Shadow Memories: A Novel (The Singularity Conspiracy Book 1) by Nicholas Erik

on the seat beside me, “I’m here about something else.”
    She froze, like what was going to follow wouldn’t be good. “What are you hear about, sugar?”
    I could see a slight tremble in her spray-tanned leg as I stood and walked over to her.
    “I need to talk to the owner.”
    “Mr. Barston isn’t here right now,” she said, relaxing, “but if you’d like to…”
    “I know he’s here,” I said, not knowing at all, “and I need to see him. I got money. For, you know.”
    “I’ll see what I can do,” she said, and hurried off through the gold-trimmed double doors. I considered sitting back down, but I was too amped to be still. My bluff had worked. I was just beginning to congratulate myself when two big dudes marched through where Crystal had exited and latched their tree trunk arms around me.
    “Hey now, guys,” I said, trying to break free, dragging my sneakers against the patchy carpeting, “this is just a business visit.” They dragged me through the double doors, which opened on to a foyer with a large spiral stairwell. Like they were carrying a sack of groceries, they hauled me up the steps. My protests seemed to be falling on deaf ears. “Look, you know what, I rethought the situation,” I said as they threw me through a heavy wooden door that screamed executive , “I’m okay with not seeing…”
    “You were saying,” a deep voice said from behind the desk. All I could see were his shoes. The big guys retreated from where they’d come, leaving me alone on the floor, licking my wounded pride. I couldn’t imagine they were more than shout away, in case I had any funny business up my sleeve.
    Not that I did. Just normal business, of a crooked variety.
    “Well,” I said, addressing the man’s shoe, “I was asking the fine young lady downstairs—”
    “Crystal?” He snorted. “That broad has sucked more trash than all the vacuums in America.”
    “Oh,” I said, still trying the tactful route, “Crystal said that…” I stopped. Crystal hadn’t said anything, and I wasn’t sure lying again was the right way to start off this relationship. It’d already proven rocky.
    “Get up, get up you dumbass,” the voice boomed, “it’s like talking to a lap dog from down there.” I did as I was told. “Good.”
    The man in the chair eyed me up and down. Older, but still formidable—his presence, if not his posture. The giant throne-like seat threatened to swallow up his thin frame. But every pore oozed fire and confidence. His blue eyes burned like sapphires, the centerpiece of an oval, clean-shaven head.
    And those eyes, they were right on me. I wanted to look away, but it seemed like that was too much pride to swallow. So I sucked it up, and instead felt like my soul was burning.
    “Yeah,” I said, “so I’m guessing—”
    “Ben Barston,” he said, shooting out a hand, more business-like and automatic than kind, “owner of Bayside Boogie, the finest local purveyor of pussy.” He grinned at this last bit—or at least, a hint of the grin. It seemed a struggle for his body to generate even that much happiness.
    “Just the man I was looking for,” I said, and then I got bold, “can I sit down?”
    “No.”
    I stood there, hooking and unhooking my thumbs. “Okay, then I guess I’ll say it from here.”
    “You’d better,” he said, “those boys downstairs, they’ve been itching for a fight. Shortage of drunk assholes.”
    “Oh, business is down?”
    “No, idiots are down. Good for me, bad for them. Although today, they seem to be making a comeback.” He looked at me with those eyes. “Your business.”
    “I need weapons. A gun. A couple guns.” The words spilled out, stiff, unnatural.
    “Interesting.”
    “I got cash.” I pulled it out and showed it to him, but held on to it. Not that I could keep it from his Samoan tag-team wrestling duo if I wanted to.
    “Also interesting.”
    “Someone wants to hurt me.”
    “That’s why people want protection.”