Chapter 81

The sardines worked sort of. The cat would rush in to take the Sardine, then quickly back off. It was a game that his gimp leg was not suited to, but he seemed to make it work. When I went inside, I gave him the chance to join me, but he refused. I figured that it was his right, so I left him outside. When it gets nasty enough, he might come in, I thought.

I spent the afternoon doing research. If I wasn't going to serve court orders, how would I spend my time. I had no idea, so research was in order. Jen had mentioned a few things, for which she could see a need. Of course the body guard things, she always seemed to push me toward those, and something I had never really thought about. A company that specialized in surveillance. Yes it was mostly following husbands and wives to catch them in the act, There were other things as well. People steeling from industrial or construction sites would also be subjects of interest.

That sounded about half interesting until I remembered some really long nights staking out a warehouse filed with f18 parts. Some of the parts were going missing and the brass was afraid they might be going to the that day's bad guys. The bad guys of the world were once our friends, so they had f18 aircraft. Now that friendships had change, we no longer supplied parts to them. The black market was the only place to find those parts.

That stakeout had cured me of ever wanting to do it again. Ten 12 hour days in a row, to find that one of the guys who worked in the warehouse was smuggling them out in his SUV. Nothing exciting in that at all. He rolled right over, once he knew that he had been caught. Totally boring, so I put that idea on the far back burner.

It took two days for the expert to determine the value of 'At Your Service'. While he did his thing, I kept looking for ideas but nothing happened. The most exciting thing was his report. Since the armory was mine and mine alone, the business had no assets worth mentioning. Since he had no idea, if I planned to include them in the sale, the two vehicles were listed separately,.

Lucas, Ed and I sat down in Ed's office to discuss the report. "Well I'm not surprised to find how little this company is worth. The expert said that, if I had exclusive contracts, the company would be worth more. Since it was all just goodwill, the company without any of the real property is only worth about ten grand. He based that on a new owner being able to walk in and earn a living."

"So Lucas, if you want the business it is yours for five thousand dollars. You can pay it from the profits over a year's time." I explained after a pause to let the value sink in.

"If you want the van, get me a price on the Internet from one of those car chart things. You can have it for the lowest price you can find on the net. Low wholesale. trade in. whatever is cheaper. Otherwise it goes to the auction."

"I'll take it all. Gwen and I talked about it and the deal is much better than we expected." he informed me.

"Well, I hope you two do well with it. Now I'm going back to my cabin and take a nap."

The cat and I had formed a working relationship. I fed him, kept him drugged, and he tolerated me. Mostly he didn't destroy my trash. I felt as if it were a good relationship. I still had hopes that he would come inside, when it got cold, but as of that time he had not.

The week dragged on and nothing much changed. I tinkered with the idea of having lunch out again the next Sunday, but I didn't want to make a habit of it. I had been walking at the community college gym every day, but hadn't run into that kid Eddie again. It was just as well, I was beginning to feel that strange, stupid things might have happened.

On the three week anniversary of the parking lot incident, I marked it by going to the Cop Out for a beer. I even managed a few dances before I got too exhausted. I was about to leave when Blevins moved across the table to whisper something in my ear. The music was so loud, I shook my head to show that I had no idea what he said.

Blevins motioned me outside. We left the club through the alley door. "She what do you want Blevins, a blow job in a dirty alley?" I said grinning.

"Not tonight, but I'll take a rain check. Word is, you are the best." he said leering at me.

"Bullshit, nobody here knows what kind of blow jobs I give," I replied with a smile.

"Of course they do, but that isn't what we need to talk about," he said.

"So what do we need to talk about?" I asked.

"Vladimir Blostovick," he said

"What the hell is that, the sir name of Dracula?" I asked with a laugh.

"No that's the name of a Moscow policeman. He was assigned as liaison with the task force of Russian crimes in the area."

"Okay, what about him? Does he want a blow job in a dirty alley?" I asked with a girlie giggle.

"Will you stop with the blow job shit. He said he needs to give you some information. Information that might save your life. You should listen to him. He is a straight up good guy."

"Okay tell him to call me." I was suddenly all business. I was still a little paranoid about the Russians. If Vad the impaler had information to keep me in the game a while longer, I sure as hell wanted it.

I drove home and doped the cat. Then I got into bed alone with Vlad on my mind. I had to masturbate in order to shut my mind down enough to sleep.

The next morning at eight the call came. "Hello Maxine Stone?" The heavily accented voice asked.

"Yes are you Vlad the Russian cop?" I asked.

"I am, we need to talk," he informed me.