Read Online Kim Oh 3: Real Dangerous People (The Kim Oh Thrillers) by K. W. Jeter - Free Book Online

out of bed, went over, and pulled the curtain back. Just a little window, keeping himself well to the side. Just in case.
     
    “What’s the matter, dear?” His wife raised her head from her pillow.
     
    Falcon went on gazing out the window. He saw Foley below, walking down the driveway toward the gates.
     
    “Nothing,” he said. “Go back to sleep.”
     
    She closed her eyes and turned her face back against the pillow. He let the curtain fall back in place, then went to the closet and rummaged through the pockets of one of his suits. He found a scrap of paper and stood looking at it for a while, then tossed it on top of the bedroom dresser. Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he picked up the phone from behind the stack of books and started to dial.
     
    * * *
     
    Over at the White Hawk, things were finally livening up.
     
    Still sitting at the bar, nursing a beer, Elton watched as a minimal combo – nothing but a drum kit and a weirdly skinny guy with a beat-up Telecaster knock-off – set up on the little stage.
     
    “Hey – it’s freezing in here!” The guitarist called over to the bartender. “How the hell are people supposed to dance, have some fun, they got icicles hanging off ’em?”
     
    The bartender came out from behind the bar, carrying a battered gasoline can with him. In the middle of the room was a fifty-five-gallon metal drum, lidless. He topped up the drum contents from the gas can, then stood back and tossed a lit match into it. Blue flames licked up from the top of the drum. The place was so cold that even a minimal heat source like that was enough to bring the temperature up a couple of degrees.
     
    Elton had seen that kind of thing before. He told me that where he came from, there were plenty of places where an arrangement like that was pretty much considered to be central heating. If you were in a dancing mood, you just wanted to make sure that you didn’t get so drunk that you were in danger of bumping into it.
     
    “That’s more like it.” The guitarist went back to conferring with his drummer about the set list. Which mainly consisted of deciding which of a half-dozen three-chord standards – the usual bar band repertoire – they’d play first.
     
    Still working on his beer, Elton didn’t turn around when he heard the door open and close. Two big guys, harder and uglier-looking than anyone else there, slid in at the bar on either side of him.
     
    “Well, look who’s here?” One of them flashed a gold-toothed smile. “It’s my man Elton. How ya been?”
     
    He didn’t return the smile. “Not too bad, Sammy.”
     
    “Bud there gave me a call.” Sammy indicated the bartender with a nod. “Said you’ve been looking for me. Shitfire, pal, I’m not that hard to find.”
     
    “You are when you owe people money.”
     
    “Money?” Sammy feigned surprise. “What money are you talking about?”
     
    “Don’t act dumb. The money you got fronted for that bookie operation you’re running over on Decatur.”
     
    “That money? I thought that money was a gift .”
     
    The two big guys exchanged smirks above Elton’s head. Who wasn’t amused.
     
    “It wasn’t,” he said quietly. “And you’re overdue on your payments. As in haven’t made any.”
     
    “Well, that is a shame. Leon, I bet you feel bad about that, don’t you?”
     
    “Yeah,” grunted the other guy. “It’s tragic.”
     
    “It surely is.” Sammy shook his head. “’Cause I don’t know when I’ll be getting around to making any. Payments, that is.”
     
    “Sammy –” Elton gave the man a hard stare. “You’re in big trouble.”
     
    “I don’t think so.” An even more emphatic shake of the head. “But I think you might have a little problem. When you go back to those loan sharks you hang out with – especially that Falcone douche – and you have to tell your boss you can’t get his money back for him.
     
    “Let me tell you something, Sammy.” Elton’s