Shadows Over Main Street by unknow

Shadows Over Main Street by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hazardous Press
Published: 2015-01-27T23:00:00+00:00


The Friendless Bodies of Unburied Men

by Gary A. Braunbeck

“He felt the loyalty we all feel toward unhappiness—the sense that this is where we really belong.”

—Graham Greene

1

He lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, watching as the regrets circled above him like vultures over carrion. He took a deep breath as one of the vultures snapped back its wings and swooped down, sinking its talons into his stomach, lowering its head, rending a small strip of flesh from his body. He watched as the bloody strand quivered in its beak, shifting, growing, expanding until it enveloped the vulture and became one of the many memories—

—a little girl hanging from the ceiling, her wrists bound overhead, split open from throat to navel, thick loops of intestine slopping out onto the floor where her parents squatted on their haunches—

—he was trying to erase from his weary and embittered mind.

He’d lost count of how many vultures had feasted on him tonight.

The phone rang.

He blinked, wiped his eyes, glanced toward the ceiling where—

—Heather Wilson; that was her name, remember?—

—no birds of prey waited, pulled himself up, then reached for the receiver with one hand and a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s Black with the other.

“Yeah?”

“Mr. Warren?” A smoky, sexy voice, the kind you could almost feel with your fingertips.

“Speaking.”

“My name is Katherine Blackmore. Rod Sackett gave me your number. He told me that you’re doing private work now.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. “That’s right.”

“He also told me that you used to work as a carny several years ago.”

Warren exhaled, looked around for his cigarettes. “Rod’s always been a fountain of information; I keep telling him he ought to quit the force and get a job on one of the bigger tabloids.”

Silence.

“Mrs. Blackmore—?”

“Miss Blackmore.”

He took a quick swig from the bottle. “Miss Blackmore. I just woke up. It takes me a few minutes to find my brain.”

“Understood. I need to inquire about your services.”

He looked at the clock and was startled to see it was almost one p.m.

“I’d like to meet with you as soon as possible.”

He wondered if the face looked as good as the voice sounded. “I’ll tell you what, Miss Blackmore. There’s a little restaurant downtown called the Sparta. Meet me there in an hour.”

“How will I know you?”

“I’m the one who smiles like someone just stuck a gun in his back and told him to act natural.”

It was one of his best lines, the only real proof that he had once possessed a sense of humor, and she ignored it.

“Very well, an hour then.”

“Why did you ask me about carny work?”

“One hour.” Click.

Phil Warren found his cigarettes, lit one, dragged deeply, and released the smoke in a long, steady breath.

The carny. Christ, how long had it been? Fifteen, twenty years? He wondered if the old language was still used. Poppers, canvas joints, gigging, African dip, ride monkey … it all came back to him in a rush of childhood echoes as he closed his eyes



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