Before The Killing Starts (Dixie Killer Blues Book 1) (10 page)

Chapter 20

Ellie sat in a chair in Chico's office in a silky, pink robe. She felt ridiculous. Juan and José had been sent back
to her hotel to pick up the rest of her stuff and somebody had found this
stupid pink robe lying around for her to wear. She couldn't even start to
wonder why on earth they had something like this lying around. She was just
thankful to be out of the basement and covered up. Her whole face throbbed from
the slap Juan had given her, she was sure her foot was broken and the cut under
her breast stung like hell. Apart from that everything was just fine. Opposite
her Chico looked relaxed and at ease. He had a drink at his elbow and was
studying her phone. He'd taken off his roman collar which she thought must be a
good sign. Evan's business card was sitting on his desk between them along with
a piece of paper on which she'd written down the money's location.

'Looks like you got two
missed calls from Evan while we were downstairs having our little chat,' Chico said, looking up suddenly. She dropped her eyes and pulled the robe closer around
herself. She needed a shower. Their idea of cleaning her up was a pack of wet
wipes and she was sure she could smell dried piss rising up from her lap. She'd
seen his nose wrinkle a minute ago although he tried to hide it, pretend he had
an itch.

He took a sip of his
drink and picked Evan's card up from the table and compared the numbers. He
nodded to himself.

'So what's going on
here?, he said, pinching the skin between his eyes and the bridge of his nose.
'We've got this guy Evan Buckley looking for Dixie in Kelly's Tavern. He leaves
his business card with the bartender. Juan and José try to have a word with him
but he gets a lucky break and gets away. They go back to the bar and pick up
the card and—surprise, surprise—they find you sitting outside waiting for
something. Or
somebody
. You tell them you've never heard of the guy and
now, the next thing we know, we've got two missed calls from him on your
phone.'

He shook his head as if
in amazement at the strange ways of the world. He waited a second but then
carried on before she could think what to say.

'Maybe when Juan and
José get back we need to go back downstairs and carry on from where we left
off.'

It was as if she was
back already. She could feel the cold metal of the secateurs against her
nipple, imagine the razor sharp blade slicing easily through soft flesh,
imagine the little lump of bloody tissue that used to be her nipple dropping
into her lap, blood spurting everywhere—she knew it would
spurt
for
Christ's sake, even if they didn't. She felt sick and dizzy. She swallowed and
reached for his drink without thinking and stopped, her hand hovering above the
desk. He pushed it towards her. She hesitated a moment before picking it up and
draining it in one gulp.

'I can explain.' She put
her hand over her mouth and coughed as the spirit hit her chest. 'At least I
can explain some of it.' Her mind was racing. What the hell was she going to
say? 'I don't know what's going on one hundred per cent either, but I'll tell
you what I do know.'

Chico
leaned back in his chair and opened
his hands wide towards her. She noticed he had a number of fresh cuts on his
palm. Served the bastard right. 'Please do,' he said, 'and it better be good.'

She swallowed thickly;
she could do with some more of that Tequila. 'I used to know the guy from years
ago, a friend of a friend.'

Chico
nodded like it sounded reasonable
so far.

'Then I ran into him by
chance just the other day. And we got talking about old times and then he told
me he was a private investigator now and I asked him if he was doing anything
exciting and he said
no, just looking for some guy
.'

Chico
nodded some more but the look on
his face said that it was already starting to sound suspect.

Ellie leaned forward,
angling her body towards him. 'I said
really? Anyone I might know
? Just
making conversation. You can imagine my surprise when he said it was Dixie.' She put her hand to her mouth, her lips parted behind it.

Chico
had stopped nodding and she
wondered if she'd overdone it with the non-verbal stuff. His dark eyes drilled
into her. She shifted in her seat but held his gaze.
Do not look away
.

'And what did you say?'

'I told him I'd never
heard of him.'

A frown creased Chico's forehead. 'Really? Why was that?'

'Because I didn't know
what Evan wanted with him. I wasn't going to say anything that might drop Dixie in trouble. I didn't want to end up being a snitch without knowing it.'

Chico
stiffened at the mention of
snitch
,
his eyes narrowing to slits. It probably wasn't the best choice of words, but
it was too late to do anything about it now.

'He didn't say why he
wanted to find him?'

Ellie shook her head.
'No. I asked him but he wouldn't say. Some BS about client confidentiality.'

He nodded in a
whatcha
gonna do?
way

'So what happened next?'

'We said our goodbyes
and went our own ways. Except I was curious what he was up to, so I followed
him. That's why I was outside Kelly's bar.'

