by Jude Hardin
“Why wouldn’t I?” Wahlman said.
“Just checking,” the waitress said. “I didn’t know if you were coming back or not.”
She rattled off another staccato series of clicks with the ballpoint pen. Wahlman tried not to look as aggravated as he felt. The waitress poured some coffee into a gigantic insulated paper cup and set it on the counter in front of him.
“I still want the double cheeseburger platter too,” he said.
The waitress nodded. She jotted the order down on her pad, and then she turned around and tapped her finger on a computer screen a few times. Relaying the order to a monitor screen back in the kitchen, Wahlman supposed. Or a printer. Or whatever. When she finished tapping on the screen, she walked back over to where the flannel shirt guys were sitting. The guys had paper cups in front of them, identical to Wahlman’s, except theirs had lids. The waitress leaned over the counter toward the guy on the left, and he leaned over the counter toward her, and they kissed on the lips. Then both of the guys got up and headed toward the door.
Wahlman watched them as they exited the restaurant.
The man who hadn’t kissed the waitress was wearing black leather work boots. Well worn, but not worn out.
The man who had kissed the waitress was wearing work boots too. But his weren’t black. They were tan. Khaki. The shade of sand in the desert.
Similar to the ones Wahlman was wearing.
And, similar to the ones Wahlman was wearing, they were wet up to the ankles.
3
It was the kind of place people sometimes referred to as a hole in the wall. Depending on the time of day you pushed your way through the heavily-tinted steel and glass door, you might see a wrinkled old drunk slumping over a shot glass or a middle-aged couple meeting for an extramarital highball or a cluster of restaurant workers drinking beer and complaining about how busy or how slow their shifts had been.
Jackson P. Feldman didn’t see any of that. He was the only customer at the moment. He limped up to the bar, his left knee still bothering him from an injury he’d sustained in Bakersfield, California. He usually told people that he’d been playing tennis out there in the desert, trying to get back in shape, but that wasn’t the truth. Jackson P. Feldman hadn’t played tennis in years, and getting back in shape was the furthest thing from his mind these days. The truth was, he’d gotten his ass kicked by a man named Rock Wahlman, a fugitive from justice he’d been hired to locate.
“What can I get for you?” the bartender said.
“Bourbon on the rocks,” Feldman said. “Make it a double.”
Feldman figured the bartender was probably in his early twenties. He wore black pants and a black polo shirt and a tooled leather belt with a fancy silver buckle on it. Light brown hair, buzzed short on the back and sides. Like a military cut. You could tell he spent some time at the gym. Not too much, just enough. He was toned, but not musclebound. Clean. Quick. Balanced. He grabbed a short heavy glass from a shelf behind the bar, dropped a couple of ice cubes in it with a pair of tongs, picked up a bottle of inexpensive but fairly respectable Kentucky bourbon whiskey from the stainless steel well rack at his knees, poured a generous amount of the amber liquid into the glass. Counting off the seconds in his head with the red plastic speed pourer attached to the neck of the bottle, Feldman supposed, rather than using any sort of precise measuring device. Bar owners weren’t especially fond of that sort of technique, but customers were, because they tended to get a little more liquor than they were paying for. Which frequently resulted in a bigger tip for the man or woman doing the pouring.
The man doing the pouring at this particular establishment slapped a cocktail napkin on the bar in front of Feldman, and then he gently set the drink on the napkin.
“You want to start a tab?” he said.
“Sure,” Feldman said, handing the young man his credit card.
Feldman had been wearing a brace on the knee, but it still hurt. Really bad sometimes. Alcohol was the only thing that seemed to keep the pain at bay. Feldman knew that he should have seen a doctor the day he’d sustained the injury, knew that he should have gone to the emergency room and had x-rays and all that, but he hadn’t wanted to take the time. And he didn’t like doctors. The ER physician probably would have referred him to a surgeon, and the surgeon probably would have wanted to operate. And that just wasn’t going to happen. Feldman didn’t have the time, and he didn’t have the money. He figured the joint would eventually heal on its own. In the meantime, there was whiskey.
He took a long pull from the glass in front of him.
There was a television mounted on the wall behind the bar. The bartender picked up a remote control and started clicking through channels.
“Let me know if you see anything you want to watch,” he said.
Feldman rarely watched television, because there was rarely anything on it that he wanted to see. It was a waste of time, as far as he was concerned. But he didn’t tell the bartender that.
“Someone’s supposed to meet me here at six,” he said. “We’ll probably move to a booth. So watch whatever you want.”
The bartender shrugged, set the remote back beside the plastic napkin caddy at the edge of the bar, where it had been before he picked it up. He’d stopped on an old situation comedy from the middle of the twentieth century. Which, in Feldman’s opinion, was the only time in history that television had been very entertaining. He glanced up at the screen for a few seconds, but the volume was too low for him to hear any of the dialogue.
“You a cop?” the bartender said.
“What makes you think that?” Feldman said, caught off guard by the question.
“I don’t know. You just have the look. Not that I have anything against cops. They come in here all the time.”
“I’m not a cop,” Feldman said. “But I used to be one.”
