by Tony Bulmer
In the aftermath of the Encino affair there was only one-way to make things right. Deliver the children home to their mom, was the first task, and quite a task it was. There is nothing more hyper, than two kids who have been munching smores and hot chocolate all night, let me tell you. Not only that, Inez found out that Paris and Dakota may be the only people on the planet—other than my mom—who can keep Chowsey the chow in line. Apparently they managed to lock the little monster inside Joe’s cabin and pacify him with a soothing diet of fish-guts and shopping channel excess, courtesy of satellite TV. I figured I played nice I could keep the little monster corralled in Kimberley’s place with the kids, until mom & pops got home from their Caribbean vacation. Convenient if Kimberly went for it, but I figured pester power would figure large in the final decision—it wouldn’t be forever, right? Of course, Max wasn’t happy. He had been keeping Semo company in the wheel-house all night. No doubt the Samoan had let the cheeky pup gorge himself as usual. But that had done nothing to quell a mournful, hungry look in Max’s big yellow eyes, that told me he had high hopes of either eating or fornicating with my mom’s tiny chow. Knowing Max he would be looking to do both.
Naturally, the children did not want to leave, after the night’s adventures, and getting them ashore was a big drama. They didn’t want to go back to Kimberly’s and I cannot say I blame them. The only thing that prevented terminal sulks was letting them take Chowsey with them. I knew Kimberly wouldn’t be best pleased—at first—but I figured looking after Mom’s pooch with the kids would give her something other than money and making my life a misery to obsess about.
After that, it was a simple matter of picking up the Senator and Larry Miller at the Peninsula Hotel. The Senator had arranged a breakfast meet, so they could hammer out the final details of the helicopter deal. Joe was already there when I burst in the door. I would like to say all eyes turned, but the tight-jawed legals and bean-counting facilitators were at full schmooze when I arrived. I might have been Osama bin Hades himself, with an AK47 in one hand and a fizzing bomb in the other. But no one cared. No one gave a damn, and that is just the way I like it. In the world of close protection, anonymity is the watchword of the successful operator, and there is none more watchful, or successful, than Cobra Close Protection.
There was a tense moment when news of the Encino Affair hit the breakfast news, but Larry and the Senator were too busy yucking it up over cigars and a pitcher of Bloody Mary’s, to pay the broadcast much heed. Or so I thought. Senator Positano set me straight on the way to the airport. She insisted I sit up back while she breathed a toxic mix of high-class hooch and Robusto after burn in my direction. The woman was a high-school principal, and a prehistoric predator all rolled into one. Vampire-lady indeed. She informed me with steely vigor about the precarious status of CCP and our government contracts. Told me if I wanted friends in Deep Five, CIA or the Federal government, I better keep my peccadilloes in order, more specifically the peccadilloes of my staff. I gave her my most earnest reassurance. Told her business would be taken care of. She told me it better.
A trip on the Ocean in The Naja was the only antidote that would curtail the pounding drama that had filled my recent days. Semo took the wheel as we headed south to Avalon. My plan was to indulge in a green tea detox, a little tai chi and some quality zees, as the ocean lapped around me. Unfortunately Joe had other ideas.
‘How’s your head hero?’ he asked, huffing cigar smoke carelessly in my direction.
‘My head is fine, unfortunately my nervous system will need replacing.’
‘Don’t sweat it Costello, you will grow another one, You sure you don’t fancy a shot of bourbon, medicinal purposes only?’
I threw him an ugly look that had him chuckling.
‘You are lucky the cops never found that machine gun.
‘What machine gun?’
‘The one that Mr. Rothstein’s Lawyer asserts was used to shoot off the wheels of his client’s BMW seven series.’
‘I wouldn’t know anything about that Costello.’
‘I thought not. Lucky for you I had half Los Angeles Police Department to witness the fact it couldn’t have been me.’
Joe huffed smoke. ‘What happened to that prick cop?’
‘Touch and go, looks like he’ll live, but you never can tell.’
Joe sniffed, took a gulp of Bourbon. ‘And the girl?’
I sipped green tea, replaced my mug on the saucer and looked out to sea. ‘Too bad about the girl, you ask me she should get a medal but the cops don’t see it that way. She gets the right brief, she could pull a crime of passion plea, but her chances aren’t good, turns out she was tight with Rothstein all along, but he played her and she took the fall.’
Joe turned his sharp brown eyes upon me. ‘You clear?’
‘You kidding, the department love me for a change, wonder how long it will last?’
Joe laughed, took a hit of bourbon and we watched, as an airliner soared overhead on a take off trajectory from LAX. It roared upwards, taking a steep turn over Long Beach, heading eastwards for a destination unknown. ‘So we got the weekend then?’ asked Joe, matter of fact. ‘Want to cruise down to Mexico and get into trouble?’
‘I am up for anything that doesn’t involve Tequila and hot sauce combination plates.’ I said, expecting Joe to be disappointed, but he wasn’t. Instead he grinned broadly.
‘Glad you mentioned that Costello, because I have been online again and I got us a couple of hot dates lined up, you interested?’
The End
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
About the Author
Tony Bulmer is a writer and journalist, from London England. A graduate of London School of Journalism, Tony lives and works in Los Angeles California.
He is the Editor of the leading Crime Blog Crimezine.
http://crimezine.wordpress.com/