Fat Free And Fatal. G. A. McKevett

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СКАЧАТЬ R.L. Can you imagine a person wanting to be called by a couple of letters like that, instead of a proper name? That alone shows what a hoodlum he must be. I would wager he’s already spent time in prison.”

      Instantly, Savannah thought of a dozen good ol’ boys from her home state of Georgia who went by assorted initials in lieu of full names. She knew a J.D., a J.P., a J.R., and a J.B., just for starters. All fine, upstanding, proud sons of the South—they hadn’t served more than thirty years of hard prison time between them. And most of that was for “thumpin’” on other, less upstanding, good ol’ boys who’d been asking for it.

      Nope. Saulie’s theory just didn’t hold water.

      But R.L. looked like he might be an exception. He did look like a hoodlum, from the metal-studded leather vest that he wore with no shirt underneath, to the spiked dog collar around his neck, from the five-inch-high black Mohawk, to the swastika tattoo proudly displayed on his bare chest. Savannah took particular notice of the enormous skull-and-crossbones ring on his right forefinger that would be nasty in a fistfight, should one ensue in the process of taking him into custody.

      No, R.L. didn’t look like your average accountant or Sunday school teacher. He looked like exactly the kind of guy Savannah enjoyed busting—somebody who continually did nasty, ornery things to nice people, but was cocksure that they would forever get away with it.

      She loved proving them wrong.

      As he sauntered through the front door, she rearranged her face from a self-satisfied smirk to the look of a moderately bored clerk who was looking forward to going home at five sharp. “May I help you?” she asked R.L. as her eyes casually scanned the rest of his person, looking for any telltale bulge that might signify a weapon—other than the oversized skull ring. But the ring was all she saw.

      He walked past her and over to where Saul stood. “Nope. Saul here is my man,” he said. “I called earlier.”

      “Ah…you’re the good fellow with the Weil and the Tutima?” Saul laid his polishing cloth down on the counter. Savannah noticed that his hand was trembling. Again, she felt a pang of concern for her old friend. This sort of thing was nerve-wracking on anyone, let alone an octogenarian who had lost his wife only a year ago and had survived a triple bypass just last winter.

      “That’s me.” R.L. glanced over at Savannah, then toward the front door and the back of the store. “Let’s do some business. And don’t take all day about it either, old man. I got places to go, things to do.”

      Saul bristled at the “old man” comment, pulled himself a couple of inches taller, and stuck out his chin. “Not so fast, young man. Saul takes his time and conducts his business in proper fashion. Let me see what you have to sell and, if you wish to do business with me, remember to address me in a respectful tone of voice.”

      R.L. gave a little snort, then dug into the front pocket of his jeans. He pulled out a couple of fine watches and dumped them onto the glass countertop as though they were nothing but a couple of carnival trinkets. “There,” he said. “I told you they were expensive stuff. New. Never even worn. So don’t go trying to cheat me. I want full price for these.”

      Saul pulled a pair of glasses from his shirt pocket, then took his time unfolding them and slipping them on. As he studied the pieces carefully, turning each one over and over in his expert hands, he said, “I’m sure you came by these fine pieces in a perfectly legal way. Eh, my impudent fellow?”

      R.L. started to answer, then paused, mentally snagged on the word impudent. Then, unable to decide if he’d been insulted or not, he said, “Sure. Like I told you, legal all the way. Christmas presents I just never got around to returning.”

      Saul cleared his throat, looked up from the watches, and gave Savannah a big, toothsome smile. Suddenly, he looked years younger and decades stronger. “These watches,” he announced in a loud, clear voice, “are exactly as we thought. We can conclude our business now if you like.”

      At his words, Savannah reached under her jacket and pulled her Beretta from its holster. She pointed the barrel at a spot a couple of inches below R.L.’s Mohawk. “Freeze,” she told him. “Don’t you even twitch, son, or you’ll have a whole new hairdo with a permanent part.”

      Half a second later, Dirk came around the corner, his revolver drawn. When he saw the suspect, he smiled as brightly as Saul. “Well, hello again,” he said. “I remember you, you worthless pile of dog crap. I busted you about two years ago for robbing a church’s poor box. Remember me?”

      As Dirk and R.L. reminisced about days of yore, Savannah was moving around the counter, intending to position herself between their suspect and the doorway. But she was watching him, his every movement…most importantly, his eyes. And she knew the instant he made the decision.

      “No!” she shouted as he spun on his heel and headed for the doorway. “Don’t you run, you little—”

      She banged her hip hard on the corner of the glass cabinet as she rounded it, but she hardly felt the pain because of the jolt of adrenaline that had hit her bloodstream. She headed for the door, about six steps behind their now-on-the-run thief.

      R.L. and his ugly leather vest shot out the door with Savannah on his heels and Dirk behind her. He took off down the sidewalk, running with the grace of a recently decapitated chicken, knocking his fellow pedestrians aside and a kid off his bicycle.

      But what he lacked in beauty, he made up in determination.

      The guy was pretty fast.

      Too fast for Savannah’s liking.

      After only a couple of blocks, she could hear Dirk huffing and puffing behind her. An excellent runner with longer legs than hers, he normally overtook and passed her when they were in a footrace. But this time it was she who was in the lead when their quarry changed routes and headed down a side street toward the old mission.

      A tourist attraction as well as a functioning church, the mission had a wide, shallow pool, decoratively situated in a courtyard at the entrance to the property. Inlaid with cobalt blue and yellow tiles, the pool provided some cool, refreshing wading for the town’s children on hot summer days.

      And, it seemed, for the occasional thief on the lam.

      Rather than try to fight his way through a crowd of tourists who were taking pictures of the ancient adobe building and its picturesque surroundings, R.L. decided to take a shortcut through the fountain.

      Splashing water like a Labrador retriever puppy gamboling at the beach, he galloped through it and was out the other side in less than five seconds.

      Savannah didn’t take the time or energy to even consider her new suede loafers. She plunged right in, making just as big a splash…much to the chagrin of the tourists within splash range.

      She didn’t take time to hate him either as she felt the cold water soak her new linen slacks up to the knee. She could always hate him at her leisure.

      Once she had her hands on him.

      He reached the other side of the plaza and its surrounding wall, where he hesitated a couple of seconds before deciding to turn right and head for the old graveyard near the back of the mission.

      Those two seconds were all Savannah needed to close most of the distance between them.

      And when СКАЧАТЬ