Submission Read Online Free PDF Page B

was a smart choice. But there were times…
    Joanna charged to a doorway,
coming to a sudden halt. “This is it,” she said, her gaze dancing over the
façade. “This is the restaurant.”
    “Doesn’t look like much of a
restaurant,” Mike said. The windows were boarded over and the awning was torn.
There was no signage and the place smelled of abandonment.
    Joanna tried the door but it was
locked.
    “I know they’re in there,” she
said with a ferocity that surprised him. She tipped her head back to look up
the facade. Even without make-up, with her hair tightly pulled back, she was
gorgeous. “Maybe we can get in through a window.” She turned an expectant gaze
upon him. “Do you think anyone would lend us a ladder?”
    Mike sighed at her innocence.
Giving Joanna what she wanted was too much temptation for him. “Just look
away,” he said gruffly.
    “What? What are you going to do?”
    Mike met her gaze. “Just look
away.”
    She exhaled, never liking anyone
else taking charge, and deliberately turned her face away. Mike knew she
wouldn’t keep her gaze averted for long. He pulled the pick from his pocket,
hid it in his hand, and worked the lock quickly. He turned the knob and opened
the door. “After you,” he said.
    Joanna looked from his hand to the
door and back to his eyes. “I thought you were Mr. Clean.”
    He smiled and shrugged.
    She dropped the subject, too
excited about the story to think about him.
    There was a message he should take
to heart.
    Joanna lunged into the darkened
space like a hound on the hunt. Of course, she had a flashlight in her purse
– this woman was always ready for everything – and she shone it
around the space with purpose.
    It was empty. Mike could see the
bare floorboards underfoot. The walls had been stripped down to plaster,
plaster that was cracked and yellowed. There were a couple of stray chairs, old
metal ones, and a lot of broken wood. It smelled like dust and decay, probably
because of the hole in the floor to the basement, a hole big enough that it
could swallow a pick-up.
    Mike was sure he could hear the
scuttling of rats. If this had looked like a restaurant the night before, Rex
must have more money to burn than was once the case. He became curious about
the Plume and its fortunes, more curious than he should be.
    He was done with that life. It was
over.
    “Nice place,” he said as Joanna stared
around herself in dismay.
    “It was here,” she said. “I know
it was here. And there were booths and the walls were lined with velvet and
there were rugs and, and…” She turned to look at him. “Do you believe me?”
    Mike did believe her, but only
because he knew Rex. “It doesn’t look like much of a restaurant, Joanna. Could
they really have torn all of that out that fast?”
    Yes. He’d helped do similar things
in his days at the Plume.
    Her shoulders drooped and he hated
that he was responsible for disappointing her. Then she illuminated the back
wall with her flashlight. “I met her in a room, back there.”
    “Joanna, I think we should go.
This is a dead end.”
    “Just one look. Please?”
    He couldn’t resist her. He could
never resist her. Even if all she wanted was a byline.
    He couldn’t even give her that.
    She headed for the back corner,
the beam of the flashlight darting this way and that as she sought some sign of
what she was sure she’d witnessed.
    Mike worked his way around the
hole in the floor. He could see something glistening down there and it smelled
bad enough that he didn’t want to investigate.
    He found her in the back corner,
standing dejected. “You know what this means, right?” she said when he got to
her side.
    He did. Rex was messing with her,
getting rid of her and her curiosity, ensuring she didn’t get a story. Mike
didn’t want to be the one to tell Joanna that she’d failed.
    “Go ahead and tell me.” Mike could
see something in the corner, something that looked like it didn’t belong in
this