by Jed Power
Chapter 27
When he finally came to, Dan found himself in the dumpster behind the High Tide Restaurant with a bunch of seagulls high stepping in the dumpster around him. The sun was high enough to hurt his eyes and every bone in his body ached. It wasn't just the cuts and bruises left behind by the beating that caused the pain. He couldn't ignore the other pain, the pain in his head, from all that shit they'd made him take. It was a different pain–a pain he was too damn familiar with–just as intense as the pain from the beating, but this pain could last a lot longer.
He struggled to pull himself up on his elbows, scattering gulls in all directions. Dan touched his face gingerly. It was swollen badly, but he still located two eyes, a nose, and his tongue. Then he found the right number of teeth. It could've been a lot worse.
Judging by the sounds he was hearing, Ocean Boulevard was pretty crowded. Dan shook his head very slowly, trying to clear the cobwebs away, but the cobwebs didn't want to go. It'd probably take a week or more before he started feeling normal again. And that was just to get over the cocaine he'd been force fed. He had no idea how long the physical damage would last.
Lying in all that garbage, with the stink strong enough to slice through his swollen nasal passages, it didn't take long before his brain started to clear enough to start torturing him. Even though all the details about Peralta and the coke and the chick without a tan line were still a bit fuzzy, he remembered enough to know he was lucky he hadn't died of an overdose up there on Boar's Head. Or from the beating. Seemed that guy Wayne had a lot of anger issues.
Dan let out a deep breath. It came out raspy, like he'd just come out of a coal mine. He pulled himself up a bit and looked over the edge of the dumpster. No one was around. Good time to move–if he could get his body in motion. Unless, of course, he wanted to be buried under garbage instead of just sitting on it.
He boosted himself up on his knees, rolled out of the dumpster, and landed on his feet. His legs felt a bit wobbly, but at least he hadn't passed out. His clothes were a mess–red shirt stained with blood, jeans all wrinkled and smelly.
Dan turned at the sound of voices. Three teenage girls were coming down the side street adjacent to the Tide. They were only a few yards away when they noticed him. They hesitated for a moment, staring at him, then hurried off down the street. He must look even worse than he felt.
He wasn't likely to make it home in this condition. Somehow he had to get cleaned up and get some food into his roiling stomach. Then he could figure out what to do.
Dan stumbled up to the High Tide and pounded on the back door. In less than a minute the door opened, and Dianne stuck her head out. The current owner of the High Tide had a round face framed in long, frizzy black hair streaked with gray. She took one look at Dan's face and swung the heavy door all the way open. "Dan, my god. What happened?"
"I had an accident," he said. Lame excuse, but it was the best he could do right now.
Dianne closed the door after them, guided him over to her small office, and helped him into an old gray easy chair. Then she just stood there, hands on hips, looking at him like he was a kid with a raging fever. Brown stains spotted her white apron. Chili Day. That meant it must be Monday. Monday was always Chili Day.
"Don't move," she said, wiggling her index finger. "Just stay here."
"Don't worry," he mumbled. "I'm not going anywhere." The way both his legs and his belly were feeling he couldn't have gone anywhere even if he'd wanted to.
Dianne hurried out of the office and returned shortly with some wet cloths and the small first aid kit from the kitchen. She wiped his face with a firm, yet gentle, hand. Every time she touched his face he flinched–it hurt like hell.
"Some of these look bad, Dan," she said. "You ought to go to a hospital and have them checked out."
He couldn't remember ever seeing her this concerned about anything and that worried him. Especially since she'd seen him in pretty bad shape before; not from a beating, of course, but otherwise. "I will. Maybe. Later."
"Dan, what the hell's going on?" she asked as she dabbed ointment on his wounds. "Someone almost kills Shamrock and now this. You're lucky you're alive. It's all about the harbor murders, isn't it? Shamrock . . . you . . . cops everywhere. What the hell's happening to our beach, Dan?"
He didn't think she was really expecting an answer so he kept his mouth shut. Finally, Dianne sat back and frowned. "Do you know who did this to you? Was it the people who beat up Shamrock? Or was it those two cops who've been looking for you?"
Dan shook his head. "I don't want to talk about it, Dianne. Not now." All he wanted to do was crawl into a hole somewhere and wake up in about a week or so.
He yawned even though it hurt, and let his eyelids flutter a little. Dianne didn't push him. Instead, she reached over like she was going to run her hand through his hair, then quickly turned and slid a case of empties across the floor. She grabbed his feet and set them on top of the case.
"All right," she said. "I'll keep everyone away. You stay here and get some sleep."
Sleep. Right. Like he could sleep after what he'd just been through. All he really wanted was a little quiet time. Time to think. Time to plan.
~*~*~