Moonlight Warriors: A Tale of Two Hit Men by Joseph Rogers Read Free Book Online

everything except that you are staying here.  You can trust him, but his phone might be bugged or his wife might be eavesdropping on him.  Let everyone assume that you are returning to your apartment.”
    “I am hoping that I can return to my apartment!”
    “You should be able to return soon.  One way or another, this matter will likely be resolved within the next few days.  After what I heard at the software company today, I have a better idea what is going on.  Until a couple of hours ago, I mistakenly thought that this was all about money.  Now I realize that Elaine Sandhaven and her comrades don’t care about money at all.”
    “They are fanatics!  Extremists!”  Fatima exclaimed.
    Marcus nodded.  “They are the same enemy that I fought in Afghanistan.  However, now they are here.  I suppose that they have always been here.”
     
    Meanwhile, Elaine drove away from the software company, angry and frustrated by Marc us’s intervention.  How dare he!  Why did I ever hire that man?
    Elaine then remembered her conversation with Jenny, the waitress at the diner.  When Marcus returned my call, Jenny was about to give me the contact information for some man named Chuck.  I should have hired Chuck to kill Dennis.
    Elaine pulled onto a side street where she parked while she fumbled through her purse in search of the scrap of paper on which she had written Jenny’s phone number.   If I can’t find that number, I suppose I could just drive over to the diner.  Oh, wait, I have always spoken to Jenny there in the afternoon; I don’t know whether she works in the evening.  That diner might not even be open this late in the evening.
    Found it!  Elaine pulled the scrap of paper out of her purse.  Using her cell phone, she called the number.   After a few seconds, Jenny answered.
    “Hello?” There was a lot of noise in the background.
    “Jenny?  This is Elaine.  I can barely hear you.”
    “Hi, Elaine.  I’m at roller derby.  We don’t start for another twenty minutes, but most of the crowd is already here.”
    “They are quite noisy.”
    “Yes.  Hold on a second.  I’m skating toward the exit door.  I will be able to hear you better outside.”
    When Jenny got outside, she asked, “Can you hear me better now?”
    “Yes.  That’s much better.”
    “I can only talk for a minute.  I will need to start getting ready for the match.”
    “I won’t keep you.  I just need the phone number of that man named Chuck.  The guy that I hired proved to be unsatisfactory, so I’d like to hire Chuck for that special project that we discussed.”
    After a momentary pause, Jenny said, “I’ll need to talk to Chuck first to make sure that it is all right to give you his number.”
    “That’s fine, Elaine, but this matter is rather urgent.  I need to speak with Chuck as soon as possible.”
    “I understand.  I’ll tell him right now.  He’s here to watch my roller derby bout.  He arrived just a few minutes ago.”
    “Excellent.  I can come there to speak with him.”
    “First I need to find him in the crowd; there are several hundred persons here.  I’ll give him your number and ask him to call you as soon as he can.”
    “Thanks, Jenny.  And I’m sure that you understand this situation requires the utmost discretion.  Please don’t mention this to anyone else.”
    “You can count on my discretion.”
    “Thank you.  I’ll be waiting for Chuck’s call.”
    “You’ll be hearing from him soon.  Bye, Elaine.”
    After hanging up, Jenny went back inside.  For about fifteen seconds, she scanned the crowd, then spotted her friend over at the souvenir stand.   Jenny skated over to him, and he glanced over his shoulder at her.
    “Hey, look what I just bought.”  He held up three photos of her in her Jenny Jawbreaker uniform.  “I’m going to need these autographed later.  I don’t want to slow you down now, though.  Your teammates are already out there warming up.