EIGHT LIES (About the Truth): A collection of short stories by Sean Chercover Read Free Book Online Page A

surveillance?” I asked.
    “Aw, come on. You know I’m not allowed to tell you that.”
    “Name of your client?”
    “Sorry,” he said. “Same answer. Look, I was on the job fifteen years. We can play who-do-you-know and you can call it in and check me out, hey?”
    “Not necessary,” I handed his wallet back to him and his expression changed.
    “Hey, wait a second. You’re not a cop!”
    “Never said I was.”
    “You’re just another P.I. You’re that Dudgeon guy.”
    “Right.”
    “Asshole.”
    “You offered, without my asking.” I gestured toward the Chapman house. “Look Pirelli, I’ve already blown your cover, so let’s call it a day, go for a beer and compare notes. I’m buying.”
    We drank at the South Loop Club, which is in my general neighborhood and on the way to Paul Pirelli’s place in Bridgeport. A couple of college kids at the next table ate Gyros, and the garlic aroma of Tzatziki reminded me to eat later. Pirelli let me pay for his drinks but he felt the need to tell me that it didn’t make us friends.
    “I’m not asking you to wear my ring,” I said. “And whatever you’ve heard about me, half of it is bullshit.”
    “Because of you, cops went to prison.”
    “A few. Really bad cops.” I figured Paul Pirelli for a guy who had his hand out a lot when he was a cop. A cop who’d take cash to look the other way on small stuff, stuff he could rationalize. But I didn’t figure him for a cop in bed with the Outfit. “Really, really bad cops,” I repeated, holding his gaze. He shrugged.
    “Whatever,” he said. “You’re a licensed dick so I’m extending a professional courtesy. I’m just saying, it don’t make us buddies.”
    I let it go and steered the conversation to his client, who I suspected was the “defender of family values” from the fax in my pocket. I told him I knew he was working for one of the aspirants to the presidency of the Chicagoland Rio De Janeiro Ball and I implied, without saying, that my client was one of the other women who coveted the position. He laughed and shook his head and called them, “crazy rich bitches.”
    We danced around the subject for another beer but Pirelli wouldn’t give up any more information and I sure as hell wasn’t about to give him anything. But when he laughed about the crazy rich bitches, he said something about their husbands being too busy making condos and shopping malls to give them what they need at home. I hoped that would be enough to lead me somewhere.
    I signaled the waitress for the bill and said to Pirelli, “Be careful what you pass on to your client, Paul. I’m sure you’ve discovered the change-of-name, but you don’t know why that happened. You don’t want to expose your client to a slander lawsuit, so don’t jump to conclusions.”
    I hoped it would give him pause, and it did. He frowned at his beer for a long time. Finally a smile invaded his face, like he had the notion he was a step ahead of me. “Ah, the Chapman chick is your client, hey?”
    I shrugged and said nothing.
    I opened a can of Beefaroni and ate it right out of the can, while watching Mark Prior pitch a gem against the Astros. In the bottom of the seventh, with the Cubs on top 3-1, my phone rang. It was Delwood Crawley, returning a message I’d left earlier.
    “What’s all this about insufficient evidence?” he said. “I’m not taking the woman to court. I simply need to know if it’s true, I don’t need proof.”
    “You don’t need a libel suit, either.”
    “I’m sure you remember our agreement.” Our agreement was that my work had to produce a publishable item in Crawley’s column. If my work produced nothing, then the hours I put in counted nothing against my debt. I’d not been in a strong bargaining position when we made the deal.
    “I remember fine,” I said. “Have you got a list of the other top contenders for grande dame of the ball?”
    “Indeed I do,” the sound of papers shuffling came through the