Free Big Goodbye, The by Michael Lister Page B

him.
    “Not much security,” he said. “One fat fucker I slapped the shit out of.”
    “Where’s the nurse?”
    He jerked his head toward the open door. “Come see for yourself.”
    I followed him into a tile-floor lobby to find the discarded box his gun had been in, the fat security guard on the floor, and the night nurse cuffed to a big wooden chair, a piece of tape across her face holding a gag in her mouth.
    “Why the gag?”
    “Take it off and see,” he said. “Shit, Jim, how long it gonna be ’fore you quit questioning every got damn thing I do?”
    I started to remove the gag, but stopped myself. “Sorry,” I said.
    The small lobby had brownish linoleum with green-and-rust-colored frames around Oriental rugs. A reception area behind a small glass sliding door stood on one wall, the light inside it providing the only illumination for the dim lobby. In the middle of the open space, two seating areas, one a modern Kroehler couch and chairs, the other East Indies Rattan.
    Off the lobby in opposite directions, two corridors extended about a hundred feet with doors on each side.
    “We just gonna bang on every door until we find her?” he said.
    Lightening flashed outside and for a moment the entire room was bright and well lit. A few seconds later thunder rolled in the distance. Another storm was moving in off the Gulf.
    I shook my head. “I’m gonna quietly look for her. You’re gonna stay here and keep an eye on things.”
    The hallway was dim, lit only by intermittent fancy fixtures with low-watt bulbs inside them. Several rooms were empty, the beds made, the doors open. I tried the handle of the first closed door I came to. It was unlocked. I opened it. Inside, I found a tall man with a long white beard sleeping on his side. I closed it and tried the next one. This time I found a rotund woman lying on her back, a small dog asleep on her slowly rising and falling chest.
    I had gone through a handful of rooms when I found Lauren’s. She was fully dressed, sitting on her bed, crying.
    “Jimmy,” she said, as she jumped off the bed, rushed over, and hugged me.
    “You okay?” I asked.
    “What are you doing here?”
    “Came for treatment,” I said. “Whatta you think?”
    “I can’t go,” she said.
    “I’m not giving you a choice.”
    Lightening flashed outside, illuminating the raindrops on her window.
    “You don’t understand,” she said.
    “Well, you can explain it to me or keep me in the dark,” I said. “Either way you’re coming with me.”
    She didn’t say anything.
    “You want to tell me what’s going on?” I asked. “What does Rainer have on you?”
    “Nothing,” she said.
    I shook my head. “There was a time when you told me everything,” I said. “At least I thought you did. Was I wrong about that, too?”
    The wind picked up and pelted the window with a volley of raindrops. Through the rain-spattered glass pane I could see the leaves of banana trees and palm fronds waving in the wind.
    I could tell she wanted to change the subject. She said. “If you’re forcing me to go, we better get going.”

Chapter 17
    “Clipper?” Lauren asked. “What’re you doin’ here?”
    “Ever since your soldier here done got hisself shot up, he can’t do shit by hisself.”
    I laughed, but only so they wouldn’t see the sick look on my face. He was right. There were many aspects of my job and my life I could no longer do, and though there wasn’t anything I could do about it, I wasn’t about to get used to it.
    “Would you please tell him I need to stay here,” she said.
    He looked confused. “You don’t want to go?”
    “No,” she said. “I can’t.”
    Lightening flashed and lit up the room, Lauren’s eyes growing wide at the sight of the bound and gagged nurse and unconscious security guard.
    “You don’t have a choice,” I said. “Let’s go.”
    “You heard the man,” Clip said. “He da one puttin’ money in my pocket tonight.”
    As we walked out, Lauren