Dark Horse (A Jim Knighthorse Novel) (23 page)

I immediately recognized the tall one with
the wavy black hair as Kingsley Fulcrum, looking rugged and
dashing.

Down girl.

As the group approaches the courthouse steps,
a smallish man steps out from behind the trunk of a white birch.
Three of the four great defenders pay the man little mind. The one
who does, a blond-haired woman with glasses and big hips, looks up
and frowns. She probably frowns because the little man is reaching
rather menacingly inside his coat pocket. His thick mane of black
hair is disheveled, and somehow even his thick mustache looks
disheveled, too. The woman, still frowning, turns back to the
group.

And what happens next still sends shivers
down my spine.

From inside his tweed jacket, the little man
removes a short pistol. We now know it’s a .22. At the time, no one
sees him remove the pistol. The short man, perhaps ten feet away
from the group of four, takes careful aim, and fires.

Kingsley’s head snaps back. The bullet enters
over his left eye.

I lean forward, staring at my computer
screen, rapt, suddenly wishing I had a bowl of popcorn, or at least
a bag of peanut M&Ms. That is, until I remembered that I can no
longer eat either.

Anyway, Kingsley’s cohorts immediately
scatter like chickens before a hawk. The shorter man even ducks and
rolls dramatically as if he’s recently seen duty in the Middle East
and his military instincts are kicking in.

Kingsley is shot again. This time in the
neck, where a small red dot appears above his collar. Blood quickly
flows down his shirt. Instead of collapsing, instead of dying after
being shot point blank in the head and neck, Kingsley actually
turns and looks at the man.

As if the man had simply called his name.

As if the man had not shot him twice.

What transpires next would be comical if it
wasn’t so heinous. Kingsley proceeds to duck behind a nearby tree.
The shooter, intent on killing Kingsley, bypasses going around a
park bench and instead jumps over it. Smoothly. Landing squarely on
his feet while squeezing off a few more rounds that appear to hit
Kingsley in the neck and face. Meanwhile, the big attorney ducks
and weaves behind the tree. This goes on for seemingly an eternity,
but in reality just a few seconds. A sick game of tag, except
Kingsley’s getting tagged with real bullets.

And still the attorney does not go down.

Doesn’t even collapse.

The shooter seemingly realizes he’s wasting
his time and dashes away from the tree, disappearing from the
screen. No one has come to Kingsley’s rescue. The other attorneys
are long gone. Kingsley is left to fend for himself, his only
protection the tree, which has been torn and shredded by the
impacting stray bullets.

Witnesses would later report that the shooter
left in a Ford pickup. No one tried to stop him, and I really
didn’t blame them.

I paused the picture on Kingsley. Blood is
frozen on his cheeks and forehead, even on his open, outstretched
palms. His face is a picture of confusion and horror and shock. In
just twenty-three seconds, his life had been utterly turned upside
down. Of course, in those very same twenty-three seconds most
people would have died.

But not Kingsley. I wondered why.

5.

I was at the Fullerton police station,
sitting across from a homicide detective named Sherbet. It was the
late evening, and most of the staff had left for the day.

“You’re keeping me from my kid,” he said.
Sherbet was wearing a long sleeved shirt folded up at the elbows,
revealing heavily muscled forearms covered in dark hair. The dark
hair was mixed with a smattering of gray. I thought it looked sexy
as hell. His tie was loosened, and he looked irritable, to say the
least.

“I apologize,” I said. “This was the only
time I could make it today.”

“I’m glad I can work around your busy
schedule, Mrs. Moon. I wouldn’t want to inconvenience you in any
way.”

His office was simple and uncluttered. No
pictures on the wall. Just a desk, a computer, a filing cabinet and
some visitor’s chairs. His desk had a few picture frames, but they
were turned toward him. From my angle, I could only see the price
tags.

I gave him my most winning smile. “I
certainly appreciate your time, detective.” I had on plenty of
blush, so that my cheeks appeared human.

The smile worked. He blushed himself. “Yeah,
well, let’s make this quick. My kid’s playing a basketball game
tonight, and I wouldn’t want to miss him running up and down the
court with no clue what the hell is going on around him.”

