I couldn’t help myself, I laughed.
“You aren’t going to have to identify my body,” I told him.
“I hope not. Your timing, it’ll be during a Broncos game. That’d piss me off.”
I smiled at him.
“Okay, I’ll try not to get killed during a Broncos game.”
He gave me one of his looks, the kind he’d been giving me for four months. The kind that made my gut twist. It was fleeting and he hid it fast but I saw it and I knew he was worried.
I decided not to go there.
“Do you want me to make you dinner?” I asked.
His eyes got huge. “What? Now you tryin’ to kill me?”
It was safe to say I wasn’t the best of cooks.
Auntie Reba could cook. She was the queen of time-economy cooking. It took her about fifteen minutes to prepare a delicious, three course feast for thirty people. She was a kitchen goddess.
Unfortunately, while she was doing this, Nick and I were listening to Stevie Wonder or Elton John or The Marshall Tucker Band, depending on our mood. Therefore, I never learned to cook.
“I was thinking quesadillas,” I suggested.
Anyone could melt cheese between a couple of tortillas. How hard could that be?
“You eaten yet?” Nick asked.
“Nope,” I told him.
“Goin’ out tonight?” he went on.
“Yep.”
“I’ll make dinner,” he decided.
We both knew that was probably best.
And most nights Nick made dinner anyway.
* * * * *
I sat at a table in the back of the bar, my back to the wall, watching Darius Tucker.
He was a tall, lean, black man with twists in his hair. He was very good-looking, had a way of holding himself that made you notice him and he was also a very bad guy.
I knew as well and was surprised by the fact that he was reportedly close to both Lee Nightingale and Eddie Chavez. Nightingale worked for money and, from what I could tell, had a foot planted on both sides of the fence. But Chavez was a cop.
This relationship intrigued me.
I’d been on the tail of one of Darius’s boys, a dealer. The dealer led me to Darius and I was watching.
It was late. I was tired. I’d had a shit day, not to mention, mentally relived the whole Park nightmare. I wasn’t sure I was in the mood for mayhem so I’d decided to give the night over to reconnaissance.
Know thy enemy.
I was keeping my eye out for Crowe, or any of the Nightingale boys. I’d only ever seen Crowe, the rest of them were still shadows for me. Though, I’d heard enough about them that I could probably pick them out in a crowd.