Bombshell (Devlin Haskell 4) by Mike Faricy Read Free Book Online

night, I was just protecting myself. I’m sorry things developed the way they did. It wasn’t my intention…”
    “Developed the way they did? You make it sound like you spilled a glass of wine on the carpet. Our tour is about to fall apart, the team enforcer has a sprained shoulder and a bone chip in her heel and you don’t like the wa y things developed? Bloody hell,” h e was red faced, heading toward purple.
    “I was just trying to block her kick.”
    “You stupid little wanker, s he kicked you because you grabbed her boobs.”
    “I didn’t grab her boobs. She spit on me, grabbed me by the throat, told me to piss off and pushed me against the wall. It was just my natural reaction to p ush back. That’s all I did. T he next thing I know she came flying back with some sort of Karate kick, I just blocked her and down she went. If she hadn’t tried to kick me how in the hell do you think I got hold of her ankle?”
    He seemed to think about that for a moment.
    “She said piss off?”
    “Yeah, as a matt er of fact she said, piss off, Y ank. Not a reason to assault anyone, I agree, but put it all together, it’s just what happened. I’m the one who was attacked here, not her. Then they clubbed me over the head, knocked me out,” I said looking aro und the room. All the girls suddenly seemed to be making themselves scarce.
    “ I’m not going to press charges or anything. I’m sorry if she’s injured, I just wanted to apologize and set the record straight. That’s all.”
    “Piss off, Yank,” he said absently. “Yeah, sounds a bit like her .”
    M y relief must have been obvious; Jimmy seemed to be deep in thought.
    “Is there some way I can still help you?” I asked.
    “Well, I think for the time being , we better have you stay away from the team, they m ight want to cut off more than your finger.”
    Not the first time th e thought had crossed my mind, staying away sounded like a good plan to me.
    “Have you had any other incidents, any notes , phone calls, any more fingers?”
    “No, as of last night most of our time has been taken up with the likes of you.”
    “Let me see what I can find out on the finger front, all right?” I said.
    Jimmy seemed to consider this for a moment, then nodded.
    “ Just a s long as you stay away from the team. They’ve enough on their plate right now with things going all to hell . ”
    “You got it, thanks , Jimmy,” I said , then held out my hand.
    He took it, shook with a firm grip.
    “Now please, let me finish my tea in peace.”

Chapter Fourteen
    The logical place to start seemed to be The Spot bar. I strolled in for a late liquid lunch of Leinenkugel beer.
    “Dev, you fall down on the job last night,” Tommy asked as he poured my tap beer.
    “H unh?”
    “Didn’t you tell us you were going to be hanging around that bunch of English girls, providing security? I read in the paper one of them was attacked by some nut case last night. Cute little thing, had her picture in the paper with some kids . You see it?”
    “The paper? No, haven’t had the chance , yet. I wasn’t at the auditorium last night.”
    “How’d you know it happened there if you didn’t see the paper?” he pushed my beer in front of me, waited for my reply.
    “Heard a couple of them talking about it when they got back to their hotel. That’s where I was all night. Just came from there as a matter of fact, planning strategy.”
    “Strategy? ” he seemed to consider this, but didn’t add anything else.
    After lunch I went back to the office and started making phone calls. Over the course of the afternoon I spoke with the police in Denver , Chicago , St. Louis and Kansas City . I decided it might be best to work backwards so I called Denver first and ended up speaking with a Detective named Kingston Quinn who sounded decidedly more black than Irish.
    “Detective Quinn, thanks for taking my call, I’m working with Detective Norris Manning up here, we ’ re looking into an