Down Don't Bother Me (9780062362209) Read Online Free PDF Page A

Underground Jesus a nickel. But what I mean is, last year you found his kid for him.”
    I hesitated. This was suddenly getting into some pretty confidential territory. I wondered how Luster knew about it. Surely not from Dooley, who was a close-lipped sort, but others were involved, too, not least Dooley’s daughter. Some of them weren’t so close-lipped. Not least Dooley’s daughter. Others, too, probably.
    I decided to play noncommittal. “Something like that might have happened, one time or another.”
    Luster waved his hand.
    â€œDon’t lawyer me, boy. Word is, the kid started running with a pretty dubious crowd. Something to do with this meth shit we got running wild these days. Maybe the kid was just using or maybe she was selling, too. Whichever it was, she was being used by her gang. Bag whoring, they call it. Pussy for drugs. You know anything about that?”
    â€œNope.”
    â€œNasty business. Anyway, story is that Dooley went to retrieve her. I hear he didn’t want her back so much. The kid had been trouble for a long time, a bad seed. But his wife was brokenhearted over the whole deal and talked him into it. So off he goes to confront these black-toothed bastards, and for his trouble he gets the holy dog shit beat out of him. Word then has it that he set you loose on them, and you tore through ’em like a tornado through a trailer park. They say you left a lot of hats on the ground.”
    â€œI can’t say.”
    â€œHell, Slim, I don’t expect you to tell,” he said, and smiled and winked at me because we were men sharing things. “Secrets are secrets. It’s a rare man these days who understands that and can keep his hole shut. I just wanted you to know that I know. They say you’ve got a bloodhound’s nose, and you’re either too brave or too stupid to be afraid.”
    â€œThanks.”
    He didn’t care for that. He had a wealthy man’s touchiness, and he showed it to me.
    â€œI just mean you got tangled up in a rough situation with bad actors and came out of it on top. Jesus, Slim, sit down.”
    His words were barely audible over the sound of rain tapping the window glass, but as soon as he said it, Jonathan came back in through the door pushing a roller chair. It was like a magic act. I sat down.
    Luster pressed on. “And I hear you helped out a few more fellas here at the mine. Finding folks for them, I mean. Bringing ’em home. They say you have a knack for that kind of thing. Bloodhounding. That true?”
    I didn’t like saying so, at least not until I had better idea of where all this was headed. Facts were facts, though, and the fact was that after the aforementioned business with Dooley I’d been approached by a handful of folks eager to locate this missing person or that. Sometimes I found them and brought them home—runaway kids, mostly—and sometimes I found them and left them alone, if leaving them alone felt like the right thing to do. But I always found them.
    Luster waited. I waited. Jonathan waited. Somewhere, a turkey buzzard fell out of the sky. Finally, the old man said, “Okay, let’s assume it’s true, then. And let’s assume also that this talent of yours is something I’m currently in the marketfor. You know about this business in the Knight Hawk? The body they found down there?”
    â€œIt was in my section, so I knew right away. I even got a look at him.”
    â€œName was Dwayne Mays. Local press, dead-tree division. Someone screwed a pistol in his ear and separated him from his brains, so this won’t be one of those things that burns off with the morning dew. The cops are plenty interested in how and why Mays’s body ended up down in my Knight Hawk.”
    â€œIt makes sense they would be,” I said. “It’s their job, isn’t it?”
    â€œBackcountry parts, their job is usually stroking their chickens and