Stick Read Online Free PDF Page B

the girl and was pulling the chain tight so that it dug into her nice flat belly.
    â€œThe one in the pink shirt on the boat?” Rainy came over and pointed. “That one. That’s Chucky.”
    Stick didn’t say anything right away. His first impression, Chucky was one of those poor miserable slobs everybody picked on when they were kids, washed his face with snow, and he’d slink off rubbing his tears and snot, to go eat some candy.
    â€œIs that Chucky’s boat?”
    â€œI don’t think so. If it’s his he never ask me to go for a ride.”
    â€œNice-looking broads.”
    He said it to see if Rainy would correct him, tell him no, they were chicks. But Rainy didn’t say anything and Stick turned away from the photographs.
    There was a dartboard hanging on the wall, the paneling around it gorged with tiny holes.
    There was a TV set. At first Stick thought there were two standing side by side but then saw the smaller one was a home computer. Seven years agohe remembered computers as big metal boxes. Now little kids were playing with them. He had not played any of those games yet himself; they looked complicated.
    He picked up from the floor a straw cowboy hat with a big scoop brim and looked inside it. The “Crested Beaut” model, with the initials CLG engraved in the sweatband. Stick placed it on the hat-tree that was piled with hats and caps of all kinds. Different-colored golf caps, a yachting cap, an orange hardhat, a straw boater, a red military beret, a long-billed fisherman hat, a New York Yankee baseball cap, a tennis hat. The guy seemed to like hats and telephones.
    Stick walked over to the glass doors, slid one open and Rainy said, “Lionel told us to wait here, man.”
    â€œI won’t go too far,” Stick said.
    It was warmer outside than in and felt good. He’d have to get used to air conditioning again. The sun was going fast now, laying off beyond where the Everglades would be, just the top part of it showing now, fiery red, but you could look right at it. You could almost see it going down.
    Directly below, on the waterway, it seemed hours later, already getting dark down there, the boats showing their running lights, and there was a string of dull amber bulbs along the awning of Wolfgang’soutside terrace. Stick was looking almost straight down at it and could hear the music, a faint pulsing beat he would swear was disco. They’d have to remember to go back after and pay the tab. He could picture Bobbi, the friendly bartender, the easy way she had with the young guys coming in high-fiving each other, making loud remarks. Rainy was right, he had to lay back and get with the rhythm of it again. Loud remarks that could get you stabbed in Jackson didn’t mean a thing outside. Just guys showing off, trying to act like studs. That Bobbi was sure nice looking . . .
    Stick straightened from the metal railing, looking down the length of the balcony, and saw a heavyset guy with his shirt hanging out, maybe thirty feet away, and it took him by surprise. At first he thought the guy was throwing up, the way he was leaning over the rail; but now he straightened and did a little pivot and Stick saw he was talking on the phone. It had to be Chucky. Even without the pink shirt he had on in the boat picture, yeah, that would be Chucky. He didn’t look like the type of guy who owned the whole top floor of a condominium. He looked to Stick like a guy, if he was ever in Jackson, would be somebody’s live-in old lady before he ever got out of R and G.
    Chucky was saying into the phone, “I’m not holding out on you, don’t say that. You and I been doing business . . .  Come on, you know goddamn well I would never . . .  What? . . .  No. Why would I want to cut off my source, for Christ sake? Look, we been all over that. I goofed, okay? I got taken in same as you. Listen, I even had his