“Retired?”
“Yeah.”
Feldman didn’t see any point in telling the bartender any more than that. The fact that he was one of the most respected private investigators in the country was none of the bartender’s business.
Feldman drained the last of the bourbon from his glass, nodded for the bartender to give him a refill.
“You want some pretzels or anything?” the bartender said, pouring another double over the same ice cubes.
“No thanks,” Feldman said.
A sudden wedge of temporary brightness flooded the room as a tall and thin man entered and made his way over to where Feldman was sitting. The tall and thin man was wearing jeans and a western-style shirt and cowboy boots. He looked like he was going to a rodeo. All he needed was a hat. He had a fresh haircut and a clean shave and he smelled like some kind of cologne you might pick up at a grocery store.
“You Feldman?” he said.
“Yes,” Feldman said.
“I’m Decker. Let’s talk over here.”
Feldman picked up his drink and climbed off of the stool he’d been sitting on and followed Decker to the far right corner of the room, to the booth furthest from the bar. Decker sat with his back to the wall, facing the door. Feldman slid into the seat across from him, trying not to grimace as an electric spear of agony traveled from his knee to the top of his scalp.
“You don’t want anything to drink?” Feldman said.
“I don’t drink,” Decker said, unsnapping one of his shirt pockets and pulling out a pen and a notepad. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
“I wanted to talk to you about tracking a guy.”
“I figured that. It’s what I do. Tell me the particulars, and I’ll let you know if I might be able to help you.”
“The guy I’m looking for is a suspect in a murder case,” Feldman said. “His name is Rock Wahlman. He’s six feet four inches tall, and he weighs—”
“Who hired you to find him?”
“A detective named Collins. Down in New Orleans.”
“So you’re being paid by the NOPD?”
“Correc
t.”
“And who’s going to be paying me?”
“I am,” Feldman said. “Out of my own pocket.”
“I told you my rate over the phone. You’re good with that?”
“I’m good with it.”
“Why don’t you just find this Wahlman guy yourself?” Decker said.
“I was a police officer for twenty years,” Feldman said. “I’ve been a private investigator for a little over seven. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that there’s no shame in asking for help when you need it. Wahlman’s smart, and he’s deadly, and he doesn’t want to be caught. He’s getting money from somewhere, substantial amounts of cash for travel expenses and fake driver’s licenses and whatnot. No paper trail. At least I haven’t been able to find one.”
“Any idea where he’s getting the money?”
“He was traveling with a woman named Kasey Stielson. Her family’s pretty well-off. I think they might be funding his current lifestyle.”
Decker wrote something on the notepad. Feldman took a swallow of whiskey.
“When you say family, you mean her parents?” Decker said.
“Yes,” Feldman said. “Her parents.”
“Got an address for them?”
“I do. I have their home address, but they’re not living there right now. It’s like they abandoned the place. That’s one of the problems. I have no idea where they went.”
“Tell me the address,” Decker said.
Feldman told him the street number and zip code. Decker wrote it all down.
“The house is only a few miles from here,” Feldman said. “But they might have left the country for all I know.”
“I doubt it. You said they’re rich. They probably have another house somewhere. I’m assuming you checked the county real estate records for a second address.”
“I did,” Feldman said. “If they have another house, it’s not in Davidson County. I ran a national search on one of the databases I subscribe to, came up with nothing.”
“How current is the database?”
“They update it twice a year. I guess it’s possible that—”
“Right. I have access to a national real estate site that gets updated weekly. It’s expensive, but it’s worth it. Especially for someone in my line of work. I use it all the time.”
Feldman knew about the database Decker was referring to. He’d tried it for a while, found it to be unreliable about half the time. But maybe it had gotten better. He decided not to say anything negative about it for the moment.
“If you can find Kasey’s parents, that would be a good start,” he said.
“I’ll find them,” Decker said. “Their name’s Stielson?”
“No. Kasey was married to a guy named Stielson. He was shot in his car out in the Mojave Desert, but we don’t think—”
“What’s the name of the people I’m looking for?” Decker said.
“Lennik,” Feldman said. “Dean and Betsy.”
“Dean and Betsy Lennik. Got it. Does Kasey have any other relatives I should know about?”
“She has a daughter.”
“Name?”
“Natalie. She’s a minor. Fourteen. Same last name as her mom. Stielson.”
“Great. Now tell me all about the murder suspect you’re trying to track down.”
Feldman took another drink of whiskey, and then he told Decker everything he knew about Rock Wahlman.
4
There were a million different ways the man who’d kissed the waitress could have gotten his boots wet. Perhaps he’d stepped in a puddle of rainwater. Or maybe he’d been fishing from a leaky boat. Maybe he installed sprinkler systems for a living.
There were a million different ways.
It seemed highly unlikely that he’d been involved in the situation over at 357 Sunset.
Highly unlikely, but possible.
Wahlman tried to shrug it off. It was none of his business. He had things to do. Pressing matters to take care of.
The Waitress With No Name brought the double bacon cheeseburger and the fries and the coleslaw.
“Is there a bus station around here anywhere?” Wahlman said.
