Free This Doesn't Happen in the Movies by Renee Pawlish Page A

of the club, or a place farther south.
    I shook my head and strolled back around to the front of the restaurant, still deep in thought.  I glanced in the window.  Jack was back at work, delivering drinks to one table, taking orders from another.  I was about to walk away when I saw him reach behind him and take the comic book out of his pocket, dropping it onto a booth table near the exit.  He picked up the bill from the table and walked away.
    A slender hand came out and picked up the comic, then a tall brunette in a dark business suit and equally dark overcoat scooted out of the booth.  The woman tucked the comic in her overcoat pocket, slung a small purse over her shoulder, and strode three steps to the exit.  It all happened so fast that I didn’t see her face at all.  As she came out the door, I ducked around the corner and peered out.  She hurried quickly down the street in the opposite direction of my car.  I hesitated briefly, considered going for my car, thought better of it, and rushed after her.  I tucked my head down into my coat, pulling up the collar, and walked with my eyes down.  Dark Suit walked down one block and got into a black Chevrolet sedan.  I was a half block behind her, so I stepped up my pace.  I got a quick look at the license plate before the car squealed away.
    I said it repeatedly so I’d remember it as I passed back by the restaurant, and around the corner.  I jerked open the kitchen door, walked past a surprised cook and waitress, and up to Jack, who had just come in from the front.  He opened his mouth in surprise and started to head back through a swinging door to the restaurant, but I grabbed his arm and pedaled him right on through the prep food tables and ovens.  He sputtered in protest as I threw him out the back door.  He stumbled into a big plastic trashcan, and fell to one knee.
    “What the hell are you doing?” he snarled, picking himself up.
    “That’s what I want to know,” I snarled right back.  I grabbed him just as he was regaining his balance, and threw him into the wall.  “Hey,” he said.
    “What’s going on with the comic book?” I asked, pinning him face first against the wall.
    “Wha…” he mumbled.
    “I saw you pass the comic book to Ms. Dark Suit,” I said, my face an inch from his cheek, my teeth bared.  “You passed the comic from Amanda to her.  Why?”
    “What?” he said, his voice shaking.
    “I won’t ask again.”  I tightened my grip on his arms, nearly lifting him off the ground.
    “Okay, all right.”  He coughed.  “They paid me.”
    “Who?”
    “I don’t know her name.  The lady in the dark suit.”  The confession came fast.  “She came in one day a few months ago, said that I could make an easy hundred every time I’d make a delivery for her.”
    “Deliver what?”
    “Comics, man.  That’s it.  She said someone might come in, request to sit at my table, and leave a comic for me.  She said to hang on to it, that someone would be in afterward to get it.”
    “What kind of bullshit is that?”
    “It’s the truth, I swear,” he said, struggling against me.  “Hey man, let go.  I swear that’s it.”
    “How many times has this happened?” I asked, loosening my grip slightly.
    “Three times.  Twice before tonight.  It was the same two ladies.  The pretty one, Amanda, ate and left a comic book, two times.  I passed it to the other lady, and she left an extra hundred with her bill.”
    “A comic book?” I repeated.
    “Yeah, a Spiderman comic.  One other time the lady in the dark suit left a comic with a hundred in it.  It was an X Men comic that time.  I took the hundred and left the comic for that lady Amanda.  That’s it, I’m telling you.  Leave me alone, man.  I’m going to be in a shitload of trouble with my boss if I don’t get back.”
    “You’re going to be in shitload of trouble if you’re lying to me.”  I pressed him into the wall for good measure.
    “It’s the