't stand, some asshole trying to lock on to his face, cut his attention off from what was going on around him. But this guy's macho was overriding even that.
"Hell, Mr. Freeman was probably on his way to get this fixed, and we don't give out tickets to our fellow officers, do we, Jimmy? Even former officers."
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jimmy put his book away. I lowered my voice: "You following me, McCrary?"
The truck cab was now between us and the partner, a bad move on the kid's part.
"Why would I be following you, Freeman? What you do is none of my business," McCrary said, matching my volume. "And what I do is none of yours."
The statement made me think too long and McCrary turned on his heel, giving his partner a jerk of his head and giving me his back as they both moved back to the squad car. I watched them pull away, and the emblem and motto emblazoned on the door just below McCrary's profile stuck in my head: TO PROTECT AND SERVE.
On Atlantic Boulevard they were just beginning to come out. The young women were dressed in the kind of casual clothes that at a glance seemed simple and comfortable from thirty feet. But close up you could see the tightness across the ass of the jeans, the waistband designed to sling so low that one would surely have to shave to stay within the limits of obscene. The cotton tops were at least a size too small and stretched over cinched up breasts to accent the curves. There wasn't a heelless shoe on the sidewalk, and even accounting for the Florida sun, nearly every woman, regardless of age, had streaked her hair, and a good minority of the young men had matched them.
I got to Arturo's a half hour early, and when I asked for Billy's reservation, Arturo himself came out and seated me at a sidewalk table that I knew was one of the most sought after on a Saturday night. I asked for my usual, and the waiter brought me two bottles of Rolling Rock stuck in an ice-filled champagne bucket. I leaned back, sipped the cold beer and listened to a burst of female laughter across the avenue, the voice of some miked-up emcee down the block that rose and fell on the breeze, the sharp wolf whistle of a kid hawking girls from the window of his car, and the bubbles of different brands of music that floated out the doors of the nearby clubs and burst out into the street.
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