Freddy coughed and his hands flew to his throat.
Michelle leaned in. “Act like you’re stretching and lock your hands behind your head.”
Gasping, he nodded and started to raise his hands toward the back of his head. Michelle grabbed his left hand on the way up and twisted it into a twist wrist lock, wrenching his arm up.
Knowing any man would object to her sticking her hand down his pants, she made an excuse he might buy.
“Sam, did you have a chance to frisk him?” Michelle asked.
“No.”
“Okay, Freddy, I'm going to frisk you. Keep your other hand behind your head while I undo your belt.” Facing Freddy in the booth, with her right hand Michelle kept the wrist lock tight and with her free left hand she unbuckled Freddy's belt and yanked on the waistband of his pants.
Freddy had stopped coughing but his voice cracked when he talked. “Nothing but joy down there for you.”
“We'll see.” She popped the top button of his oversize jeans and reached inside. She grabbed his balls and clamped down hard with her vice‑like grip.
Freddy jerked against the wrist lock and his eyes flew wide. “Fuck!”
“Shut up, asshole. You talk when I say talk.” Michelle squeezed his balls again to emphasize her point.
Freddy's breath came fast and he blinked.
“Now Mr. Freddy D. I need to know. Where's my friend?”
The bartender threw a towel over his shoulder and came down to the end of the bar. “Hey, you guys okay?”
Michelle let go of the wrist lock, put her right hand on Freddy's shoulder, squeezed his balls, and whispered, “Put your hands on the table.” Keeping her position facing Freddy so her body hid what she was doing with her left hand, she spoke loud enough for the bartender to hear. “Tell the man.”
“Yo, Dennis, it's cool,” Freddy said. “We're just having a little discussion.”
“Yeah? You don't look so cool,” the bartender said.
“Yo, thanks for checking my-man,” Freddy said, “but like I say, it’s only a little discussion. It's cool. I got it covered.”
The bartender shook his head and walked away.
Michelle gave Freddy a dead-eyed stare. “Look at me.”
Freddy met Michelle's eyes.
“Your hands are free. If you're real fast you might get me with an elbow. Try it and you'll die right here. That means everyone in the place dies. I don't want to kill those people because you're a fool. Be smart, don't make me do it.”
Freddy cleared his throat. “I’m cool. We can do this thing.”
“Keep your hands on the table.” Michelle pulled her hand out of his pants, but kept her eyes on his face. “Sam, does he know why we’re interested in him?”
“No,” Sam said. “I only told him we had an interest in learning more about who had been asking for information on G‑Baby’s operation.”
“Okay, and why are we asking Mr. D these questions?”
“Freddy here was overheard talking about his important connections with some important people who would pay to get the goods on how we run our show.”
While Michelle and Sam talked, Freddy shifted in his chair, slouching lower. Then he flinched sideways — hard.
“Don’t” Michelle hissed in his ear. While talking to Sam, she had pulled her knife and, unnoticed, snuggled it against his ribs. When he slid down, she pushed it with enough force to cut through his jacket and prick his skin.
Freddy looked down at the knife pressing into his side. “Jesus Christ, woman! What the fuck are you?”
“Cold death on a nasty winter day.” Michelle locked onto his eyes. “Now sit your ass up and pay attention. Keep your hands on the table like I told you to.”
“Alright,” Freddy said. “You got my attention. You gonna get to the point — tell me what all this is about?”
“We need to know who’s been asking about us,” G‑Baby said.
“Who they are,” Michelle said. “Who they’re connected to, and what you told them. And do yourself a favor. This is one of those times the truth will be better than a lie. I catch even the tiniest lie and you pay. Tiny lie means big pay.”
“I ain’t gonna lie,” Freddy said. “I would’ve told him but I didn't. I just heard about it.”
“What did you hear about?” Michelle asked.
“A guy who works for an old timer in the area came in asking about you.”
“Stop right there, asshole,” G‑Baby said. “Let me put this in perspective for you. My fiancé was kidnapped yesterday. We’re working on a short time frame. Your life is nothing to me. These others may care about letting you live, I might have before and maybe will again. Right now? Right now, if I leave here without real answers, you’ll wake up dead tomorrow morning.”
“You heard the man,” Michelle said.
“Tony. He’s an old white guy, maybe fifty‑five. He’s a fixer. Been around a long time. Used to work for Ascia but I ain’t seen or heard of him since Ascia was killed in that big toss-up a while back.”
“Who?” Sam asked.
“Ascia, he was the top guy with drugs and women here in Houston for a long time. You’d think, a guy like Freddy here would at least get the name right. It’s Italian and pronounced like the tool, ax, it sounds like ax-see-a. It means ax man, probably from back when men used axes to chop down trees. I don’t know if it was his real family name or not, but it was fitting.”
Locking eyes with Freddy, Michelle asked, “Did you ever work for him?”
“No,” Freddy said. “I heard he was into some scary shit. Like always played for keeps.”
“How?”
“You know, this is only what I heard, but I believe it’s true,” Freddy said.
“Tick tock, asshole,” G‑Baby said.
“The reason I believe it, is I heard it a few times over the years. You know, when I was a kid it was a rumor, then later I heard it from a guy who I know personal. It wasn’t no rumor. This guy I know told me this Tony guy strapped a dude to a chair and just blew him away to make the point he was serious about getting the information he wanted.”
“Where can we find this friend of yours?” Michelle said.
Freddy shook his head. “You can’t, ma. He left town and Texas all together. Last I heard he was out in Oakland or San Jose.”
“The name Galletti mean anything to you?” Michelle asked.
