Read Online The Fourth Watcher by Timothy Hallinan - Free Book Online

e’s just a bully.” They are in bed again, but the glow they shared an hour earlier is a fading memory. Rafferty’s fury, however, is still very much alive.
    â€œHe’s a government, ” Rose says. The sky has paled during the time it took him to talk her into trying to get some rest. Early light leaks balefully through the gaps in the tape over the space around the window air conditioner. Rose gives the new day the look she reserves for uninvited visitors and follows her train of thought. “Worse, with those policemen along, he’s two governments. I may not have written a bunch of books, Poke, but I know you don’t punch a government.”
    â€œI didn’t punch him.” He can’t bring himself to tell her what Elson said to provoke the aborted attack. “And I’m not the one who told him to go get laid.”
    â€œHe needs it,” Rose says.
    â€œI don’t think so. He probably jerks off to a spreadsheet.”
    â€œWhat mean ‘jerk off’?” Rose asks, reverting to pidgin. “Same-same ‘beef jerky’?” She takes another drag on the cigarette and hits the filter. “He has very bad energy,” she says in Thai. “He likes power too much. He needs to spend some time in a monastery. And you should have been more careful. You should have kept a cool heart.”
    â€œHe had it coming. His behavior was, as they say, ‘inappropriate.’” He uses the English word because he can’t think of a Thai equivalent.
    â€œWhat does that mean?” Rose lights a new cigarette off her old one, not a good sign. That was the way she smoked when he met her.
    â€œâ€˜Inappropriate’ is government talk.” He slides the ashtray closer to her so she can stub the butt. The stink of burning filter fills the room. “It means someone has fucked up on a planetary scale. When an American congressman is videotaped in bed with a fourteen-year-old male poodle, his behavior is usually described as inappropriate.”
    â€œFourteen is old for a dog,” Rose observes.
    â€œGee, and I thought you weren’t listening.”
    â€œI’m listening, Poke. I’m even thinking.” She shifts her back against the pillow propped behind her. The cloud of smoke she exhales is penetrated in a vaguely religious fashion by the invading fingers of light, good morning from Cecil B. DeMille. “This could be very bad for us.”
    â€œOh, relax. It’s not like you and Peachy are printing money in the basement. Today they’ll go to the bank where she got the bills, and that’ll be the end of it.”
    â€œMaybe.” She pulls the sheet up over her shoulders as though she is cold.
    â€œSure it will. It was an accident. Bad luck, that’s all.”
    She does not reply. But then she shakes her head and says, “Luck.”
    He slides his knuckles softly up her arm. “Okay, it’s not luck, it’s a kink in somebody’s karma. Worse comes to worst, you have to replace the counterfeit junk with real bills. Come on, Rose. It’s only money.”
    She does not look impressed by the insight.
    It didn’t cheer you up either, Rafferty thinks, and then, pop, he’s got something he’s sure will distract her. “Listen, did I ever tell you that it was money that first made me want to come to Asia?”
    â€œReally.” She takes a drag and blows the smoke away from him. “I thought you came here because you were destined to meet me.”
    â€œAh, but destiny moves in strange ways.” He laces his fingers togetheron top of his chest and lets his head sink into the pillow, his eyes on her profile. “In my case it was money. When I was a kid.”
    Now he gets the full gaze that always makes his spine tingle. “You never talk about when you were little.”
    â€œWell, I am now. You want to hear about it?”
    â€œOf course.” She gives him