take me for?â
âI donât take you for anything other than what you are: a pushy, stubborn, controlling pain in the ass.â
âNow you sound like my editor.â
Frankâs mouth twitches. âMust be a smart and handsome man.â
âNo comment,â I say and finish my coffee.
âYou buying the gun?â Benny asks as I pay for the rental, ammo, and coffee. He has the Governor cleaned, oiled, and sitting pretty in its blue carrying case. âTake it now and Iâll deduct the cost of the rental straight off the top. Even throw in a trigger lock, two boxes of ammo, and a bore snake.â
âIâm tempted,â I say.
âPaperwork is already done. Youâve got your license, so you can take it home right now.â
âHow much?â
âSix fifty all in. I eat the taxes. Best deal youâll find.â
âThatâs a weekâs wages,â I say.
âBecause itâs you, I can take installments.â
I chew my lower lip and study the Governor. I like how it feels in my hand, but do I really want a gun in my house?
âSorry, Benny, Iâm just not there yet.â
Benny shrugs and takes my cash for the rental.
âYouâve got the bug, Dix,â he says. âIâll get you soon.â
âWeâll see.â I head outside to catch a lift back downtown with Frank.
Six
Frank drops me on the corner a block from the NOW offices. The morning mist has turned to drizzle, but I donât mind. Iâm one of those people who find walking in the rain to be one of the best ways to cleanse the jumble of my thoughts, sort out the mismatched ideas and see if there are any pairings to be made.
Which reminds meâIâm way behind on laundry.
As I near the restaurant, I pinch my nose, stare straight ahead, and make a dash for the stairs. Even with such precautions, I can smell the aroma of roasting lamb shanks with garlic and rosemary. If I didnât know better, Iâd swear that Dmitri installed a fan in the kitchen to blow directly into the stairwell.
By the time I reach the third floor, Iâm thinking someone should make a gum, like they do for smokers, for people who need their food cravings taken away. The heroin addicts I pass on the street are always skinny, so maybe we need a line of flavored gums with just enough poppy powder to take away the cravings without making us nodding zombies. The downside to that, of course, is that fewer things lower a womanâs perceived intelligence like chewing gum. Men, on the other hand, can pretend theyâre baseball stars.
After letting Stoogan see my face so he can report what a loyal and agreeable employee I am, I head into the morgue and ask Lulu to pull any files she has on Krasnyi Lebed or clippings that mention Red Swan.
Her fingers dance across the keyboard.
âNot much here,â she says when she looks back up. âNothing under âRed Swanâ and only a couple of hits on Lebed. Man keeps a low profile.â
âPull me what you have.â
âSure, doll. Only take a minute. This to do with that Classified ad I mentioned?â
âIt is.â I smile. âThanks for that.â
Lulu beams. âIâm not just a pretty face.â
âPreaching to the choir, sister.â
Lulu bursts out laughing as she disappears into the archives to search for printed copies of the material. When she returns, she is holding a slim folder with Krasnyi Lebedâs name on the cover.
Newspapers keep archives of prominent people so that when they die, obituaries are easier to write. The same is true of criminals who are likely to get in trouble with the law again. Nothing beefs up a breaking story on deadline than being able to quickly pull up a background full of previous run-ins and convictions.
I take the folder back to my desk and open it. There are only four clippings inside. Three are related to the case twelve years ago that Frank