The Bad Beat by Tod Goldberg

Author:Tod Goldberg [Goldberg, Tod]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, General
ISBN: 9781101516379
Google: hxZWHF3jPyAC
Amazon: 045123409X
Publisher: Signet
Published: 2011-07-04T16:00:00+00:00

Two hours later, a yellow Econoline van pulled up in front of Henry’s house. According to the sign on the side of it, the van belonged to ALL-AMERICAN INSULATION & AIR-CONDITIONING REPAIR. According to the bulletproof tires, I had a sneaking suspicion that the van actually belonged to Sam’s friend Marci and her cohorts. It’s not every air-conditioning service that can afford Teflon-honeycombed antigun, antiexplosion, extreme-terrain experimental tires that I’d only previously seen in Iraq.

From the living room window I could see the van’s passenger door open and a woman of no less than six full feet of height step out. She wore a tan jumpsuit with a utility belt and held a clipboard, the universal uniform of anyone who wants to look nonthreatening. Though I had a slight twinge of fear that Henry might think it was also the universal uniform of the New World Order. Fortunately, I could still hear Henry snoring away. Well, snoring and intermittently shouting in his sleep.

Sam came up behind me and looked out the living room window. “That’s my girl,” Sam said.

“That’s a woman,” I said.

“You don’t need to tell me that,” Sam said.

“She’s a doctor?”

“Among other things.”

“What other things?”

“Geneva Convention prevents me from saying,” Sam said. He stepped away to open the front door and in walked Marci. She greeted Sam with a hug that practically lifted him off his feet and then she gave him a firm slap on his backside. It was . . . awkward. But Sam seemed to like it.

“What do we have here?” she asked. She walked into the living room, regarded me with nary a mention, and then sat down in the recliner and stared directly at her clipboard, as if she didn’t want to take in too much information other than what she was asking for. That or plausible deniability was big in her world.

“Big favor, Marci,” Sam said. “We’ve got a subject in the bedroom that we need to get off the grid.”

“Enemy?”

“No,” Sam said.

Marci wrote something on her clipboard. “Client?”

“Not in the traditional sense,” Sam said. He looked over my way. “Maybe you noticed another person in the room?”

“I don’t see anyone,” she said.

“Well, the person you don’t see, he’s a friend of mine named Michael,” Sam said. “We sort of—how should I say this—help people occasionally.”

“I’ve never heard of Michael Westen,” she said, which was interesting since Sam hadn’t said my full name.

“Right, great,” Sam said. “At any rate, the subject in the bedroom is, uh, emotionally unstable. We’re helping his son with some business regarding, uh, well, a gentleman named Big Lumpy and another gentleman named Yuri Drubich and, uh, we need our emotionally unstable client to get the help he needs in a secure facility and, uh, well, here we are.”

Marci looked up. “Did you say Big Lumpy?”

“I did,” Sam said.

“This house,” Marci said. “I expect that it will be cleaned after I leave?”

“Of course,” Sam said.

“No fingerprints, no hair, nothing?”

“Pro job all the way,” Sam said. “I’ll burn it down if you want me to.

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