Primary Valor by Jack Mars (booksvooks TXT) 📗

strong hand on Clare’sforehead, and gently pushed the man’s head backwards. The chair tipped up onits hind legs.

“Wait!” Clare said. “Wait!”

The chair rolled over backwards. Edmade no attempt to slow the man’s fall. Clare’s head made a heavy THUNK againstthe peeling linoleum. Gravity just took him, all impact. His cigarette flewaway and rolled across the floor. His teeth clacked together as he hit. He waslucky he didn’t bite off the tip of his tongue.

“Ow! What is wrong with you? Youcan’t do this anymore. I have rights. I’m going to have your badge, you knowthat?”

“You lost your cigarette, Louis,”Luke said.

Ed studied the man on the floor. “Andyou won’t have my badge because I’m not a cop. Is this how you did your time,mouthing off and complaining like a punk? I don’t believe it. You never wouldhave made eighteen minutes, never mind eighteen years.”

There was a long moment ofsilence.

“You need to understand yoursituation. Think. If your brain works at all, now is the time to use it.”

Clare didn’t say a word. Apparently,he was doing as he was told. He was in an odd position, the back of his headagainst the floor, the back of the chair against the floor, his legs up in theair, tied to the legs of the chair. He was still in a sitting position, but hehad been rotated ninety degrees.

“I don’t like people like you,” Edsaid. “You understand that part, right?”

“Yes.”

“Does anyone care about you?” Edsaid. “Will anyone miss you?”

Clare thought about it, but notfor very long. Luke already knew the answer. This guy had a mother once, butshe died while he was locked up. He had a couple of siblings somewhere, butTrudy said there was no evidence that he saw them.

Other than that…

“No. There’s a hooker that I seesometimes, but you know how that goes. Money.”

Ed nodded, though Clare couldn’tsee it. “I do know. Why would anyone see a man like you for free? So listen. Iwill feed you to the alligators. I mean that. I don’t like you. You know thatalready. But here’s something you don’t know. I’ve killed men before, quite afew, and for less than what you’ve done. It’s really that simple. You willcooperate with me, or I will kill you. No one will find your body. No one willeven care. You’ll just be a bad guy who disappeared one night.”

Clare’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “Whatdo you want?” he said.

“A girl went missing late lastweek, up in Wilmington.”

Clare’s chest heaved. He took adeep breath and let out a long exhale. Luke recognized the movement. It was asigh of relief.

“Saw it on the news,” Clare said.“That’s all. I had nothing to do with it. Don’t even know anything about it. Idon’t involve myself in that kind of thing anymore. I’m out on parole. If I getbusted again, they will send me away for the rest of my life. I don’t wantthat. I like my freedom, such as it is.”

“You know something about it,”Luke said from where he was standing.

Clare shook his head. “I don’t. Ireally don’t.”

“Think,” Ed said again.

“I knew you guys were cops. Sorry.I can’t help you. And I’m going to talk to my parole officer about this, Ipromise you. You had me going there for a minute. It’s against the law, whatyou’re doing. Habeas corpus, all that. You can’t just take people away. Youhave to arrest me or let me go. And if you arrest me, I have the right toremain silent. So am I under arrest?”

“We’re not cops,” Luke said. “We’reinterested parties. We can do whatever we want. We were brought in because somepeople want this problem fixed, and they’re worried the cops can’t or won’t doit.”

Clare was still shaking his head.“Like I said… sorry.”

“If you can’t help us, that meansyou’re useless to us,” Ed said. “You know what we call things that are useless?”

Clare didn’t answer, so Lukeanswered for him.

“Trash,” he said.

“And you know what we do withtrash, right?”

There was a long pause before Lukespoke this time.

“We take it out.”

Louis Clare shook his head. “I don’tbelieve you.”

* * *

Clare screamed into the deep darkness.It echoed among the trees and swamps, and came back to them. The sound washaunting.

“Shout all you want,” Ed said. “There’snobody else here.”

There was a long moment of quiet.

“What do you see out there?” Lukesaid.

He swept his flashlight across thewater. Eyes sparkled in the inky darkness, twenty or thirty pairs of eyes. Theywere low, at water level, along the embankments of the creek. As Luke watched,a couple of pairs seemed to creep closer. There was a splash as something heavywent into the water.

“Eyes!” Clare said. “I see eyes!”

He was standing now, his blindfoldoff, at the edge of the deck that looked over the water. The railing hadcollapsed at some point in the past. Ed had looped a length of thin rope thatthey’d found in a drawer through the zip ties on Clare’s wrists.

Clare leaned way out over thewater, his feet on the deck, his body in space. His arms were pulled behind hisback at nearly a right angle. His shoulders were bunched, and his neck wassticking out like some strange bird. The position looked uncomfortable.

The only thing keeping him herewas Ed, who was holding him up by the rope. The rope was taut, each end of itwrapped around one of Ed’s hands. Ed leaned back a touch, the muscles in hisshoulders, biceps, and forearms working.

The zip ties were tight on Clare’swrists. His hands had turned red, then purple from the loss of blood flow.

“You want to meet those eyes? Inthe drink, hands tied. You know what the gators do, right? They hold you downand drown you. Then they save your body to snack on later. They like it whenyou start to rot and fall apart.”

“The meat falls right off thebone,” Luke said. For a second, he sounded like a waiter in a nice restaurant.

Ed giggled at that. He must havethought the same thing.

Clare was smoking anothercigarette. Even in this moment of extremis, he was putting another nail in thecoffin. He would go to the gates of hell with a