Breacher (Tom Keeler Book 2) by Jack Lively (reading well TXT) 📕

Dave said, “That’s the guy. Watch him go to the Subaru.”

I said, “That’s a lot of Chinese food, Dave.”

Dave spread two fingers to brush across his faint mustache. “True. They make good egg rolls in there.”

“You’re suggesting the bag is full of egg rolls, Dave?”

He looked over without moving his head. “No. I don’t know how many egg rolls are in there, Keeler. But if there are egg rolls, they will be good.”

We tracked Willets as he moved to the car and handled the take-out bags. He settled them safely in the passenger side floor, racking the seat forward to hold them steady. Then he went back around and got into the driver’s side. We watched Willets put his seatbelt on. I said, “Like a normal citizen, Dave.”

Dave said, “Yeah. It’s amazing how normal people look when you watch them for a little while. And then sometimes they go and do all kinds of crazy shit.”

I said, “You see a lot of crazy shit?”

Dave shrugged. “Not that much. But you do get your crazies up here, that’s for sure.”

We watched Willets take off. Part of me wanted to follow him. Another part of me wanted to get eyeballs on Amber Chapman. That’s the part that won out in the end. Wasn’t much of a competition. I got out of Dave’s car and walked back until I was directly across the road from the Golden Lights Wok. Through the big window I could see the space between panels that fed back into the seating area. I crossed over to get a closer look. There were two round tables visible. Large tables, filled with people eating and drinking. None of them were blonde, none of them were young, and none of them were Amber Chapman.

I opened the door and walked into the Golden Lights Wok.

Thirty-Five

The woman at the counter looked up at me and didn’t smile, not even a little bit. Her pink sweater was cashmere. It looked like somewhere you could crawl into and hide away until the winter was over. Which was a long, long time in Alaska. I’d only tried wearing cashmere once, and it tore to shreds in less than forty-eight hours. Too delicate for me. The woman looked about as delicate as a Mossberg 12 gauge. Her voice had a hard high-pitched edge to it, like something that could break glass.

“Take-out?”

I said, “No thanks. My friends are already here. I’ll just go back and find them.”

I took my eyes off her and moved. I knew that she was not happy, that she didn’t like my attitude, or my face, or the fact that I was now completely ignoring her and walking through the opening in the panel screen.

I felt the weight of the Glock 19 in my jacket pocket. I had no plan to speak of, just the feeling that Chapman was in there and I needed to get eyes on her. Dave had seen a tall blonde, but was she Amber Chapman?

I moved into the back. More spacious than I would have imagined from the empty street out front. A large room with big round tables, each big enough to seat ten comfortably. And the place was jammed. I counted forty-two people. Noisy and boisterous and in other circumstances would have looked like a really good time. But these were special circumstances and I wasn’t looking for a good time, just a blonde woman named Chapman.

But she was not among them.

By the time I’d done the full scan I was about to butt up against the back of the room when I bumped into a short and rotund woman with dark brown hair in a pony tail. It was June from the SEAS office. She didn’t recognize me immediately. I managed to pivot out of the way and June stepped back. Then she looked up. It took her a moment to get past the clean shaved face and see me.

“Keeler. You came! Who told you?”

I was lost for a second. Then I remembered that it was June’s birthday.

I said, “Tell the truth, I didn’t remember. I’m looking for a friend. But happy birthday just the same.”

“Whatever, you’re going have a drink with me right now. You look different without a beard.”

June had taken my arm and was pulling me toward one of the tables. I had scanned the room when I’d come in but missed her because she had been in the bathroom. A waiter was busy collecting dishes from a table across the room. The woman in pink cashmere had returned to face front again. June had seven or eight friends around the table. Young locals, red-faced with drink. As we moved up I could see a large collection of shot glasses gathered on a tray in the middle. When the friends saw us coming a chair materialized next to June’s. By the time my ass hit the seat there was a shot in front of me.

June turned to me, then the others, “North to the future everyone!”

It was the Alaskan state motto. The drunk friends yelled it out in unison and the shots went down. Vodka, not nearly cold enough.

June flushed and said, “You see your friends?”

“No. But they came in here.”

“They have private rooms downstairs. I was just down there in the bathroom. Definitely saw some people hanging out. What’s your friend look like?”

“Tall woman in her twenties, blonde and pale.”

“Tall blonde? Yeah I think I’ve seen her. You should go down there.”

I thanked June and wished her happy birthday again. Then I started over to where she had emerged from the bathroom, the corner of the main room. Alongside the kitchen was a narrow entrance giving onto a stairwell. One direction, down. The kitchen doors swung open and I was hit by a wave of garlic and oil. I ducked into the stairwell and everything got a lot darker and a lot quieter. Down at the first landing was a switchback to