SK01 - Waist Deep by Frank Zafiro Page B

face.
    I put my hand over the top of my cup. “Fine.”
    She shook her head. “I don’t mean the coffee. I mean you. Are you okay?”
    I didn’t have an answer for her, so I pulled out two five dollar bills and dropped them on the table.
    “You’ll need some change,” Phyllis told me as I slid out of the booth.
    “Nope,” I said, folding the file Katie had given me and sliding it into my jacket sleeve. “That’s for you.”
    Phyllis gave me an enthusiastic thanks . I nodded that I heard her and left the diner.

21
     
     
    My knee ached and my head swam .
    I trudged west down Sprague Avenue, keeping the pace slow to avoid my limp coming out. I knew it would anyway, long before I got home. I’d pay for the long walk tomorrow, but right now I needed the time and motion.
    None of it made any sense to me. Sure, girls ran away. Some got tattoos. Some even became prostitutes. It wasn’t an uncommon story.
    But not girls like Kris Sinderling.
    So w hat had happened?
    I continued to walk along, my boots clicking on the sidewalk, because I had absolutely no idea.

22
     
     
    I wished I’d opened the folder and read it when Katie had suggested it. I could’ve asked her questions that would be useful now.
    Rolo, for instance. He wasn’t a pimp that I knew, but my information on River City bad guys was a decade old. I didn’t know who the players were when it came to hookers, gambling or dope anymore. I was about as out of touch with the criminal scene in River City as I’d felt when I’d opened up the entertainment section of the newspaper back at Polly’s.
    At Sprague and Smith, I stopped and looked around. Regular Joe Citizens zipped by in their Regular Joe cars, on their way to or from legitimate , taxable enterprise of some sort or another. All the while, most of them remained oblivious to the less legitimate, completely untaxed business that transpired right on Sprague Avenue. Two blocks west, I saw a small black kid huddled in the doorway of a paint store that had gone out of business. He was most likely a dealer, or a runner for one. A half block further up, I saw a heavyset white woman in stretch pants and a dark green windbreaker. A true River City hooker. No import, that one.
    I paused, struck with an idea. Some of the cash Matt had given me was still in my front pocket. I pulled it out, shielding the bills with one hand and flipping through them with the other. Carefully, I arranged four twenties on the outside of the stack, folded it over and slipped it into the inside pocket of my jacket.
    I passed by a dry cleaners, an Army-Navy Surplus store and a restaurant before reaching the deserted paint store. The thin, young black kid sat huddled in the corner of the inset doorway. I briefly considered talking to him, but rejected the thought. He might know things, but he wasn’t likely to tell me anything except where to get some rock cocaine. I ignored him and fixed my eyes on the wide hips up ahead of me.
    Even though I wasn’t looking directly at him, his eyes followed me as I walked by. He waited until I was almost completely past before hissing, “Hey, man!”
    I looked over in spite of myself, slowing to a near stop.
    The kid was in bad shape. H is head and shoulders jumped in small, sharp twitches. His toes tapped as if he were listening to music only he could hear. His eyes held a ho llow, desperate look .
    I should’ve kept walking, I thought.
    He struggled to his feet and licked his lips nervously. “Hey, man, you got a cigarette?”
    “No,” I told him. “Don’t smoke.”
    He gave me a brief nod, then cast his eyes quickly left and right before bringing them back to bear on me.
    “Suck it ?” he asked, his voice slightly lower.
    “What?!”
    He stepped toward me with the beginnings of a smile. “Suck your dick, mister?”
    I shook my head and moved back, my skin crawling.
    “C’mon, man,” he said, casually. “I’ll suck it hard . I’ll suck it good . You’ll blow your wad harder