Loose And Easy

CHAPTER FIVE

Dressed to kill and driving a minivan?

Johnny double-checked the direction of her gaze and ended up right back at the same POS minivan he’d thought she was looking at-the butt-ugly brown-and-tan one with the license plate number LVH3590 and the big orange boot on it.

From her crestfallen expression, she knew that baby wasn’t going anywhere tonight. To her credit, the news only waylaid her for about three seconds, before she turned and stuck out her hand to him.

“Well, it was great to see you… really,” she said, giving his hand a firm shake when he took hold of hers. One shake, then she let go of him. “Good luck with my dad tomorrow. Maybe we can have that drink sometime.”

Sure they could, he thought, watching her take off across the street, dodging the traffic. Talk about a bum’s rush.

From the other side of Wynkoop, she hailed a cab, but the cabbie passed her by. That was her problem, not his. His problem was… hell, he didn’t have any problems. He’d done three combat tours and gotten away with nothing worse than a sprained ankle, a bajillion flea bites, and a few stitches once when a round hadn’t quite missed him.

He didn’t have any problems.

Except for the skinny, blond-haired guy getting out of the passenger side of a Buick LeSabre about halfway up the block on her side of the street. Two things bothered him about the guy. One, Johnny knew him. His name was Dan Smollett, more often known as Dovey, and he worked for a bookie up in Commerce City named Franklin Bleak. Two, Dovey was looking straight at Esme as he was getting out of the car, which made this as close to a high school reunion as Johnny had ever gotten- him, Dovey Smollett, and Easy Alex. They’d all graduated from East the same year, and apparently, only one of them had gone straight. Surprisingly enough, it hadn’t been the class valedictorian.

Dovey closed the door on the LeSabre and started toward her, and Johnny felt another knee-jerk reaction coming on. Goddammit.

Civic duty, he told himself. They were in the middle of lower downtown, Esme had not yet seen the scumbag zeroing in on her, and Dovey was coming up on her strong side. The element of surprise could really work against old Dovey in this situation, given that Esme had a.45 strapped under her arm, and from the extra little bit of adjusting she’d given the messenger bag, Johnny was guessing she practiced drawing out of her shoulder holster, which had the potential of making her fast.

Not that he thought she might accidentally shoot old Dovey. No, he figured if she shot somebody, it probably wouldn’t be by accident.

Kee-rist. He stepped off the curb, checking the traffic both ways, and made his way across the street. She saw him coming, he made sure of it, and she didn’t look happy about it, but that was just too damn bad.

He headed for her left side, to put himself between her and Dovey, and no doubt, Dovey was going to see him, too, and no doubt he’d tell Franklin Bleak what and who had happened to his bird, which meant Johnny was going to have to call Sparky Klimaszewski and have him put the heat on Franklin to set things right and get the bookie off his ass.

It was amazing really, how quickly life could get complicated, amazing just how quickly a guy without any problems could acquire a whole boatload of them.

Case in point: Being in debt to Sparky usually required felonious restitution. Sparky was only interested in one thing, cars and the grand theft auto thereof.

Hell. Johnny hadn’t stolen a car since he’d been fifteen. Okay, seventeen, but that had been a strictly one-off job for the last time he’d needed a favor from Sparky. But fine, he could deal with Sparky, because Sparky, for all that he ran more cars through Denver than any other chop shop, was not an undersized psycho who tried to compensate for his lack of physical stature by committing violent acts of retribution against losers who didn’t pay and anyone else who got in his way.

Franklin Bleak was all that and more, a verifiable freakazoid. He had a very nasty reputation, well earned, for doing very bad deeds-and he’d sent his errand boys to pick up Esme Alden.

Johnny didn’t particularly bother to explain all this, or himself, to her when he stepped up on the curb on the other side of Wynkoop.

“Let’s go.” The command was short, succinct, and impossible to misinterpret, his specialty, and before it was even out of his mouth, he had ahold of her, one of his arms going around her back, his hand gripping her upper right arm, his other hand going across his front and taking hold of her left biceps. Without expending too much effort, he had her under control, half lifted off her feet, and heading back across the street.

“Wh-what in the… who do you think…whwhat in the hell?”

“Incoming at nine o’clock.” He kept walking, hustling her along. Given half a chance, she might have resisted, but he didn’t give her half a chance. He’d grabbed her, and they were moving back through the traffic, fast, too fast for her to get any leverage against the hold he had on her.

