Altered States Read Online Free PDF

sense?
    When Conner arrived at the bail-bondsman’s establishment he found the front office empty. He stepped in and looked around the shabby room. On a desk there was a computer screen showing a half-completed game of solitaire. Then he heard distant raised voices from the back of the building. He un-holstered his gun and made his way quickly but cautiously down a dimly-lit corridor. At the end was a closed office door. The din of voices was louder but he could make out no figures through the obfuscated glass in the door. He placed one hand on the handle and held his gun in readiness. Slowly, he turned the handle and held it for a moment to wait for a reaction. There was none. In a swift motion he swung the door away from himself and brought both hands to his gun. The room was empty. It was a boardroom of some kind with an oval desk in the centre. On the desk was an open briefcase with piles of dollar bills spewing from it, some of them onto the floor.
    The raucous voices had now evolved into the unmistakable sounds of a man being repeatedly punched. Adjoining the office was a small kitchen area leading to the back yard. That was where the beating was taking place. Conner judged that only two people were involved and started to move quickly. By the time he was outside the larger and uglier of the two men was wielding a metal bar.
    ‘Police!’ Conner screamed. ‘Drop it. Now!’
    The bar-wielder stood motionless for a while, assessing the situation, slowly arriving at the inevitability of each of the possible outcomes. Eventually, he dropped his arm to his side, and then the bar to the floor. Whilst the big man was growing accustomed to the new balance of power, Conner called-in for uniformed back-up and a paramedic. As he did so, the guy on the floor spoke up weakly.
    ‘No,’ he rasped, ‘I don’t want to press charges.’
    ‘I don’t care,’ Conner replied. He quickly assessed the man’s physical condition. ‘You need medical attention. And this guy needs to calm down. So, either way, both of you are getting some flashy-light action. Now, anyone care to tell me what the hell’s going on here?’
    Silence.
    Silent submissive cowering from one; silent seething anger from the other.
    ‘I’m not very happy about this, I’ll have you know,’ Conner pointed out to break the silence. ‘I’m not supposed to be here. I only came for a quiet little chat and now I’m going to have to file a bloody report about it.’ The two remained motionless. ‘Well, this is nice. Whilst we’re sharing, you might like to know that I came here to ask about a man called Jackson Burch.’
    The angry guy’s seething erupted vocally. ‘That idiot –’ pointing to the man on the floor ‘– lost me half-million bucks over him.’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    The man quickly regained control and composure. ‘I’m not saying anything more till I’ve spoken to an attorney.’
    ‘Great.’ Conner rolled his eyes. He had to wait a while for the uniformed guys to turn up. He used these moments to arrive at the conclusion that there was no way his chief would not find out he was here, disobeying his orders. He figured that as he was already in deep enough shit it wouldn’t make much difference if he kept digging. So he took a ride to the hospital with the battered guy – one Kent Bradshaw, who was employed as a clerk at the bail-bondman’s office. The man doing the beating was his boss, and the altercation was over the bailing of Bigby. Apparently, the man who had bailed him had handed over a case of hundred-dollar bills that later on turned out to be a case of one -dollar bills. The case had only five thousand dollars in it when it should have had five- hundred thousand dollars.
    ‘That’s not a mistake you make easily,’ Conner pointed out to the clerk.
    ‘I know that. Especially when you know this is the result.’ He pointed to his tumescent features. ‘I can’t explain it. I sat there and I counted every single