A Living Grave Read Online Free PDF Page B

assholes.” That time he was looking at me, but there was something more than the conversation at hand in his gaze. He looked like a man having a good time. He added, “You know?” And then he looked from my face down my body. He wasn’t rude or trying to be obvious about it; just a little more honest than I was used to.
    â€œYeah,” I said. “I know what you mean.”
    Nelson Solomon, the famous painter, looked back at me then. He pursed his lips and looked like a schoolboy caught checking out the new teacher. I thought I should keep things on track, so I said, “Things don’t usually happen that way.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œPeople, even asshole bikers, don’t usually start in with random strangers. Especially not when they have to get off their bike, climb a fence, and cross a field to do it. Must have been some reason.”
    â€œMaybe he doesn’t like art?”
    â€œDo all your critics work so hard to make their point?”
    â€œSometimes it feels like it,” he said, smiling again.
    â€œCould this have been his property?”
    â€œNo,” Nelson said, and it was the first time he sounded absolutely certain. “Bank owns it.”
    â€œDid the bank give you permission to be here?” I asked as I put a foot on the center strand of wire and pulled up on the top strand.
    Just before ducking through he nodded again. Once back on the road side of the fence he said, “I’m a good customer.”
    I didn’t doubt that.
    â€œSo, you don’t know what the guy wanted?”
    â€œHe wanted to kick my ass and he mostly did.” He said that with a self-deprecating smile that, if I’m honest with myself, I enjoyed. Then he added, “I think he wanted me to be scared a little bit too.” That was the truest thing he’d said to me about the fight.
    â€œBut you didn’t just leave and call the sheriff’s department?”
    â€œI’ve had enough scares in my life.”
    That’s when I looked at his eyes and saw the kind of resolve that can make a cop’s life both easier and more difficult. You want to root for the good people who stand up for themselves, but at the same time you see the consequences of that every day.
    â€œYou decided you just had to fight him, then?”
    That grin again.
    â€œThere was no fight. Mostly it was just me getting beat up. I was already finished up and packed, but I learned a long time ago, if you let the bastards take, they never stop. He started pushing me around when I told him to kiss my ass. Then he took hold of my painting and said he was keeping it, and I was leaving. That’s when I swung the field kit at him.”
    I looked again out to the trees he had pointed to earlier. “Out there?” I asked. “Then how did all the mess get strewn around up here?”
    I looked away and watched the big cube-shaped ambulance pull up behind my SUV.
    â€œNo,” he said. “That was where he left me on the ground. There, where everything spilled out, was where I caught up to him.”
    â€œAnd I found you here because . . .”
    â€œI caught up to him again at his bike. He must have gotten a good one in to my ribs, because I went down. Then the kicking started. That’s why I thought maybe there were more of them. It felt like I was being trampled.”
    One of the EMT’s, an older man named Lawrence trotted up to me at the fence with his big kit.
    â€œWhat’s up, Hurricane?” he asked.
    I pointed over to Solomon.
    â€œI don’t need an ambulance,” he said, waving both hands in front of himself.
    â€œGo with Lawrence,” I told him. “If nothing else, he’ll wipe some of that blood off your face.”
    Solomon hit me with a look that said something there were no words for, but women always recognize. The surprising thing about it was that I didn’t mind. Then the look blossomed into that