Chico
was quiet for a moment while he
gave her story some thought. Ellie hoped he couldn't see how nervous she was.
Sweat was running down the middle of her back and had already soaked into the
ridiculous pink robe.

'Why did you tell Juan
and José you'd never heard of the guy?'

She shrugged. 'I don't
know—I panicked, I suppose. I couldn't tell them anything they didn't already
know, so I didn't say anything at all.' She shrugged again. 'It was a mistake.
I'm sorry.'

Chico
smiled at her. 'That's okay,
everybody makes mistakes. But why's he calling you now? That's what I want to
know.'

Ellie shook her head
helplessly. 'I don't know. I told you I don't know exactly what's going on.'
She paused a second and then took a gamble. 'Do you want me to ring him back?'

She held her breath and
prayed she'd read him right. If he said
yes, call him back
, she was
finished. He'd overhear the conversation and know that she'd twisted everything
round. Then it would be straight back downstairs for her. Down to the naughty
basement until she could be trusted again. Sayonara left breast.

'No, I don't think so,'
he said eventually. 'You might spook him.'

Ellie shook her head.
'No. I wouldn't. I promise—'

He held up his hands and
patted the air to quieten her down.

'I don't mean
deliberately. But you've had . . . a rough day'—he gave her a little smile—'and
you probably won't sound like yourself. Why not text him instead?'

So, under his guidance,
she sent Evan a text:
Just seen your calls. Can't talk. Text me.

The reply pinged back
almost immediately:
Where were you? Where are you now?

She showed Chico the reply and he told her what to say:
Long story. I'll explain later. Meet me at
hotel tomorrow morning at 9?

Ellie hoped that Evan
wouldn't be able to make it, but the reply came back:
Okay. See you then
.

Her heart sank.

'We'll look forward to
it, Mr Buckley,' Chico said with a self-satisfied smile.

Chapter 21

Evan got to Ellie's
hotel just before eight in the morning and headed straight up to her room, even
though he was an hour early. It wouldn't hurt to catch her off guard. It would
give him an advantage if she was still in her nightdress. Everybody felt stupid
talking to a fully clothed person when they were dressed for bed. Who knows, it
might even be some black, see-through item, not that he'd have schtupped her if
she'd begged him after the way she acted in the bar the other night.

But it was Evan who got
the surprise when it turned into déjà vu all over again. After he didn't get a
reply to his knock on the door he just went ahead and tried the handle. It was
unlocked. He stepped into the room and looked around. At first he thought
nobody had been back since last night. The mattress was still leaning up
against the wall, the drawers from the dresser still lying empty on the floor.
But then he noticed her clothes were missing. He couldn't see the suitcase
either. She'd obviously been back to the room, seen that it had been trashed
and cleared out.

So why arrange to meet
him here? Maybe she'd come back after she'd made the arrangement and couldn't
be bothered to change it. His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of his
cell phone. That must be her now.

'Where the hell are
you?' he snapped, without looking at the display. 'I'm getting pissed off with
this—'

'Good morning to you
too, Evan,' Guillory said.

Evan's mind went blank
for a moment. He recognized the voice but he couldn't place it.

'I take it you were
expecting somebody else,' Guillory said and laughed. 'At least I hope you
were.'

The sound of his
laughter made it click.

'Ed? Yeah, sorry about
that.'

In the background Evan
could hear what sounded like breakfast cereal being poured into a bowl. It
reminded him that he'd skipped breakfast to get here early and now she wasn't
even here. There was the sound of milk splashing into the bowl. It sounded
fresh and ice cold and made his mouth water.

'What's that? Cheerios?'

'Uh huh,' Guillory said
through a mouthful of food. Evan swallowed drily and waited.

'Isn't it a bit early in
the day to be getting so pissed?' Guillory said when he'd finished chewing.

Evan rolled his neck in
a figure of eight, massaged it with his fingers and let out a sigh.

'Easy for you to say,
sitting there having a leisurely breakfast, although normally I'd agree with
you, but this one—'

'Don't let the bastards
grind you down.'

Evan snorted. 'That's
very constructive, thank you—'

'Pleasure.'

'What are doing calling
so early anyway? I'm surprised you're out of bed.'

'Who said I'm out of
bed?' A long yawn came down the phone line. Evan was glad he wasn't there and
didn't have to look at all the little bits of cereal stuck in his teeth,
probably little pieces of nuts as well, not to mention his furry, white tongue,
because there was no way the guy could hold a bowl, a spoon and his phone and
cover his mouth as well. It didn't stop his stomach grumbling though.

