Read Online Denton - 01 - Dead Folks' Blues by Steven Womack - Free Book Online Page A

you sure you aren’t just thinking with your pecker?”
    I looked over at Walter. Sometimes he could be a real jerk.

Walter’s two-bit psychoanalysis pissed me off at first, but the truth was I’d already considered it. Rachel Fletcher comes to me with this story about her husband being in trouble with bookies and can I help him out and all that good stuff. The next thing you know, he’s dead. C’mon, give me a break. Something’s stinko.
    If I were a real detective, I’d have gone home, chugged a couple of shots of cheap bourbon, smoked a pack of unfiltered cigarettes, and grabbed a few hours’ shut-eye. But bourbon gives me heartburn like the devil, and the one time I smoked a cigarette was when I was twelve—out behind my grandparents’ garage. My father was going to spank me, until he decided that twenty minutes of projectile vomiting was punishment enough.
    And I sure as hell needed more than a few hours of shut-eye. I hate to confess it, but if I don’t get an unbroken eight hours of sleep every night, I’m not worth killing the next day. Just a wuss, I guess.
    By the time I got back to East Nashville, it was nearly four in the morning. I decided to hide out for a while and regroup. I closed all the blinds, made myself a cup of hot chocolate, turned the ringer off on the phone, and crawled into bed. I drifted off to sleep as an all-night news program played out some hostage drama in the Mideast.
    When I woke up, the soaps were on. Something about somebody being unfaithful to somebody else, or some such melodramatic twaddle. I was too dazed to know or care whatthey were talking about. I fumbled for the remote control. The room sank back into blessed silence.
    Only I couldn’t sink back into sleep. I lay there awhile, but it just wasn’t going to happen.
    The answering machine light was blinking a fast red. I pushed the button; the synthesized voice on a chip said: “Hello, you have … two … messages.”
    Rachel’s voice came next: “Harry, are you there? Harry? The police were here. They told me.… Oh, God, Harry—” There was a long silence, followed by a phlegmatic wet sob. “Call me.”
    Lonnie Smith, my repo buddy, was next: “Got one in Shelbyville, man, you interested? Trans Am, T-tops, should be a fun ride. I’ll bring the truck back. You can drive the Pontiac. Call me, dude.”
    Great, I’m in the middle of a murder, and now Lonnie wants me to swipe a car as well.
        There was a box on the front page of the morning paper, a short bulletin about Conrad’s death. Apparently it all happened too late to get full treatment. I suspected the story would be all over the afternoon paper, though. I also figured my answering machine at work would be overloaded with reporter calls as well, which is why I decided to stay away from my office for a while.
    I decided to take a chance and go see Dr. Marsha. I met Marsha Helms about five years ago, when I was covering a murder for the paper. I’d just been moved off the Lifestyles section onto Cityside, and it was my first real chance to get involved with the law enforcement bureaucracy in this town. Marsha helped me appreciably—gave me a lot of inside information, details I probably wasn’t supposed to know.
    Marsha’s tall, maybe an inch or two taller than me, and striking. Jet-black hair, red-frame glasses, a nose as sharp and well defined as a wasp’s sting. But not what you’d call classically beautiful. Attractive, though, and with a personality that could best—and diplomatically—be described as off the wall.
    What else would you expect from a lady who cuts open dead bodies for a living?
    I crossed over the river on the Memorial Bridge, through the dense lunchtime traffic, past the police station, then maneuvered my way around to First Avenue. The partly cobblestone street runs down behind all the old buildings on Second Avenue, the ones that were feed stores and blacksmith shops a hundred years ago, beautifully renovated