Chapter 34

Lincoln Steele parked his rental car under the same street light on Main Street that he had the last time he visited the Red Dog Saloon and strolled down the dimly lit alley. He paused at the open door to survey the inside. Red stood behind the bar thumbing through a magazine lying on the counter. A man and woman sat at a table in the farthest corner. Both chairs were side by side on the same side of the square table. The woman, in her twenties, had stark red hair that had to have been colored from a bottle. Maybe even a bottle of dye that went bad. Her eyes were closed. The man, brown haired with gray at the temples, looked twice her age. He was nibbling the side of her neck. A bottle of beer and a half empty martini glass sat on the table.

Red Maran looked up when Steele entered. The couple at the table didn’t notice so Steele stomped his feet as he stepped up to the bar. The man yanked his hand out from under the table and the woman’s eyes popped open. She gasped. Now closer to the bar counter, more of what was behind it came into view and Steele had an unobstructed view under the table. The woman snapped her legs together and tugged both sides of her skirt down. She shifted in the chair. The man glared at Steele. The woman stared wide-eyed, all the while fidgeting with her skirt.

Steele climbed onto the round bar stool in front of the open Guns & Ammo magazine.

Red’s eyes were locked on Steele and his lips were curled in a sneer. “What do you want?”

Steele glanced at the couple at the table who were still eyeballing him and then his eyes drifted around the empty room before returning to Red. “Looks like a slow night.”

“You put my regulars in the hospital. What do you expect? I said, what do you want?”

“A beer. On tap.”

“We ain’t the only place in town to get a drink. You got a lot of nerve coming here?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“I told you the last time that I didn’t want to see you again. Remember my threat?”

“I didn’t see it as a threat. I thought you understood why I did what I did. Isn’t that why you stayed out of it?”

Red stared at Steele through narrowed eyes and then they softened. “They never said nothing about doing what they did. They were supposed to— They were wrong doing what they done.”

“So, can I have a beer?”

Red studied Steele and then placed a tall glass under the tap and pulled the lever. He tilted the glass and flipped the lever back when the foam rose to the top. Shoving the magazine aside, Red placed the full glass in front of Steele.

Steele gulped down about a third and swiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “What do you know about Marco Perez?”

“Never heard of him.”

“Yeah right.”

“You think just because I own this place it means I know criminals?”

“I never said he was a criminal. So you have heard of him?”

“You’d have to be dead in these parts not to have.”

“Tell me about him.”

“That’s another way to get dead.”

“You don’t seem the type to scare easy. You afraid of him?”

“If you were smart, you’d be.”