“Incoming? What the… dammit … This is a bad move, Ramos,” she said in a tone of voice that reminded him that besides the.45 he could feel through her jacket, she had a knife, that she had a knife for a reason, and that he’d just become one of those reasons.

Sonuvabitch. That was not the sort of information he was used to forgetting. That was the sort of information he was used to hardwiring into his brain.

“Do you remember Dan Smollett?” he asked, his grip still very firm on her, very close to a death grip. He couldn’t afford to have her squirming away just yet, or going for one of her weapons, or doing any damn thing, not in the middle of the street, or anywhere else for that matter. He was in charge, and that was for the best almost one hundred percent of the time.

“Dovey?”

Obviously, she did remember the cretin.

“He’s thirty yards behind us and closing.”

She let out a short sound of disgust. “If you’re on the run from Dovey Smollett, that’s your problem, not mine.”

“No. It’s your problem, babe.” They reached the other side of Wynkoop, but he didn’t relent with his grip. He kept her moving. He had a plan, and it didn’t involve letting Dovey Smollett catch up to them.

“The hell it is. I don’t give a damn if Dovey Smollett is in LoDo, or if he dropped off the edge of the earth. Now let go of me, you…you… jerk.” She tried to twist out of his grip, and got exactly nowhere-for a damn good reason. He was well trained in the ways and means of physical restraint, and he could bench-press Esme Alden, all hundred- and-what pounds of her.

Hell, he could bench-press three Esme Aldens.

“Can you run in those heels?”

“Yes.” She didn’t hesitate with her answer. “But-”

“There’s no but,” he cut her off. “If I say run, you keep up. Got it?”

“Go to hell.” Short, succinct, and impossible to misinterpret-he had to give her credit for that much.

He opened the next door they came to and pushed her inside ahead of him, straight into the crush of people jamming O’Shaunessy’s back bar.

“Excuse me… sorry…” Johnny edged his way through the crowd, keeping one hand wrapped around her waist, keeping her close. Nobody was getting to her without going through him first, and the only people in this town who could get through him were on his side.

She could thank him later-but he wasn’t going to hold his breath.

“What the … oh, cripes. You’ve got a…a… dammit,” she said, her voice low.

Yeah, he had her pulled real close to his right side, and he’d wondered when she would notice the pistol riding under his arm.

“Dammit,” Esme swore again. “I don’t believe this. I can’t believe I… dammit.”

“Just keep moving.”

The crowd thinned out at the service end of the bar, and after getting the two of them tucked into the dark corner between the waitress station and the kitchen door, he took a moment to check and see if Dovey had followed them inside.

Geezus. Franklin Bleak. Whatever she’d gotten herself into, she needed to get herself out, or she was going to end up wishing she’d picked a different line of work. The stories he’d heard about Franklin Bleak weren’t just grim; they were gruesome.

“Dammit, Ramos. If this is your way of getting a girl to have a drink with you, I can see why you’re alone on a Friday night.” He had her about half behind him in the corner, and her voice was close to his ear and very sharp-edged, understandably so. He’d pretty much railroaded her into O’Shaunessy’s.

Which in no way fit in with his plan to head back to his beer at the Blue Iguana, despite the fact that she had in no way begged him for help.

No, there had been no begging. That was too big of a stretch, even for him. It had been a clean snatch-and-grab all the way.

“And now, if you’re finished manhandling me,” she continued, starting to push by him, “this party is over.”

No, it wasn’t.

“Stay put,” he said, shifting his body sideways and holding her in place, while keeping his gaze on the crowd of people.

“You’re out of line, no matter what you’re packing under your shirt,” she whispered, her voice even closer to his ear.

“And you’re in more trouble than you seem to realize.”

At that, she let out a short, surprised laugh. “And how in the hell do you figure that?”

“For a secretary, you’ve got some real bad guys after you.”

“Like you?” The comeback was vintage Easy Alex, pure smart-mouthed.

“No. Dovey,” he said, turning to face her. “He’s what we call an undesirable element, no matter where he is-in LoDo, dropped off the edge of the earth, or sitting at home on his couch.”

A flash of something darkened her gaze, but only for a moment, and it took him another second to realize what it had been: alarm, the first instance of it he’d seen in her since he’d spotted her up on Seventeenth.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to let Dovey get within ten feet of you.” The skinny numbers runner was no match for a U.S. Army Ranger, not on his best day with three of his buddies.

