Shannon woke with a hangover. It had lasted two days.
The phone rang.
Bill, his partner said, “I need you.”
The next sound was a death rattle.
Bill was now his ex-partner.
Shannon got out of bed with his hangover intact. He picked up his gat. Someone was going to pay for Bill.
Outside in the night air he stopped at the newsstand. “Cigarettes.”
Ali said, “You stopped smoking three years ago.”
Shannon lit up and said, “It was three years too soon.”
The taxi to Bill’s place cost $10. He told the driver to wait. The cops had yet to show on the scene. It was the change of shifts.
Bill was lying on the floor. A gun in his left hand. Blood stained the floor.
Someone was in the other room.
It was a girl.
Not a woman.
She looked at Shannon and asked, “Is he dead?”
Shannon looked over his shoulder. “Yes.” He believed in telling the truth only because he was too lazy to tell a lie.
Shannon was no cut-out detective. He was the real thing. There wasn’t many of them left around.