“Sounds like a natural.”

“A natural dolt. Wife says I should just
leave him alone. The trouble is, if I leave him alone, he tends to
want to play Barbies with the neighborhood girls.”

“That worries you?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“You think he could turn out gay?”

He shrugged uncomfortably, and said nothing.
It was a touchy subject for him, obviously.

“How old is your son?” I asked.

“Eight.”

“Perhaps he’s a little Casanova. Perhaps he
sees the benefits of playing with girls, rather than boys.”

“Perhaps,” said Sherbet. “For now, he plays
basketball.”

“Even though he’s clueless.”

“Where there’s a will there’s a way.”

“Even if it’s your will and your way?” I
asked.

“For now, it’s the only way.” He paused, then
looked a little confused. He shook his head like a man realizing he
had been mumbling out loud. “How the hell did we get on the subject
of my kid’s sexuality?”

“I forget,” I said, shrugging.

He reached over and straightened the folder
in front of him. The folder hadn’t been crooked, now it was less
uncrooked. “Yeah, well, let’s get down to business. Here’s the
file. I made a copy of it for you. It’s against procedures to give
you a copy, but you check out okay. Hell, you worked for the
federal government. And why the hell you’ve gone private is your
own damn business.”

I reached for the file, but he placed a big
hand on it. “This is just between you and me. I don’t normally give
police files to private dicks.”

“Luckily I’m not your average private
dick.”

“A dick with no dick,” he said.

“Clever, detective,” I said.

“Not really.”

“No, not really,” I admitted. “I just really
want the file.”

He nodded and lifted his palm, and I promptly
stuffed the file into my handbag. “Is there anything you can tell
me that’s perhaps not in the file?”

He shook his head, but it was just a
knee-jerk reaction. In the process of shaking his head, he was
actually deep in thought. “It should all be in there.” He rubbed
the dark stubble at his chin. The dark stubble was also mixed with
some gray. “You know I always suspected the guy doing the shooting
was a client of his. I dunno, call it a hunch. But this attorney’s
been around a while, and he’s pissed off a lot of people. Trouble
is: who’s got the time to go through all of his past files?”

“Not a busy homicide detective,” I said,
playing along.

“Damn straight,” he said.

“Any chance it was just a random shooting?” I
asked.

“Sure. Of course. Those happen all the
time.”

“But you don’t think so.”

“No,” he said.

“Why?” I asked.

The detective was used to this kind of
exchange. He worked in a business where if you didn’t ask
questions, you didn’t find answers. If my questions bothered him,
he didn’t show it, other than he seemed to be impatient to get this
show on the road.

“Seemed premeditative. And no robbery
attempt. Also seemed to be making a statement, as well.”

“By shooting him in the face?”

“And by shooting him outside the courthouse.
His place of work. Makes you think it was business related.”

I nodded. Good point. I decided not to tell
the detective he had a good point. Men tend to think all of their
points were good, and they sure as hell didn’t need me to boost
their already inflated egos.

I’m cynical that way.

He stood from his desk and retrieved a sport
jacket from a coat rack. He was a fit man with a cop’s build. He
also had a cop’s mustache. He would have looked better without the
mustache, but it wasn’t was my place to suggest so. Besides, who
better to wear a cop mustache than a cop?

“Now it’s time to go watch my son screw up
the game of basketball,” he said.

“Maybe basketball’s not his game.”

“And playing with girls is?”

“It’s not a bad alternative,” I said, then
added. “You think there’s a chance you’re reading a little too much
into all of this with your son?”

“I’m a cop. I read too much into everything.”
He paused and locked his office door, which I found oddly amusing
and ironic since his office was located in the heart of a police
station. “Take you, for instance.”

I didn’t want to take me for instance. I
changed the subject. “I’m sure you’re a very good officer. How long
have you been on the force?”

