Buried Biker (11 page)

“What’s rain got to do with it?”

“If it’s raining or too cold, he can’t work. He’s got to keep a job for parole. He’s working on a crew out where they’re building that new bridge. They start work at seven. Good job. He don’t want to mess that up.”

For once, Aaron was probably on target. Parole people came down hard on people who lost their jobs. Sometimes they got locked up again.

“I got some new contacts,” he said. “People taking pretty good care of me. You interested in making some extra money?”

“No.”

I went over and climbed back on my forklift.

“Jesse?” Aaron called after me.

I was tempted to keep going, but I turned back to him. “What?”

“You gonna hook me up with a supplier?”

I was pretty sure I knew, but I asked, “Supplier of what?”

“You know. Meth. Or crack.”

“How about them new contacts? They can’t help you out there?”

He looked around. “Eventually, they said. But not right now.”

“Hope you’re not getting in over your head, buddy.”

He looked surprised. “Me? I’ve just started with them. They need a little time before they can trust me.”

I looked at Aaron’s slouching stick-thin figure, his blood-shot eyes, and rotting teeth. Not to mention the scabs on his face and hands. Even if I was wrong about him being a police informant,
nobody
in their right mind would trust him.

“Only thing I’ll hook you up with is Narcotics Anonymous. I’ll take you to a meeting if you want.”

A crafty look crept into his narrowed eyes. “I didn’t know you went to NA.”

“I don’t.”

“Then how you gonna take me to a meeting?”

“No problem finding out about the meetings. And anyone can go.”

“
Do
you go sometimes?”

“Nope.”

“Why not?”

“‘Cause I don’t use.”

Aaron looked me up and down. “Okaaaay…” he said.

I had an uneasy feeling he thought he knew something about me. Even if he was wrong, he could cause problems for me.

Chapter 6

A
S
I G
OT
O
UT
O
F
W
ORK
, I scanned the street for bikers, but all I saw were cars, most of them were parked and empty. A cold wind blew down the street, and a weak sun was trying to peer through the scattered cloud cover.

One car, a late-model silver Lexus, peeled out of the parking lot and skidded to a stop beside me.

“Hey, Jesse!” Aaron shouted out the open window. Last time I’d seen him behind the wheel, he’d been driving a beaten up blue pickup. “Want a ride home?”

“No.” I eyed the vehicle. “And where the hell did you get
that
?”

Aaron smirked at me. “Let’s just say I borrowed it.”

“Yeah? And who lent it to you?”

“Some of my new business partners. They think it’s important that I look prosperous if I’m gonna work for them. You know, like they don’t got to go scraping for cash.”

A shower and some decent clothes would go a long way toward that for Aaron, I thought, without making him look like a car thief. But I didn’t say anything.

“So you gonna climb in or not?” he asked.

“Not.”

“Why not?”

“I got no idea where you got that car. I’m not gonna take any chances of being caught riding in a stolen vehicle.”

“Aw, Jesse. It’s legit. It’s
cold
out. I can give you a ride home.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.”

Aaron shrugged, rolled up the window, and laid rubber as he took off.

I flipped up my hood, slipped my hands in my pockets and turned toward my apartment.

Another car was parked by the curb, a driver behind the wheel. The car was a puke-green hybrid gas/electric model. The windows were tinted, and I couldn’t see the driver well, or whether there were additional occupants. It started up as I passed it.

Uneasy, I didn’t look back at it. It didn’t look like an unmarked cop car—what cop would drive a puke-green hybrid? More likely they picked something like the black Lincoln Belkins and Montgomery were using, or a four wheel drive SUV. But they confiscated all kinds of vehicles when they found drugs and used them for a while, so the possibility was always there. It made no noise as it glided along beside me.

The muscles in my shoulders and neck tightened. I stopped and backed up against a wall to let it pass.

It slowed down.

I glanced around. I could turn back the way I’d come or step down an alley. But the sun was now washing the sidewalks with feeble morning light, and the driver would have no trouble seeing where I went. I made sure my hands were in plain sight. If it
was
a cop, I for sure didn’t want anyone thinking I was going for a weapon.

The car pulled over to the curb, slid past a fire hydrant and stopped. The door opened.

A cop wouldn’t have worried about parking next to the fire hydrant.

The driver was a
she.
A very attractive she. Petite, blond, a flawlessly made-up face. And wearing spike heels and a fake fur coat. Or maybe it was real fur, although that didn’t seem to go with the hybrid.

Nobody I knew. I shifted from one foot to the other, still careful to keep my hands where they could be seen. She came directly toward me. Somebody from the parole office? A social worker?

Smiling, she said. “Jesse Damon?”

She obviously knew exactly who I was, so I saw no point in denying it. “Yeah.”

“My name is Carissa Daniles,” she said, holding out her hand for me to shake.

Not knowing what else to do, I wiped my hand on my jeans to get some of the oil and dirt off it and took her hand. It was soft and smooth.

She tossed her multi-colored blond hair back over her shoulders and smiled again, showing more teeth than I would have thought a human mouth could hold. “I’m with the
Rothsburg Register
,” she said.

Rothsburg Register
. That was the paper that had carried my picture on the front page yesterday.

I couldn’t think of a response to that.

“I was hoping you’d talk to me a little,” she said.

“I got nothing to say,” I answered.