'What do you want
anyway?'

'Seems to me you're
confusing me with that other caller again. Anyway, ignoring your rudeness, I've
got the information you wanted.'

'Sorry, you're right.
Fire away, you don't have to type it up.'

'Uh uh.'

'What do you mean,
uh
uh
?'

'I was thinking I'd call
your bluff on all those drinks you've promised me. What are you doing at
lunchtime?'

'Drinking on duty?
That's not like you.'

Guillory let out a quick
stutter of a laugh. 'I'll explain when I see you. Why don't you pick me up at
twelve thirty?'

Evan's phone pinged to
let him know he'd received a text. Maybe Ellie had tried to call him while he
was wasting time shooting the breeze with Guillory. Probably hadn't noticed he
had a call waiting because of the noise of all the crunching and slurping
coming from the other end of the line.

'Gotta go,' he said.
'I'll pick you up later.

He ended the call and
checked his messages. He was right; Ellie had just texted him.

I'm picking up
breakfast. Doughnuts or danish?

That was what you called
good timing. Guillory could shove his cheerios where the sun don't shine.
Danish
,
he texted back, his mouth salivating again. Maybe she wasn't so bad after all,
for a selfish, manipulative bitch. He sat down in the armchair and crossed one
leg over the other, but he couldn't get comfortable. He jumped up again and
walked over to the window. He stuffed both hands deep into his front pockets
and leaned back on his heels. It was quiet outside, hardly any traffic. He
turned to face the room again. The mattress caught his eye. He might as well
put it back on the bed. He was surprised the maid hadn't been in. He grabbed
hold of the corner and pulled it away from the wall and manhandled it onto the
bed frame. It was quite heavy and substantial which surprised him in a cheap
place like this.

He took a minute to get
the mattress straight on the bed, fixed the covers and looked at his watch.
Where the hell was she? How long did it take to pick up breakfast?
He
started to turn back to where the mattress had been propped against the wall,
see if there was anything that had been hidden behind it that he might have
missed the night before. A sudden noise behind him made him jump and spin
round; somebody was outside the door.
Not before time, he was starving
.
He took a step towards the door and stopped, heard footsteps on the other side,
but moving away, and then the sound of a key in a lock further down the hall.
Damn.

He turned round and
looked where the mattress had been and smiled to himself.
Idiot
. There
was nothing there, of course. Just dull wallpaper and some scuffed paintwork.
What had he been expecting? A message for help written in lipstick on the wall?
Blood? A dead body? He started to laugh then stopped abruptly as it suddenly
struck him.

Doughnuts or danish?

That was it. That was
what had been niggling him, making him antsy, stopping him from settling.
Listening to Guillory munch his way through breakfast had put him in the wrong
frame of mind, made him to listen to his stomach, not his gut, which wasn't the
same thing at all.

Doughnuts or danish?

Ellie had celiac
disease, he remembered now, how could he forget? She had to eat a one hundred
per cent gluten-free diet. One sniff of a doughnut or a danish would set off a
whole bunch of unpleasant symptoms from canker sores in her mouth to depression
and anxiety, pains in her bones and joints to little green men climbing out of
her vag for all he knew, the fuss she made about it. The thought of her
stopping to pick up doughnuts or danish for somebody else to enjoy while she
watched was laughable.

She hadn't sent the
text.

He ran to the window and
looked down at the street. Nothing had changed since he looked out five minutes
ago, no cars that weren't there before. He moved to the side of the window to
get a better view to where his car was parked further down the street. He
watched a car back into the space behind it. It looked similar to the one the
two Hispanics had been driving but he couldn't be sure. He couldn't see the
license plate from this distance or see through the windshield because of the
angle.

He watched it straighten
up, the driver making a meal of it, a feeling of dread rising up inside him.
The doors opened. Any lingering doubts evaporated as the same two guys climbed
out and looked around. One of them pointed to Evan's car and they both smiled,
walked up to it and peered through the windows. Did they think he was hiding
under a blanket in the back? Then the smaller guy, the one called José, pulled
something from his pocket and crouched down by the front tire. Evan caught the
glint of sunlight on a blade and watched, mesmerized, as if it wasn't his car
that was being casually vandalized, as José pushed the knife through the side
wall of the tire. There was no hiss of escaping air, he was too far away, but
he had no trouble seeing the tire slowly deflate as José worked the blade free
again, the car settling gracefully onto the wheel rim.

José straightened up,
snapping the knife shut and pocketing it, as they crossed the street towards
the hotel.