A Week In Hel by Pro Se Press Read Free Book Online Page A

National Road Grille.
    ‘ If I take you for a steak
will you tell me why these guys are so hard on you talking to a
cop?”
    Her eyes shined when she
smiled up at me. She was something, fat lip and all. Hotter than a
ten dollar car.
    “ I must really look like
hell. I bet you really wanted to get the run around by some barmaid
and her screwed up life. You’re probably thinking about how fast
you can unload me.”
    She sounded so honest just
then, I started to fall for it. I was trying to puzzle her out. She
was beautiful. Tall and leggy like I like ‘em. She wasn’t a stick,
but not an ounce was wasted anywhere. She had good meat on her
bones in all the best places. Dark hair, and I told you about them
big brown eyes. I’d call her a 36D easy. The rest of the package
was probably in the neighborhood of a small, tight 26, with her
fenders no more than 35. I didn’t need a tape measure to recognize
a well-built dame when I saw one.
    The dress she wore didn’t
leave a lot to the imagination, and thanks to her and the beefcake,
I’d had any gaps in my assessment pretty well filled in. I was
thinking about her legs the next time she spoke.
    “ Do you think there’s any
chance you might be able to forget everything that’s happened so
far?”
    I started to shoot back at
her, but I swear she looked so pathetic just then, I didn’t have
the heart. I should have let her have it with both
barrels.
    “ Candi, I’m a forgiving
person in most cases, but I don’t forget. You can’t, not in my
business, or you get dead in a hurry.”
    “ If we can start over from
square one, I’d like to take you up on that steak.”
    I gave her the eye and she
smiled up at me again with those big brown eyes. With the squirrels
and perps I run across on the job, I might be a bear, but for a
dame in trouble I’m a big fat sucker.
    “ It’s almost ten. The only
place to get a decent steak at this hour is the truck stop. You
okay with that?”
    She gave me one of her
better smiles. The best one was yet to come, but this one wasn’t
bad as far as smiles go. That is, the smiles from perfectly built,
all natural beauties, right before they stick a knife in your gut
and kiss you deadly, before walking off with whatever means the
most to you.
    “ You mean the place out
there on the highway?”
    “ Yeah, between here and
Loudon on the interstate. It’s a ten mile trip, but the food is top
notch.”
    She got excited just then
and scooted over next to me. She smoothed out her dress and checked
herself out in the mirror. Her hair wasn’t too bad, but her makeup
was a bit smudged, what with crying and getting slapped around. I
noticed her perfume just then and it was the kind of stuff that
smelled sort of soft, but candy-like.
    “ Cool, this is going to be
like an adventure.”
    We left downtown on High
Street and headed into the east side. We crossed Lime Street and
passed St. Bernard’s on the right, and the big Methodist Church on
the left. This was Irish Hill, formerly a very ethnic working class
neighborhood. Now it was just a dying residential slum on the edge
of a dead industrial slum.
    We passed the Catholic High
School and started climbing the long hill that led through the
historic district. I drove past the former mansions of the Champion
City elite, Asa Bushnell, Burton J. Westcott, and John
Foos.
    “ Did you ever wonder about
what life was like back when those guys were still
around?”
    She looked out at the
expansive grounds of the Westcott place and I thought she was
actually going to break down.
    “ Nah, not really. I grew up
so poor that when the news said money was getting tight, we
couldn’t tell.”
    I gave her the nod. We were
by no means well-off when I was coming up either.
    “ Yeah, I know how that is.
My dad was a cop and for a long time Mom didn’t work. She kept the
house and made sure that my old man’s dinner was ready to hit the
table, no matter what time he might come home.”
    “ I told you about my