“It’s not Dovey I’m worried about,” she said, giving him a carefully measured look, holding the moment for the space of a breath before she continued. “So what’s with the ‘we’ and the ‘undesirable element’ lingo? You sound like a cop.”

Her tone implied it would be the worst damn thing in the world, which did nothing to reassure him that she was up to anything except no good.

Geezus. She’d hog-tied that poor sap in the Oxford. She’d stolen something from the guy, and Mr. America here had been going to let her just walk away from the crime. He wasn’t sure he even wanted to know what was up with that. Just because he’d liked a girl in high school did not make her a saint, although he had seemed to fall for the saintly ones, the good girls, the ones who wouldn’t give it up in a backseat.

No wonder it had taken him so long to get laid.

Thank God, he’d expanded his horizons since then. Saintliness didn’t even make the cut on his top ten list of attributes to look for in a woman anymore. As a matter of fact, given what he’d learned of human nature, any woman aspiring to saintliness was highly suspect in his book.

Which, of course, under her current circumstances, made Esme Alden look like the perfect girl for him all over again, except this time from the dark side-very dark, if Franklin Bleak was after her.

“No. I’m not a cop. I’m the guy who just saved you from getting shook down by Dovey Smollett and maybe getting thrown into the back of that Buick LeSabre parked on Wynkoop.”

Her reaction was almost imperceptible, a slight, extra stiffening of a body already strung tight, but without another dose of alarm. He knew the difference between readiness and fear-and she was ready.

Ready for the likes of Dovey Smollett, and alarmed by the police. That didn’t look good or set well.

“What’s it to you who shakes me down?” she asked.

Her cool little attitude didn’t set too well either. Neither did the fact that he didn’t have an answer to her question. What the hell was it to him who shook her down? None of his business is what it was-and yet here he was, jammed into the back of O’Shaunessy’s, up close and personal with her for no damn good reason.

“If you tell me why he’s after you, maybe I can help.” And maybe that was enough, the whole “damsel in distress” motif. Although, from what he’d seen so far, she was doing pretty good on her own, and if it hadn’t been for Smollett and Bleak, he might have let it be.

But it was Smollett, and it was Bleak, and if she knew what he’d heard about Bleak, she wouldn’t be quite so nonchalant.

She seemed to consider his words, weigh his offer, and see what it might be worth.

“I saw the LeSabre,” she finally admitted. “But I can’t imagine any reason for some guy from high school to get on my case, let alone abduct me- present company excluded, of course.” The last was delivered with the arching of one delicate eyebrow.

He got the point.

Smart-mouthed Easy Alex didn’t mince words, and she was right. He had abducted her off the street, and done a damn good job of it. He had her, and Dovey Smollett was sucking air out there on Sixteenth and Wynkoop.

“Dovey was staring at you so hard when he got out of his car, I’m surprised your hair didn’t start on fire. He had a tractor beam on you.”

“Guys stare at me all the time.” She was stating a fact, not dabbling in vanity, and he didn’t doubt her for a second. Hell, he’d hardly taken his eyes off her since he’d spotted her up on Seventeenth.

But he shook his head. “He was waiting for you, parked on Wynkoop with a good line of sight on the Faber Building. If you hadn’t been dressed in your flavor-of-the-week getup, I’m guessing he would have recognized you when you first went to your dad’s office and tried to pick you up then.”

“Are you sure you’re not a cop?”

“No, I’m not, but I know a stakeout when I see one.”

“Congratulations. So do I, and you’ve been following me since the Oxford. But we’re done.” She looked up at him from underneath her lashes. “Right here, right now. I’m walking out of here, and if you touch me one more time, I’m going to take deep, personal offense. No more nice girl just because we’re old school chums. Do you understand me?”

Well, when she said it like that, he guessed every guy in the bar would understand her.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Her eyebrow arched again, and she started to step by him-but he stopped her with a simple lift of his hand, being damn careful not to deeply and personally offend her.

“I just have one more question,” he said. “Do you know who Dovey Smollett works for?”

“No.” She shook her head and gave him a small, indulgent smile. “Dovey and I haven’t kept up.”

She started to move again, but his hand stayed where it was, blocking her path, but still not touching her.

“I do.”

Her look said she wasn’t impressed and didn’t give a damn.

“He’s a local guy,” he said anyway, whether she wanted to hear it or not. “He makes book up in Commerce City, a guy named Franklin Bleak.”