Life Among the Tombstones by H.R. Boldwood

Author:H.R. Boldwood [Boldwood, H.R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Third Street Press

By the time I walked into The Blue Note, Dallas had stocked the bar and iced the tubs. I mopped the floor and rolled silverware to stay busy, until around nine, when Harry and Opie stopped in to buy me a congratulatory shot that magically turned into three.

I brought up the war between Nonnie and Headbutt, hoping someone might offer solutions that didn’t involve duct-taping Nonnie’s mouth or moving. The most surprising suggestion came from Harry.

“Get a bird.”

“How’s that going to help?”

“Oh, it won’t,” Harry said, taking a sip of his Guinness. “Birds are easier to take care of, is all I’m saying. You don’t have to walk them. And they don’t piss on your neighbor’s bushes.” He pulled out his phone and scrolled through some pictures. “This is Kulu, my African Grey.”

Well, slap my silly ass and call me Sally! Harry had a pet. Go figure.

Harry rambled on about how smart his bird was. How it did tricks and talked a blue streak. His phone vibrated on the bar top, interrupting his story about how he taught the bird to sing “Drunk on a Plane.”

Thank you, Lord. A freaking pterodactyl wasn’t worthy of that much conversation, much less a stinking parrot.

Harry ended the call, drained the last of his beer and said, “We’re up.”

“You and me?” I said, looking at the clock. “Now?”

“Biter sighting at The Crosley Building.”

I could feel Dallas’s eyes burning a hole in the back of my head. I turned to apologize, but he waved me off. “You were doing more drinking than working anyway. I got this.”

Well. That was just uncalled for. Even if it was true.

I swung by Dallas’s office to grab Hawk and my Ka-Bar. A light snow had fallen, so it made more sense for me to ride with Harry than to take the Harley. The moment I climbed into the passenger seat of his car Little Allie started yapping my ear off. She had a hinky feeling about this call. So did I.

I buckled my seatbelt and asked, “Who calls in a biter sighting in an abandoned building at ten o’clock at night?”

“I asked the same question,” Harry said. “Anonymous caller from a pay phone, a block north.”

“A pay phone?”

Harry snorted. “They still exist, you know. Not everyone can afford cell phones.”

He parked beneath a street light, maybe fifty feet from the corner of Spring Grove and Arlington, and radioed in our location. “1 David 26 out for investigation at 1329 Arlington Street.”

I opened the car door and got a noseful of Eau de Deadhead.

“We’re in the right place,” I said, letting my eyes wash over the ten-story tall Crosley Building, a behemoth of crumbling brick and broken windows.

Harry slipped his radio into his pocket, then opened the glove compartment and pulled out his backup piece. He clipped it to his belt and took the lead as we jogged through the dark.

“Seriously?” I snickered, drawing Hawk. “Your back up piece is a .38, too?”

He puffed like a freight train. “Big surprise. I told you, I’m a dinosaur.

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