Just The Pits (Hetta Coffey Series, Book 5) by Jinx Schwartz Read Free Book Online Page B

overruns. Gee, really? In Mexico? Where every single stage of anything has someone out front with his hand in your pocket? What a surprise.
    When I estimate any job for Mexico (and to be fair, many other countries) I build in a huge percentage for mordida —the bite, or bribe—as well as for theft and bad management. If that sounds uncharitable, sue me. It is a way of life south of the border and anyone who thinks it isn't needs to take Doing Bidness in Mexico 101, better known as How to Steal Gringos Blind and Become a Mexican Hero.
    But the Trob knows all that. Sooo, if there are overruns worth worrying about on the Lucifer project, they must be effing humongous. I didn't want to call Wontrobski from the office, nor use the office computer for an email to discuss the details. Besides, he sent me to snoop, not ask him about what. I sighed and went back to seeking out invisible dragons to slay, flying blind and hoping not to get my armor singed.
    By Wednesday I'd practically forgotten about that little b&e on my boat despite a dearth of Velveeta. And my morning commute was so much better, thank you. Pedro passed me in a flash daily, but I kept a nice large, slow truck in front of me, running interference from the Pedros coming down the hill. I used that same tactic going home, thereby figuring all that metal in front of me was a little insurance. It was seriously slow going, but I left in plenty of time to get into Santa Rosalia before dusk. I do my best to never drive on Mexican highways after dark, and I sure as hell wasn't planning on challenging the Hill of Hell during non-daylight hours.
    It was during this daily twenty-miles-per hour commute that I spotted the dog.
    In the middle of nowhere, on a two-lane road with no shoulder to speak of, and few turnouts, this dog was somehow surviving. He looked to be some kind of retriever, fairly young, and not your typical Mex mutt of indefinable lineage that I call canardlys because you can hardly tell what they are.
    Because I couldn't stop or, for that matter, even watch him for more than a few  seconds, I only caught a glimpse, but the picture of him sitting there skinny, filthy and forsaken, was burned into my brain. How he was managing to survive was a mystery, but one thing was evident; if he didn't get hit by a car he'd starve to death. He crept into my thoughts all day at the office, but as I searched for him on the trip back home, he wasn't there. Hopefully someone had picked him up. At least, that is what I wanted to think.
     
    I decided to visit Jan and Chino, my little whale-watching love dovies, over the coming weekend, so I called to make sure they were up for a visitor.
    "Are we going to be home? Surely you jest. We never go anywhere that doesn't involve one of these oversized guppies Chino loves so much."
    Uh-oh. Sounds like Dr. Yee buying Jan a couple of luxury fifth-wheels trailers for his lonely stretch of beach didn't do much to soothe Miss Jan's restlessness. "Uh, are the mothers and babies still in the lagoon?"
    "They're beginning to leave now, but there are still a few. Wanna go out and pet 'em?"
    Pet a whale? I'd have to think about that. I petted a snake once, but it tried to bite me. The snake dude said I must have given it bad vibes. Do whales pick up on stuff like that? Nah. "Yes, I do," I said with far more conviction than I felt.
     
    Saturday night at Camp Chino we sat around the fire drinking beer. I'd driven over on Friday afternoon, even though most everyone else at the mine worked a half day on Saturday. I'd put my foot down on that one. Who ever heard of working weekends, for crying out loud? Not that I still indulged in my former Friday night bar-hopping habit, but still and all, Saturday?
    Jan put me in my very own trailer, a forty-foot job with all the amenities. Chino, in an effort to keep the Janster from taking off like one of the sea birds surrounding the camp, had eschewed his grass shack on the beach existence and built what I