Read Online A Reason to Live (Marty Singer1) by Matthew Iden - Free Book Online

it."
    "How's that going to happen?"
    "You. I don't have access now. To anything. If I dig something up, I can't chase it down, can't follow it until I get something out of it."
    "You want me to dig up anyone from that posse he always had around him?"
    "Who?" I asked. "Lawrence Ferrin? Delaney?"
    He nodded. "Those assholes always stuck together. Ferrin especially, thinking he was the cat's ass because his old man would get him out of a bind if he needed it."
    I shrugged. "If you don't turn something up on Wheeler, sure. It would tickle me to no end to find out that we could nail Ferrin or Delaney on something related to Wheeler. ‘Til then, though, make Wheeler number one."
    We were quiet for a minute. My beer sat, untouched. Kransky took another sip of his, staring outside. All around us, the place clattered and banged with the delivery of sushi boards and rice dishes.
    "You know," he said slowly, "After the trial, I made it a hobby to keep track of him."
    I didn't say anything.
    "I was ready to bust him on anything. Littering, jaywalking, whatever it took to reel him in. I was…a little out of my head. I wanted to make his life hell. If I'd found him, I was ready to plant something on him. Drugs, a gun, anything to put him away. I've never done that in my life."
    "And?"
    "A month or two after the trial, he was gone. I checked his plates, ran his record, but he just floated away."
    "When's the last time you checked?"
    "Years," he admitted.
    "So, nothing recent? Autotrack? LexisNexis?"
    He shook his head. "Nothing in the modern age."
    "So, it's been a while, but Wheeler didn't just cease to exist. Maybe something's been digitized since the last time you checked. Run the records again. If you dig something up, I can chase down the leads. And keep Amanda safe."
    "I can do that. What are you going to do while I look around?"
    "Something I don't want to do," I said with a sour look.
    His eyebrows shot upward. "Atwater?"
    "She might know something. Hell, maybe they've stayed in touch this whole time. Crooks have been known to fall in love with their defense attorneys for getting them off. Maybe all I have to do is peek in her bedroom window."
    He watched the kooky samurai movie for a second. I could sense a wave of discomfort coming from him. "I heard about the…"
    I gave him a second, then said, "Cancer, Jim. You can say it."
    He nodded, discomfort on his face. "You up for this?"
    I took a sip of beer, put my glass down. "I'd better be. She doesn't have anybody else. She's not long out of college, probably doesn't have two nickels to rub together. Who am I to turn her down?"
    "What if you can't take care of it?"
    I said nothing, though a muscle in my cheek ticced involuntarily. I watched his face as he figured it out.
    "That's why you came to me," he said. "You were afraid if you didn't make it…"
    "She needs somebody on her side, Jim. As long as I'm it, I'll do what I can. But if I'm out of the picture, I know there's only one other person who cares enough to take over. You and I don't have to hold hands over this, but it would be good to know you'll be there if she needs you. Like I said, we both owe it to her. You in?"
    "I'm in," he said. "I always have been."
     

 
    iii.
     
    The old man coughed into his fist. His nurse, out of earshot but watching him closely, moved forward. The old man waved him away and spoke into the phone.
    "You can't find him?"
    "He's in DC, that's all we know," the voice on the other end said. "Used a credit card in Logan Circle. We squeezed the number out of the shitbird that gave it to him."
    "Dead end?"
    "Single use, then he ditched the card."
    "Keep on it. Did you find the girl?"
    "She's a professor or something at GW. There's something, though. She made a trip to Arlington."
    "And?"
    The man paused. "I saw her talking with Marty Singer."
    The old man closed his eyes out of disgust instead of pain. "She met with Marty fucking Singer?"
    The man said nothing.
    "Goddamnit," the old man said, then