Diesel (The Mavericks Book 13) by Dale Mayer (read books for money .txt) 📕

the towel to dry off the shaving cream off his chin, but he appeared to be completely unconcerned.

He listened at the door, and she heard the same scraping sound. He nodded, handed her the towel, walked to the front of the door, and opened it suddenly. She jumped around the door to take a look at what was going on, just as she heard sounds of a fight. Before she realized it, she was being pushed back out of the way, and he was hauling a young male in his arms into the motel room. His hand was over the man’s mouth, but it wasn’t necessary, as he was limp in Diesel’s arms. He put him on the kitchen chair and said, “Don’t get close to him.”

She instinctively stepped back. “Is he involved in this?”

“I have no idea if he is or if he just thinks that it might be a nice place to find some booty,” he said.

“Meaning wallets, purses?”

He nodded. “Add on to that list cell phones and even the clothes on your body.”

“Seriously?”

“I’m not kidding,” he said. “This is Manila. Everything’s for sale here, but you must have goods to sell first.”

She shuddered and walked back to the little kitchenette, where she poured herself a glass of water. It wasn’t the cleanest-looking water, but no notice about a boil advisory was posted, and certainly no bottled water was around.

She sipped it, realized it tasted fine, and had a big glass. “What will you do with him?”

“Ask him a few questions,” he said. “Don’t worry. I won’t beat him up.”

“Good,” she said cheerfully. “I really don’t like the sight of blood.”

“Seriously? You do stem-cell research, and you don’t like the sight of blood?”

“Well, not fresh,” she said, with a grin.

He just nodded. He picked up his phone, took a photo of the guy, and sent it off.

“And what’ll that tell you?”

“Whether he’s got a record, if he’s into breaking into hotel rooms, it’s hard to say. And maybe it’ll tell me nothing.” He dropped his phone nearby.

Eva said, “The problem now is, he’s unconscious, so you can’t ask him anything.”

He looked at her, smiled, and said, “A smack across his face will wake him up.”

“I doubt it,” she said.

“He’s more or less just trying to play dead, thinking he can make a run for the door.”

At that, she walked around and looked at the young man. “He looks like he’s out to me.”

“Of course he does,” he said. “He has to keep looking that way too.”

She shrugged; he motioned her farther back. “You really think he’ll jump me?”

“Well, I would,” he said. “So, yeah.”

She just stared at him in shock, and then, all of a sudden, the young man burst from the chair and headed for the door. And he almost made it.

But Diesel grabbed the back of his shirt, hauling him into the kitchen and slamming him back into the chair. He looked at the kid and said, “I said, sit. This time stay there.” He looked at her. “Like I said, give them an inch, and they’re trying to take a yard.”

Just then came a knock on the door. He looked over at the kid on the chair, pointed at him, and said, “Sit.” And he walked to the door and opened it.

Jerricho walked in, carrying bags of food. He stopped when he saw the kid at the table. “I didn’t know we had company,” he said, with that dry tone of his. “I would have brought more food.” He walked to the far side of the table, put the food down, looked over at Diesel.

“Unexpected company. Unexpected and unwelcome,” he murmured. “And we’re not sharing our food with this kid.”

“Good, so I’m just in time for the interrogation.”

“Well, if the kid’s smart, he’ll tell us exactly what he knows, and he gets to walk out of here with all his teeth and his limbs attached.”

The kid immediately stared up at him in shock. “I don’t know anything.” Although a bit garbled his English was clear enough to understand.

The two men just nodded. “Of course you don’t. Let’s say, that’s how you guys work. Great, you take a few bucks to go in and check out the apartment, see what they’ve got, scoping around. We let you go because there’s absolutely nothing too scary about you, and then you come back with your buddies.”

The kid looked at him in horror.

“Right?”

He shook his head immediately. “No, of course not. I would never do something like that.”

“Well,” Eva said, “the alternative’s much worse.” She walked over so she could study him closer. “You know what? An awful lot of seasoning is in your eyes for somebody supposedly so young.”

“That’s common here,” Diesel said. “The trouble is, I want to know who sent him and why.”

“Probably for our laptops most likely,” Jerricho said.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I think it was to kill us.”

At that, the kid looked at her and jumped up immediately.

Diesel pressed him back into the chair. “I said, sit!”

“I don’t have anything to do with murder,” the kid yelled.

She looked at the age creases in the corner of his eyes and at the world-wearied look in his gaze, and she said, “I don’t believe you.” He was probably sixteen, but he looked like he was over twenty. A hard life will do that to you.

“Honest,” he said, trying for an earnest look. He looked at the other two and said, “Okay, okay. I was told to come in, case the joint.”

“Now that you have, what will you tell them?” Jerricho said, with a laugh. “You can tell them that the two guys caught you, so you couldn’t figure out what was here. Or will you tell them that you found a laptop, cell phones, and a pretty young woman?”

At that, the kid had the grace to look ashamed. He looked over at her and said, “Sorry, it’s part of the deal.”

“You tell others if there’s a female?” she asked in horror.

He just shrugged. “Women sell,