Witness To Kill (Change Of Life Book 1) by Kent Keefer Read Free Book Online Page B

gentle dead Luis. Her mind
    recreated the scene of meeting him. On her first night he’d interceded on her
    behalf with Big Max, a bullying alcoholic cook at Maison Paris notoriously
    hard on new staff . If Max didn’t think you were sufficiently deferential
    he would let you die on the vine as a waiter, angry customers blaming you for slow service and mistakes , stiffing the server for the sins of the
    kitchen . Luis saved her from his unreasonable wrath that night,
    assembling and putting up the orders she needed, grinning sweetly at her over
    the chest high aluminum service counter while he ignored the glowering
    Frenchman.
    After that kindness, they became friends. And later, she
    remembered with a stitch in her chest, they became casual lovers.
    Casual! Jesus! Casual! The story of my life!
    During their year of sharing the house the males became
    close, doing ‘guy’ things together, Luis helped teach Brian to swim and ride a
    bike; on domestic issues the boys teamed against the woman.
    Now, she thought glumly, poor Luis is gone, and poor little
    Brian’s noncommittal and even more withdrawn.
    “So . . . you guys know why he was killed?” She sucked in a
    breath and reached for the survivor of his assault on the rolls. “I’m going to
    eat this because I know I need to. But, I tell you, I haven’t been able to eat
    much—” She took a small bite and set the remainder down.
    “Yeah, I kin imagine ain’t been easy on you these past few
    days, you’n the boy. I’ll tell what I know . . . ain’t much.”
    He shifted in his chair and rubbed the side of his face, the
    hat brim slanted over his eyes.
    “But you gotta be kinda cool about what I say . . . don’t
    let on I told you nothin’ when Ruggle runs you back down.” His jowls sagged
    until he resembled a hound-dog. “And Hon, he will. They been pagin’ me already
    . . . wanna make sure they’re runnin’ this whole show. And you know, truth of
    it is,” his face lifted as he snickered, “they ain’t all that sure ‘bout me.”
    He patted the cell-phone holstered next to his gun on his belt and proclaimed
    innocently. “But the boys downtown’ll tell ‘em I ain’t real good workin’ this
    newfangled stuff.”
    He snickered again, a little more mischievously. “Dinosaur,
    like I said.”
    As she listened, she was halfheartedly watching a robot on
    the sidewalk between Decatur and the Monde. It stood next to a coffee can with
    a hand-lettered card sticking out: Keep Robby Running . An inverted
    aluminum funnel was secured on its top by a wire running under a square silver
    chin, metallic arms and legs stuck out at machinelike angles from a rectangular
    thorax. It stood perfectly erect and its limbs moved in staccato chops as the Monde patrons stared, the head notched in specific short jerks, its eyes as dull as
    the ends of burnt corks. Encouraged by the words and hand gestures of her
    parents, a girl of about five kept a wary eye on the robot as she edged near
    and stooped to drop a bill into the coffee can, then scurried back to their
    table still eyeing the machine. The silver head cocked respectfully at the
    adults, but the eyes stayed shallow and dumb.
    Sherry’s voice jerked her back to their discussion. “. . .
    and it looks like he musta got mixed in with some bad-asses out of Miami . . .
    Cubans. Dunno what the connection is . . . but the strike force guys took your
    ID’s and I think they already figured out who them bastards are . . . and they
    think they know who they’re connected in with.” He rubbed his chin and studied
    her face with a wide eye. “Ya know . . . the descriptions you gave me t’other
    night were ‘bout as good as any I ever had, even down to that smell . . . what
    was it you said? Lilac?”
    The wide eye foraged her plate while he talked.
    “An’ Hon, I been doin’ this a long time, you know?” The eye
    lifted inquisitively. “Shore you never seen them boys before?”
    “No, never,” she frowned