Nickel City Crossfire by Gary Ross (popular romance novels .txt) 📗

liked to crawl around on my belly. She took my shirt off so grit on the floor and carpet fibers would make me stand up and try to walk. But before I stood I scampered about on my hands and feet. I was pretty quick. She said I looked like a spider running across the floor, and the name stuck.”

The faraway look in his eyes surprised me, so I remained silent and let him continue.

“My mother got Alzheimer’s some years back,” he said. “Broke my fucking heart, especially when she no longer remembered who I was. Toward the end, she thought I was her father or her brother. Some days I was a complete stranger. But before she ended up in the nursing home, one of the people who was especially good to her, who helped her get the support she needed to stay in her own house as long as possible, was a young sister named Simpkins. Dr. Simpkins. The same young sister who had some trouble a while back and disappeared.”

“Knowing her as you did, it was your professional opinion she would never do what the newspaper said she did.”

“Exactly.”

“So your people had nothing to do with—”

“Not our style to force things on civilians, especially good ones. Good business demands a certain purity of product. Success is based on repeat customers, not dead ones.” His eyes hardened again. “If I knew somebody who did something like this—”

I nodded my understanding of his unfinished sentence. “You don’t know who but you figure it might be a competitor, somebody outside your regular network.”

He shrugged. “No shortage of them. You can’t make deals with everybody. There’s a lot of young fools out there, greedy and impatient.”

“Even careless,” I said. “Leaving a job unfinished is just unprofessional.”

“I appreciate a man who knows the fundamentals.”

“How long have you been following me?”

“Since yesterday. When I found out you were the one hired to find her, I thought I’d check on your progress.”

“Because you knew that as a cynic in search of redemption, I’d keep looking till I found her.”

“Yes.”

“Then lead you to whoever hurt her, so you could make a deal or settle a score. It could be business or it could be personal. You’re ready to play it either way, as long as I stick to finding my clients’ daughter and pay no attention to things that don’t concern me.”

This time his smile was broader, and the contrast with the emptiness in his eyes was unsettling. “I’m so glad we understand each other.”

I sat back and thought for a moment. “Why reveal yourself? Why not just keep tailing me to the end?”

“My employer is not the only one you impressed, Mr. Rimes. Sooner or later you’d have made me. I didn’t want you distracted—for both our sakes.”

“Since yesterday,” I said, resting my chin on my fist. “I remember the company car was a Lexus SUV. Your personal ride wouldn’t be a black Navigator, would it?”

“No. Why?”

18

The Erie County Bar Association holiday party was held in the Grand Ballroom of the Hyatt Regency downtown, close enough to Phoenix’s loft that we walked. As I hung our coats on one of the stainless steel racks outside the entrances, Phoenix exchanged her boots for shoes and moved to one of the floor plans propped on large easels near the doors to find the table reserved for Landsburgh, Falk, and Trinidad. Then she took my hand and led me inside.

The ballroom was already full of women in gowns and dinner dresses and men in suits and tuxedos. With an open bar set up on either side, most of those in attendance had a drink in hand. A five-piece band near the first door filled the air with soft jazz. It took us a long time to get near our table, in a far corner, because Phoenix, elegant in her off-the-shoulder black dress and ocean blue Larimar necklace, was intercepted every few feet by someone she knew, or by women she didn’t, who felt compelled to compliment her. My own suit—my only suit—was a navy pinstripe I so seldom wore its condition was good enough not to embarrass her and basic enough not to draw attention away from her. I shook hands when introduced, smiled, and nodded when greeted in passing by someone I didn’t know. I slipped off to get us drinks when she was drawn into conversation by an old law school classmate.

Holding Phoenix’s Malbec and a Captain and Coke—my cocktail of choice when I had to wear a tie—I turned and nearly collided with Mayor Ophelia Green. She had replaced her customary glasses and business pantsuit with contacts and a stylish lavender dress. Antique gold pendant glittering at her throat, she was on the tuxedo-sheathed arm of the tall State Supreme Court justice whose relationship with her had been a secret until after she won a second term last month.

“G!” she said, offering me a cheek to kiss. “What a nice surprise!”

“Looking better, I hope, than the last time you saw me.”

For a moment she said nothing, the beauty mark at the corner of her mouth falling as her smile faltered. Perhaps she was remembering that we had last talked when she came to my hospital room shortly before the election. Having served in Iraq with her late husband Danny, I was a family friend hired as an independent investigator to look into matters related to the murder of her personal driver. I had been shot in the shoulder during that investigation. My findings, once publicized, had guaranteed her re-election. Perhaps now she was wrestling with the knowledge that, in essence, I had taken the bullet for her.

Her bronze cheeks flushed, and she glanced at her companion. “G, I am so sorry. Gideon Rimes, this is Hal—”

“Judge Chancellor,” I said. “I’ve seen your picture in the paper, sir. I’d shake your hand but—” I held up the drinks, one in each hand.

“A pleasure to meet you just the same, Mr. Rimes.” Hal Chancellor’s voice