She tilted her chin in and looked up at me with big brown eyes from under thick dark eyelashes. “Oh, I’m sure you have lots you could tell me.”

I scratched my cheek. My beard was reaching the itchy stage. Time to shave or decide I actually was growing a beard. “I dunno what.”

When she stepped closer to me, I caught a clean, flowery soap scent. Maybe it was perfume. Her smell was tantalizing, not at all like the hot steel and oil smell of the factory. Or the sweaty body odor I was sure she’d pick up if she got too close to me. I leaned away from her, but I had the wall at my back.

Her voice was a soft purr. “How about we go get breakfast someplace?”

I was on a tight budget that didn’t lend itself to spur of the moment restaurant meals. And would she expect me to pay for her? “No, thanks.”

She was so close her fluffy red scarf touched my jacket. Her voice was soft and low. “My treat.”

“No, ma’am. I can’t accept that.”

“Expense account,” she said.

Did that mean the newspaper was paying for it? Still, she had to want something from me, or she wouldn’t be offering.

“No, thanks.” I couldn’t remember being this close to any woman but Kelly since I’d been a little kid. I felt damp sweat beading on my back.

“We could just go for a cup of coffee.” She took hold of the front of my unzipped jacket. “Just you and me.”

“I don’t think so.” Was she trying to set me up? “And I think I’d better be going, ma’am.”

She frowned. Her perfectly made up face was just as pretty as when she smiled. “Why not? You can’t tell me you’re afraid of me?”

Maybe I was. But what I said was, “I almost just got arrested on rape charges. That can’t come as any surprise to you. I’m damn sure not going anyplace, ‘just you and me,’ with a woman I don’t know.”

She stepped back and did that flip thing with her hair again. “Okay. How about a cup of coffee at Starbucks? That’s plenty public.”

I’d never been in a Starbucks. And I
knew
I should say no. But she smiled again and looked up at me with those big brown eyes and stepped close so her intriguing scent filled my nostrils. “Please? I won’t take much of your time.”

“Okay.”

“Great.” She took my sleeve and pulled me across the sidewalk. “I’ll drive.”

I stopped short. “I’m
not
getting in that car with you.”

She frowned. “How are we going to get to Starbucks?”

“Tell me where it is, and I’ll meet you there.” Unless I came to my senses on the walk over and went home instead.

Her bright pink lips formed a pout. “It’s all the way across town.”

I almost said, “So?” but that might sound rude. “There’s a McDonald’s a few blocks over,” I said. “How about I meet you over there?”

She reached up with a pink fingernail that matched her lips and touched my cheek, stubble and all. “Sure you’re not going to run out on me?”

I shifted from one foot to the other. “I’ll be there.”

“Okay. If you promise. See you there!” She gave me one last look from under her hedgerow of eyelashes and hurried to her car.

McDonald’s sold any size coffee for a dollar. Even I could afford that kind of splurge.

When I walked up, she was waiting at the door. Gesturing toward a booth in the back, she said, “I already got our coffee. And a couple of breakfast burritos.”

A pile of at least a half dozen sat on the tray with two large coffees. My stomach growled.

What the hell was I doing here?
With an attractive woman who worked for the local newspaper?

I was aware of how stupid I was being, but I found myself following my nose as she wound her way back to the booth, her tantalizing scent lingering in the air.

“Have a few of the burritos,” she said, taking off her coat. “I can’t possibly eat more than one. And I shouldn’t eat that. Have to watch my girlish figure, you know.”

She giggled and ran her hands down the tight-fitting top she wore. It was hard not to stare. She was so
skinny.
Like Aaron. I wondered briefly if she did drugs, too. But her skin was clear, and her brown eyes were sharp and bright, even this early in the morning.

I shrugged off my jacket and laid it on the seat next to me.

Carissa slipped into the booth across from me and smiled again. She closed her eyes and bowed her head. I wouldn’t have pegged her as the type to say grace before meals—Mrs. Coleman had always insisted on a moment of silence for thanksgiving before we were allowed to dive into our food—but what did I know? I sat mesmerized, staring at her.

Her arms were so thin they looked like they might snap if anything touched them, the elbows forming sharp angled points. I thought about Kelly’s solid muscles on her sturdy frame.

Her eyes still closed, Carissa gave a huge sigh, her chest heaving. I saw she
did
have breasts, small pointy ones. They certainly weren’t the luxurious soft expanse Kelly had. What would they feel like if I reached over and touched them?

Hugging her might feel like I was holding a bunch of clothes hangers.

What was the matter with me? I had to stop thinking like this. I grinned, thinking of a bundle of clothes hangers under her shirt. It was a good thing we
were
in a public place. I blushed and shoved the strands of hair that had escaped from my hair tie back from my face.

Carissa’s eyes opened, and she shook herself. “Mediating,” she said. “Seeking my inner muse.”

I had no idea what she was talking about. It didn’t sound like saying grace, though.

She slid further into the booth. Her bony knees brushed against mine. I quickly moved my legs so they were tucked off to the side, but hers followed and settled gently against mine. Was she
trying
to touch my leg with hers?

I hadn’t had much contact with women in the last twenty years or so, but I’d had plenty of contact with crazies. Crazies tend to get locked up a lot. And the alarm bells were going off in my head.

She leaned forward, once again filling my nose with her scent. I tried to concentrate on how good the coffee smelled instead.

“Now,” she said, “can I ask you a few questions?”