The Falling Star by Ariel Winter

Author:Ariel Winter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Titan

EIGHTEEN

I didn’t bother locking my apartment door. If Hub’s men wanted to get in, they’d get in, the only question was whether I’d have to deal with a busted doorframe afterwards.

I took up a position so I’d be behind the door when it opened. I stood there and nothing happened. I kept standing, feeling like a fool. But in the last thirty-six hours I’d had a gun pointed at me, been threatened by gangsters and by the police, and found a mutilated body. I waited.

The knock came, three heavy thuds made with the meat of a fist. I stayed quiet. We all listened to the floorboards. The knock again, more insistent, and this time, “Come on, Foster. We know you’re in there. We just want to talk.” It was Mitch’s voice.

I heard a hand on the doorknob, and then the door swung towards me, but faster and harder than I’d expected. It slammed into my hip, sending a sharp pain up and down my side. I must have cried out, because Mitch hurled his full weight against the door, pinning me behind it. I tried to lean forward but my shoulders were pushed together, my arms in front of me like a fighter trying to protect his middle. I was stuck.

Mitch peeked around the door, still holding his weight against it. At the sight of me, he eased the pressure for a moment only to fall back against the door, shooting pain along my shoulder blades.

A second man appeared, rail thin and well over six feet tall, wearing a gray suit with a black vest underneath. He patted me down to see if I had a gun. I didn’t. He took the newspaper article I’d stolen from the library out of my pocket. Then he nodded at Mitch.

The weight fell away from the door and I staggered forward. “What do you two want?”

The tall man unfolded the newspaper article, glanced it over, and looked back at me. “For somebody not working on a murder, you have an interesting choice of reading material.”

“I just ripped that out for the crossword on the back.”

He held up the backside, which wasn’t a crossword. “We were told to give you a chance. We were told to use our discretion.”

“I told it to Gilplaine straight. I’m working another job.”

“Then how do you explain this?”

I couldn’t explain it. I couldn’t even say why it was important. I didn’t know anything other than I was a damn fool for having gotten mixed up with this business in the first place.

“Mr. Gilplaine finds your explanation unconvincing,” the tall man said. He turned to Mitch, who was jumping lightly in place on the balls of his feet, like he was warming up. “Leave his face alone. This is only a warning.”

I tried to dodge to my left in an attempt to get out the door, but Mitch barreled into me, slamming me back up against it. Holding me there, he punched me in the kidney. One would have been

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