He ignored my question. “I wondered why you
insisted on meeting me in the evening.” As he spoke, he placed his
hand lightly at the small of my back and steered me through the row
of cluttered desks. His hand was unwavering and firm. “When I asked
you on the phone the reason behind the late meeting you had
mentioned something about being busy with other clients. But when I
called your office later that day to tell you that I was going to
be delayed, you picked up the phone immediately.” He paused and
opened a clear glass door. On the door was etched FPD. “Perhaps you
were meeting your clients in the office. Or perhaps you were
in-between clients. But when I asked if you had a few minutes you
sounded unharried and pleasant. Sure, you said, how can I help
you?”

“Well, I pride myself on customer service,” I
said.

He was behind me, and I didn’t see him smile.
But I sensed that he had done so. In fact, I knew he had smiled.
Call it a side effect.

He said, “Now that I see you, I see you have
a skin disorder of some type.”

“Why, lieutenant, you certainly know how to
make a girl feel warm and fuzzy.”

“And that’s the other thing. When I shook
your hand, it felt anything but warm and fuzzy,” he said.

“So what are you getting at?” I asked. We had
reached the front offices. We were standing behind the main
reception desk. The room was quiet for the time being. Outside the
smoky gray doors, I could see Commonwealth Avenue, and across that,
Amerige City Park, which sported a nice little league field.

He shrugged and smirked at me. “If I had two
guesses, I would say that you were either a vampire, or, like I
said, you had a skin condition.”

“What does your heart tell you?” I asked.

He studied me closely. Outside, commuters
were working their way through downtown Fullerton. Red taillights
burned through the smoky glass. Something passed across his gaze.
An understanding of some sort. Or perhaps wonder. Something. But
then he grinned and his cop mustache rose like a referee signaling
a touchdown.

“A skin disease, of course,” he said. “You
need to stay out of the sun.”

“Bingo,” I said. “You’re a hell of a
detective.”

And with that I left. Outside, I saw that my
hands were shaking. The son-of-a-bitch had me rattled. He was one
hell of an intuitive cop.

I hate that.

And the adventures of Jim Knighthorse
continue with:

Jim Knighthorse #2

by

J.R. Rain

(read on for a sample)

Chapter One

I was doing decline push ups when my office
door opened. Decline push ups cause a lot of blood to rush to your
head and a fabulous burn across the upper pectorals. They also
looked pretty damn silly in a professional environment. Luckily,
this wasn’t a professional environment.

Somebody was quietly watching me, probably
admiring my near-perfect form or the way my tee shirt rippled
across my broad shoulders. Either way, I rattled off twenty more,
completing my set of a hundred.

In a distinctive country twang, a man’s voice
said, “I could come back.”

“And miss my near-perfect form?”

I eased my running shoes off the desk and
immediately felt a wave of light-headedness. Granted, I didn’t
entirely mind the light-headedness. I am, after all, a sucker for a
good buzz.

The man who came swimmingly into view was
wearing a cowboy hat and leaning against my door frame, a bemused
expression on his weathered face. He was about twenty years my
senior.

“Howdy partner,” I said.

He tipped his Stetson. “So what do those push
ups supposed to do, other than cause a lot of blood rush to your
head?”

“That’s enough for me,” I said happily. “Oh,
and they happen to be a hell of a chest workout.”

“Seems like a lot trouble,” he said.

“It’s not easy being beautiful.”

“Ah,” he said. “You must be Jim Knighthorse.
I heard about you.”

“Lucky you.”

As he spoke, his Adam’s apple bobbed up and
down like a buoy in a storm. His white hat sported an excessively
rolled brim—completely useless now against the sun or rain. Maybe
he was a country music star.

“I was told you could be a cocky son of a
bitch.”

“You would be, too,” I said. “If you were
me.”

He looked at me and shrugged. “Well, maybe.
You’re certainly a big son of a bitch.”

I said nothing. My size spoke for itself. He
looked around my small office, perhaps noting the many pictures and
trophies that cluttered the walls and bookcases, all in recognition
of my considerable prowess on the football field. Actually, all but
one. There was a second place spelling bee trophy in there
somewhere. Lost it on zumbooruk, a camel-mounted canon used in the
Middle East. Hell of a shitty word to lose it on.