Fit hits the Shan - Chapter Four - A Jake Burbank mystery thriller excerpt

CHAPTER FOUR

They lay on top of the white duvet on his queen size bed under a skylight he had installed himself.

The noon sun drilled through at an angle, casting an oblong rectangle of bright yellow on the white wall.

It had tracked along the wall as they finished the shower and started time number two in the bed.

Number three finished him for the day for good, he thought as he collapsed into a quivering heap next to her, one hand draped across her flat stomach tracing indentations in the smooth expanse of skin.

She wiped sweat from her forehead with the back one hand and rubbed the small of his back with the other.

“Just like I remembered,” she said.

“That could go either way,” Jake said.

Gretchen rolled over to one side and cocked her head on her hand.

“I think you know which way it went.”

“You told me,” he nodded and switched to writing circles on her hip with the tip of his finger.

“You were a little different.”

“I’m a different man now.”

The crease came back between her eyebrows.

“All of that…mess?”

Mess, she called it. An innocent man killed. A guilty man gone free. A man he loved like family killed in the crossfire by someone who blamed him, and everything he had worked for gone.

Yeah, he shrugged.

“It was a mess.”

“It’s over now,” Gretchen told him. “You can get back on your feet.”

He nodded.

It wasn’t the first time someone told him. Hell, it was practically a daily quote any time he ran across someone he knew in town.

Even strangers were caught quoting it to him in the honky tonks on the outskirts of the city limits he liked to frequent.

Less chance of running into anyone he knew.

Less chance of anyone randomly shooting at him.

“I could use a drink,” he said.

“I’ll get it,” she offered and started to roll off the bed.

Jake reached out and hooked her elbow with his hand.

“You’re being very …giving,” he told her.

It bothered him a little.

Giving was against her nature. He wouldn’t go so far as to call her selfish, but there was a reason Gretchen did every little thing, from the application of her well thought out make up, to the act of making him breakfast to the easy seduction of him in the shower.

And twice after, he reminded himself with more than a little pride.

“Jake,” she chided. “I was only going to make sure it was water, not bourbon. I don’t want you to get dehydrated.”

She trailed her nails across his skin as she got out of bed, and he admitted that he enjoyed watching her walk across the room.

She was back after a few moments with two glasses of water. She passed one to him, and settled into a nest of pillows as she covered herself with a sheet.

Here it comes, he thought as he took a sip.

“I need a favor,” she said and put the glass to her mouth as she watched for a reaction.

“What kind of favor?”

“You could call it a job, really, if you wanted.”

“Would you call it a job?”

“It’s just, I know you’re under water now, and on the verge of losing all this-,”

“Who says I’m under water?”

“Everybody.”

“You’ve talked to everybody? I didn’t know you were back in town.”

She paused for another sip.

Jake noticed the water level didn’t fall. She was just buying time.

“Not literally,” she flashed a smile of perfect white teeth. “But some people say you’re having money trouble.”

“I wouldn’t call it trouble,” said Jake.

“What would you call it?”

“Well,” he said. “You have to have money to have trouble with it.”

“You can pay for drinks,” she told him.

“Pocket change.”

“Not the way you do it,” she said.

“Is that more of everybody saying something?”

Gretchen nodded.

“Po’s family tied up a lot of assets,” said Jake. “And Rich took a swipe at what was left.”

He drained the water from his glass and wished it was vodka. Or bourbon. Or rum.

Time with Gretchen always made him feel like a pirate and that made him want rum.

Some drunks found what worked and stuck with it, but Jake considered himself an equal opportunity drinking man.

Why settle for one nectar of God when he was so good as to provide so many?

“But I had a little stash in my rainy day fund.”

Gretchen frowned and nodded.

“How long will that last?”

Jake smiled.

“Do you want me so desperate for cash I’ll just say yes without knowing what the favor involves?”

“Yes,” she said.

He liked the honesty.

“I’ll probably say yes anyway, so long as you’re not asking me to kill anyone. I could use the money and if I do you a favor, you’ll owe me.”

He tugged at the sheet.

She gripped it tighter to her chest, and raised one eyebrow.

“You don’t think my sharing favor with you in the shower and out here was enough?”

“Twice out here,” he gave her a half grin.

“Twice,” she conceded. “If we make it three, will you hear me out?”

Jake didn’t want to tell her he would listen to what she had to say no matter what.

He didn’t want her to take back the offer of favor number three.