“Yeah.” Freddy started to lift his hand, then put it back on the table. “I mean I don’t know him or nothin’ but sure I heard of him. Old man Galletti ran things over on the white side of town before Ascia took over.”
“Does Tony work for him?” Michelle asked.
“I think so.”
“You think so.”
Freddy glanced around the table. “I’m telling it for real, I don’t know, not for sure. I think so.”
“Okay,” Michelle scoffed. “You’re a paragon of integrity.”
“No, serious, I really don’t know, but I think he does. The thing is, I ain’t heard of either of them for a while. Like I said, Tony’s been off the streets since Ascia got his. And then last week, both of their names are on the street.”
“Is there any word on where Galletti might be?” Michelle asked.
“That’s the strange thing. I ain’t heard his name for a couple years, then all of a sudden, I hear he's doing business in Tulsa,” Freddy said.
“And Tony?”
“Don't know,” Freddy said. “He could be anywhere. I heard he's from New York but nobody knows for sure.”
Michelle moved away from Freddy, folded her knife, and pocketed it. She slid out of the booth, picked up her purse, pulled out a Franklin, and dropped it on the table in front of Freddy.
“What's this?” he asked.
“The next time I need information from you, I suggest you act like a business man with a product to sell, not an asshole. The Franklin is for Tony.” She pulled out another. “What else can you tell me?”
“Reall
y? You for real? Just like that you gonna pay me.”
“I always pay or payback. One way or the other. What’cha got for me?”
Freddy’s eyes flicked down to the bill on the table, across to G‑Baby still seated, still holding a gun on him, and back to Michelle. “Nothing that’s worth nothing.”
“You got any people in Tulsa I could talk to?” Michelle asked.
Freddy shook his head slowly. “No.” He picked up the bill. “This mine?”
“Yeah.” Michelle pocketed the second Franklin. “If you hear anything I should know, get in touch with Sam.”
Freddy’s eyes followed second bill disappearing into her pocket. “Alright. You can count on it.”
“Put some of that money to good use. Go to the bar and buy yourself and the bartender a beer. Sit your ass at the bar for thirty minutes before you leave. If you stick your head out that door, I'll put a bullet in it.”
“Yeah, sure, I got nowhere better to be,” Freddy said.
Michelle slid out of the booth, side stepped to the bar and waved at the bartender. “You got a clean damp cloth back there?”
“Sure, you spill something?”
“No, just touched something.” Keeping her eyes glued on Freddy, she picked up the offered bar towel and wiped her hands. “Thirty minutes asshole.” She turned and calmly walked out the front door.
Thank you for reading this preview of Hit Hard, the fifth book in the Michelle Angelique series.
It will be released later this year (2018) on Amazon.
Would you like to get all of
Michelle Angelique’s adventures FREE?
Be a part of the Advance Reader Team.
You will get a copy of each book before it’s published. When you read it (like you would anyway) post an honest review on Amazon.
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Contact me at [email protected] if you’re interested in the Advance Reader Team.
Speaking of Free Books
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Did You Enjoy Hard Run?
I hope you enjoyed Hard Run, the fourth book in the Michele Angelique series, as Michelle and her crew turned the tides on entrenched criminals and twisted the pages of history with breaking the bonds of slavery by answering to her own strong moral code and righting the wrongs she is faced with. That is the person Michelle is, and who we have come to depend on.
If you are enjoying the series and would like to see more of Michelle, Nikky and Deja, your review will help them come back. Reviews are golden to a series like Michelle Angelique. Your review tells Amazon you enjoyed this book and want to see more like it.
I am asking for your personal help. Please go to Amazon’s Hard Run page and write a review to tell others how much fun you had reading Hard Run. It doesn’t matter how short. A simple “I loved it.” will be fantastic. I deeply appreciate every review.
Why am I asking for your help? Every review readers post is very helpful for two important reasons. Your reviews help other readers, just like you, make informed decisions. Also, reviews help me know what you want to hear more about, or less of, from Michelle and the ladies. I love your encouragement, and honestly, it really helps me to keep up the work.
Dedication
To Mateo . . .
Powerful, Engaged, Enormous heart . . .
I see the hope of a better world in your eyes.
Acknowledgements
It’s true, writing is a lonely business. It’s also true a book is only as good as the whole team who helped make it what it is. Thanks to Diana P. and Kellie Wynn for powerful beta reading that helped mold directions Thank you, Kimberly Grenfell for your amazing insightful editing and Kit for excellent proofing. Ed Benjamin for constant support and commiseration at all levels. And finally, to Katie Keily for the last finetooth combing for any and all issues. To my family thanks for your daily support and constant good cheer. Your smiles every morning makes the many long hours’ worth it all.
Copyright
HARD RUN
Dyslexic Dog Publishing
Copyright © 2018 by Jason Stanley.
All rights reserved.
Cover by Pjae Stanley
All characters and situations are fictional. Any resemblance to real people, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
This is fully copyrighted material with all domestic and international rights of reproduction and sales belonging to the author. If you find you’re the illegal recipient of this book, kindly do me a couple favors. Please tell your friends how much you enjoyed reading Hard Run and encourage them to purchase it at Amazon.com. Also, check my Jason Stanley Amazon Author page for my other books, and buy the rest of the Michelle Angelique series. Help a working guy out . . . I worked for many months without pay to write and edit this book. Like you, my bills still have to be paid. Unlike Michelle Angelique, I am not a skilled assassin and my wife refuses to become a budding madam, so writing is how I earn the income to pay those pesky bills.
Hard Run: Action Adventure Pulp Thriller Book #4 (Michelle Angelique Avenging Angel Series) Page 30