“I don’t know if you’d really call it a station, but there’s a little shack where a guy sells tickets. Two blocks west, right on the corner.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“Where you heading?”
“Junction City. I have an appointment tomorrow afternoon. My car’s in the shop, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to be finished in time.”
“So you’re going to Junction City, and then you’re coming back here?”
“Looks that way.”
The Waitress with No Name nodded.
“Junction City isn’t that far,” she said. “My boyfriend could probably give you a ride in his truck. It wouldn’t be free, but it would be cheaper than taking a bus.”
“What makes you think your boyfriend would want to do that?” Wahlman said.
“He’s out of work right now. He could use the money.”
Wahlman thought about it. A ride in a personal vehicle would be more convenient than a ride on a bus. And more comfortable. And less expensive. But Wahlman didn’t want to get involved with any of the locals in Reality, Missouri. He didn’t want to get involved with any of the locals anywhere. He needed to be as anonymous as possible, talk to as few people as possible.
“Thanks anyway, but I think I’ll take the bus,” he said.
“Okay. Suit yourself.”
The Waitress With No Name turned and walked away. There was a phone on the wall, a couple of feet to the right of the coffeemakers. She picked up the receiver and punched in a number and started talking to someone.
Whispering.
Wahlman couldn’t hear what she was saying, and he didn’t care what she was saying. He squirted some ketchup on his plate, dragged a French fry through it, and took a bite.
5
The bus station was exactly as The Waitress With No Name had described it. A shack on the corner. More like a miniature hut. There wasn’t enough room for two regular-sized people to fit in there, and there wasn’t enough room for one Wahlman-sized person to fit in there. It reminded Wahlman of a structure he’d seen in a history book one time, where people dropped photographic film off to be processed. You put your name and address on an envelope and sealed your roll of film in there and the attendant told you how many days it would be until your pictures were ready. Hard to imagine. Like traveling across the country in a covered wagon or something. Just unfathomably slow.
A woman with long blonde hair and a nice smile slid the window open when she saw Wahlman approaching.
“Can I help you?” she said.
“I need to get to Junction City, Kansas,” Wahlman said. “Tonight, if possible.”
The woman tapped the monitor screen in front of her with a nicely manicured fingernail a few times, and then she consulted a three-ring binder that was bulging with printouts.
“There’s a coach coming in from New York City, headed toward Topeka. It’ll be here tomorrow afternoon, a little after one if it’s running on time. From Topeka you can connect to—”
“That’s too late,” Wahlman said. “I need to be in Junction City by one or one-thirty. Two at the latest.”
“Oh. Then I don’t know what to tell you.”
“Where’s the nearest airport?”
“There’s an airstrip over in Fantasy. But they don’t land any passenger planes over there or anything. Just those little ones people buzz around in for fun.”
“Where’s the nearest real airport?” Wahlman said.
“Jefferson City.”
“How soon can a bus get me there?”
The woman tapped the screen some more and paged through the binder some more.
“That coach should be coming through here around noon tomorrow,” she said. “But even if you were able to get a flight out of Jefferson City right away—”
“S
o you’re telling me that there’s no way you can get me to Junction City by two o’clock tomorrow afternoon?”
“Sorry. A bus left here for Topeka about fifteen minutes ago. Too bad you didn’t stop by a little sooner.”
“Yeah,” Wahlman said. “Too bad.”
He walked back down to the diner, sat on the same stool. The Waitress With No Name was standing over by the coffee machine, sorting silverware and rolling it into paper napkins. When she turned to carry a handful of the wrapped utensils over to the bin where they were being stored, she saw Wahlman sitting there.
“You’re back,” she said.
“Could I get another large coffee, please?”
“Sure.”
The waitress lowered the silverware into the bin, walked back over to the coffee setup and filled one of the gigantic paper cups. She set it on the counter in front of Wahlman. It was hot and it smelled fresh.
“Thanks,” Wahlman said.
“How did it go at the bus station?”
“Not so good.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“I was wondering if your boyfriend might still be interested in giving me a ride,” Wahlman said.
“I can give him a call and ask, if you want me to.”
“Yes. I would appreciate that.”
The Waitress With No Name stepped over to the telephone and punched in a number. Started whispering again. A few seconds later, she hung up and walked back over to where Wahlman was sitting.
“He’s on his way over here,” she said.
“Great,” Wahlman said.
He sipped his coffee and waited. The coffee was fresh, but it had a faint aftertaste he hadn’t noticed earlier. Like the glue on the flap of an envelope when you lick it.
Wahlman had thought about walking up to the highway and hitchhiking, but that was always hit or miss. Especially with a man Wahlman’s size. He was six feet four inches tall, and he weighed two hundred and thirty pounds. Chest muscles as big as frying pans, abs like a six-pack of sledgehammer heads. He looked like the kind of guy who could break you in half if he wanted to. And he was that kind of guy. Not that he ever went looking for trouble. He didn’t. But motorists tended to shy away when he walked along the shoulder with his thumb out, sometimes to the point of changing lanes to maximize the distance, as if he might reach out and yank them from their seats as they whizzed by at eighty miles an hour.