Johnithan Kellerman – Bad Love

You should have seen it, Milo. The boy’s teeth were rotting, he had a tubercular cough. The girl was naked, wrapped up in a sheet, trying to feed the baby. If I’d offered enough money, I probably could have bought the baby.”

“I’ve seen it,” he said softly.

“I know you have. I have too. It’s all around. But I haven’t really let it register for a while.”

“What’re you gonna do, solve everyone’s problems? Plenty of your own to deal with, for the time being. You get names on the freeway people?”

“Not the girl. He calls himself Terminator Three.”

He laughed. “No one else down there besides them and the baby?”

“No one I could see, and I was flashing ten-dollar bills.”

“Real smart, Alex.”

“I watched my back.”

‘Yeah.

“The kid said the place fills up at night. I could go back after dark and see if anyone else knows Gritz.”

“You’re really in the mood to get your throat cut, aren’t you?”

“If I had a macho cop with me I’d be safe, right?”

“Don’t count on it. … Yeah, okay, it’s probably a waste of time, but that makes me feel right at home.”

Robin was still working in the garage, hunched over her bench, wielding shiny sharp things that resembled dental picks. Her hair was tied up and her goggles were lodged in her curls. Under her overalls, her T-shirt was tightened by perspiration. She said, “Hi, doll,” as her hands continued to move. The dog was at her feet and he stood and licked my hand as I looked over Robin’s shoulder.

A tiny rectangle of abalone was clamped to a padded section of the bench.

The edges were beveled and the corners were inlaid with bits of ivory and gold wire. She’d traced the shell with minuscule curlicue shapes, cut out some of them, and was in the process of excising another.

“Beautiful,” I said. “Fretboard inlay?”

“Uh-huh. Thanks.” She blew away dust and cleaned the edge of a pick with a fingernail.

“You do root canal, too?”

She laughed and hunched lower. The tools clicked as she carved out a speck of shell. “Kind of baroque for my taste, but it’s for a stockbroker who wants a showpiece for his wall.”

She worked some more, finally put the tools down, wiped her forehead, and wiggled her fingers. “Enough for one day, I’m cramping up.”

“Everything okay?” I rubbed her neck.

“Nice and quiet. How about you?”

“Not bad.”

I kissed her. The wind got stronger and drier, ruffling the cypress trees and shooting a cold stream through the open garage. Robin undamped the abalone, and put it in her pocket. Her arms were goosebumped. I put mine around them and the two of us headed for the house. By the time we got to the door, the wind was whipping the trees and stirring the dust, causing the bulldog to blink and sniff.

“Santa Ana?” she said.

“Too cold. Probably the tail end of something arctic.”

“Brr,” she said, unlocking the door. “Leave your jacket in the car?”

I shook my head. We went inside.

“You were wearing one, weren’t you?” she said, rubbing her hands together.

“That baggy brown tweed.”

Artist’s eye.

“YUP.”

“Did you lose it?”

“Not exactly.”

“Not exactly?”

“I gave it away.”

She laughed. “You what?”

“No big deal. It was fraying.”

note. the remainder of this book has been scanned using oscar.

“Who’d you give it to?”

I told her about Little Calcutta. She listened with her hands on her hips, shaking her head, and went into the kitchen to wash her hands.

When she came back, her head was still moving from side to side.

“I know, I know,” I said. “It was a bleeding-heart reflex, but they really were pitiful–it was a cheap old thing, anyway.”

“You wore it the first time we went out. I never liked it.”

“You didn’t?”

“Nope. Too philosophy prof.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

She shrugged. “It wasn’t that important.”

“Snoring, poor taste in haberdashery. What else don’t you like that you haven’t informed me about?”

“Nothing. Now that you’ve ditched the coat, you’re perfect.”

She ruffled my hair, walked to the French doors, and looked out at the mountains. They were shimmering, denuded in patches, where the foliage was brushed back like blow-dried hair. The pool water was choppy, the surface gritty with leaves and dirt.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *