Walker (In the Company of Snipers #21) - Irish Winters Page 0,39

It had all come down to who had the bigger dick and more clout, the as-yet unnamed person behind the scenes.

Strolling along the dock, Walker came to a gray-haired man sitting on a fold-up chair with a shaggy white dog lying at his feet. The old guy wore glasses, a tweed cap, tattered gray pants, and an equally tattered gray button-up shirt that bloused over his paunch. Bright smears of paint blotched the shirt, no doubt from the paintbrush between his teeth and the palette on his knee.

When Walker came closer, the dog barked and jumped to its feet, slapping its front paws on the boardwalk like it wanted to play. “Shhhhh,” the old guy shushed even as he tipped forward into the wooden tripod where a small canvas rested. An easel, that was what it was. Not a tripod.

The dog barked and spun around, its voice ratcheting higher.

“Rover, no. I said be still. I’m working here,” the old man groused. He looked up over his black, square-rimmed spectacles. “Are you bothering my dog, mister?” he asked around the paintbrush still in his mouth, his right hand suspended above the canvas, not a hint of friendliness in his dark eyes. A thick, gray, street-sweeper mustache covered his top lip. Longish gray hair curled over his ears. Walker put him in his high sixties, maybe low seventies.

“Just out for a stroll,” he replied easily, as he extended a hand. “Name’s Hotrod. You’re American?”

The man’s shoulders deflated, as if he’d lost the mood, or whatever it was artists needed to paint. With a sigh, he set the brush in his hand over the smear of bright blue paint on his palette, then removed the other brush from between his teeth.

“Yup, and you’re another,” he grumbled as he leaned forward and shook Walker’s hand with one, short, there-now-leave-me-alone shake.

“Yes, sir. Sorry if I disturbed you.”

By then the dog, a Labrador-sized welcoming committee, stretched to the end of the long leash tied to one foot of the man’s chair. “Mind if I pet him?” Walker asked, not taking anything—like simple, every day courtesy—for granted.

With an annoyed sigh, the painter folded both arms over his barrel chest. “His name’s Rover and he’s a stray, but he likes me and…” He lifted both shoulders. “That’s more than I can say for most people. Hotrod, huh? Your parents give you that stupid name?”

Walker had to smile. “Just a nickname from my job,” he qualified, as he knelt to stroke his new friend’s furry snout. Damned if the crazy dog didn’t close his big black eyes and groan. “But it stuck. Guess I’m a stray like Rover.”

Wasn’t that the truth?

“Name’s Brimley Scott,” the old man growled as he extended his hand again. This time his grasp was strong and sure. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Hotrod Who-Ever-The-Hell-You-Really-Are. Marine?”

“Navy,” Walker admitted. It was always smarter to go with partial truths. Lies were too hard to keep track of. “Been out for a year now. Thought I’d sail the world while I still could.” He jerked his head back toward the dock where he’d berthed his yacht. “You know how it goes. Might as well do something exciting before I settle down.”

“Hmmpf. You even got a woman?” Brimley asked with a twinge of sarcasm. “As ugly as you are?”

Nothing said you’re home free like a dig from a fellow smart-assed warrior.

With a sigh that came from the depths of his all-American soul, Walker nodded, his heart instantly flung across the ocean to the only woman he’d ever spent a peaceful night with. “Yes,” he replied, then coughed and replied louder, “Yes, sir, I do.” At least, I wish I did.

The older guy’s lips twisted. “Good for you. See that you treat her right. Mine up and left. Guess she got tired of waiting.” His shoulders lifted again. “But I had important stuff to do, and some things can’t wait. So here I am. Me and somebody else’s dog. But Rover doesn’t give me any flack like she did. We’re good for each other. You hungry?”

That segue was abrupt. Walker lifted to his feet. “Nah. I’ve got places to go.” Too bad his stomach let out a growl that sounded like it came from Big Foot just then.

Brimley cocked his head, a spark of mischief in his dark eyes and a wrapped sandwich extended in his hand. “Want to try that again?” he asked as he glanced to the empty bench across from him. “I’m not going anywhere. Doesn’t look like