Blind man's alley by Doug Peacock

Author:Doug Peacock [Peacock, Doug]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Policier
ISBN: 9780385531061
Published: 2010-09-14T07:00:00+00:00

37

CANDACE FOUND Tommy Nelson at McGee’s, an Irish bar in the West Fifties. She’d met him there last year, when he’d spoken to her on background while she was digging into the Aurora accident. He’d been on a first-name basis with the bartender, so Candace had pegged him as a regular.

Nelson was the site supervisor for Omni at the Aurora, making sure the various moving parts were not colliding. He had talked to Candace off the record a couple of times when she’d been doing her original investigation into the accident. It hadn’t been especially fruitful. Nelson had pinned the blame for the accident on Pellettieri, focusing on what the subcontractor had done wrong while making excuses for why he hadn’t caught it. Candace assumed Nelson had talked to her with the blessing of his employer, trying to make sure that Omni wasn’t the focus of her story. She’d ended up using almost nothing he’d told her, finding it too self-serving, but she’d thought Nelson a decent enough sort.

Nelson was standing at the bar, talking with a couple of other men. Candace sat down a few feet away, ordered a beer she had no intention of drinking, looked over at Nelson until she caught his eye. He said something to the men he was with, then picked up his drink and came over to her.

“The hell do you want?” he said in greeting. He was tall, with white hair and a red face, broken capillaries crawling along his cheeks.

“Good to see you too,” Candace replied, lifting her glass in a pretend toast that Tommy, ever the Irish gentleman, turned into an actual one.

“Haven’t you already used me up and spit me out?”

“Now, Tommy. You’re not even half used up.”

“The Aurora Tower must be ancient history as far as you’re concerned.”

“I think the Aurora’s about to be back in the headlines.”

“Is that so?” Nelson said neutrally, taking a sip of his whiskey and holding the liquor in his mouth for a moment before swallowing.

“I hear an indictment’s in the cards. The DA’s saying that it wasn’t just negligence that caused the accident, but deliberate misconduct. I get you another Jameson?”

“You remember your whiskey,” Nelson said with a half smile.

“Of course, you already know about this,” Candace said as she attempted to flag down the bartender.

Nelson looked taken aback, but Candace didn’t buy it. “I do?” he asked.

“The DA must’ve talked to you,” Candace said. “Unless of course you’re a target.”

This got a reaction, Nelson leaning back and away from her, offering an exaggerated shake of his head. With a quick glance Nelson secured the bartender’s attention and ordered another drink. “We’re off the record,” he said.

“Do we have to be?”

“You’re the one who came to me,” Nelson said. “I was perfectly happy with the idea of never seeing you again, my dear.”

“Fine, off the record,” Candace said.

Nelson’s fresh whiskey arrived, and he bantered with the bartender for a moment and took a sip before turning back to Candace. As he did so he noticed the bandages on both of her palms.

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