Bubblegum Smoothie by Ryan Casey Read Free Book Online Page B

free food?”
    Gus’s eyes narrowed. He scanned my face, then looked back at Martha, then at me again.
    “Free food?”
    I scratched the back of my neck. Shit idea, this. “Yeah… Like—like who lets you do little jobs for them and… and pays you in food. Something like that?”
    Gus frowned even more. He wobbled his lips, trying to get his head around what I was saying. “Free… free food.” He thought about it like it was an answer to a pissing pub quiz question. “Erm. Mum. Mum give me free food.”
    I held my smile, but deep down I felt tense and pissed. “Not your mum, Gus. I mean… anyone else. Like—like a man. Are there any men who give you free food?”
    Gus’s face just curled up even more. “Men who… who free food?”
    “Yes Gus,” I said. “Men who come into this pub and give you free food for you to do jobs for them—”
    “Dad?”
    I stopped again. Closed my mouth and bit onto my tongue. What I’d give for a lozenge or nineteen to sooth my throat, to cool me right down. I stared at the table. Tried to work out a different approach. There was no chance in hell that Gus was the perp. And by the sounds of things, he didn’t have a bloody clue what I was talking about. So either Martha’s arms guy was screwing us, or Gus really was just an airhead simpleton.
    When I looked back up and saw Gus re-stacking his coins, I think I found my answer.
    “Who taught you to do that with coins?” Martha asked. Somehow, her voice was smoother than mine, more chilled. Maybe I was getting out of practice. Maybe I should get my wang chopped off and go full woman, too.
    “No one taught,” Gus said, plonking another coin atop the pile. “Me taught.”
    “Well that’s very clever of you,” I cut in, intentionally making my voice higher and smoother, like Martha’s. “Where do you get your coins, anyway? Mum give them you for pocket money?”
    Gus plonked another coin down. “Man in hood gave me.”
    He said it so nonchalantly that I almost missed it.
    “Man in… A man in a hood? Which man?”
    Gus placed another coin on top of the pile. Squinted so hard that his eyes were bloodshot.
    “Gus? Which man gave it to you—”
    “One who give me letter and tell me to give…”
    His speech trailed off. Jesus, this airhead was incapable of stringing more than two words together before losing himself.
    “Give you what, Gus?” Martha asked.
    His pile of coins tumbled down. He squeezed his fists together, banged them against the table, made a sound like a problem child.
    I decided to give it a second before I spoke. I didn’t want to annoy the guy. Sure, he was dumb as shit, but he was at least forty-five times my size. I’m not sure I’d survive a punch from him. I was barely surviving his stench.
    After Gus had calmed down and started to re-stack the coins, I took a deep breath of the shitty air in and readied myself.
    “What did the man in the hood give you, Gus?”
    Gus plonked a coin slightly to the side now, like he was going for a different tactic.
    “He give me coin and I give him present when I… when I ask the man for present. Then he give me more coin.”
    I looked at Martha. We both nodded at one another. It was obvious what had happened now—the perp had bribed Gus. Offered him some shiny coins in exchange for an arms deal, in exchange for the knife. Poor big bastard. He had no idea what he’d gone and embroiled himself him. I’d be surprised if he even knew what “homicide” was.
    “This man. This man in the hood. What did he look like?”
    Gus leaned back from his coins. He rubbed his huge, sweaty hands together. “He… He was man.”
    I nodded. Forced that smile again, but I was struggling to hold it. “Yes, I know he was a man, but what did he… did he have dark hair? Blonde hair? Was he big? Small? Fat? Thin?”
    Gus took a few seconds. Rubbed his palms together. He was muttering things. Totting things up under his breath. I prayed he remembered. Prayed he could give me