Free Ticket to Ride by Ed Gorman

Fortunately I’ve learned how to sleep through the typing. Any special plans for Labor Day?”
    The smell of the fresh wet wash was sweet on the dusty heat of the early afternoon. “Nothing planned. I’m working for Harrison Doran.”
    She nodded, her pretty Italian face breaking into a smile. “All last night Kenny was telling me how much you hated Doran. He called your office a while ago and talked to Jamie. She said you’d agreed to help him. Molly must have changed your mind.”
    â€œYeah, Molly did—and Cliffie. He’s already convicted Doran. And there’s no other lawyer in town who’ll help him.”
    â€œI have to say Doran’s pretty hard to take. I sat in Burger-Quik one afternoon and listened to him tell anybody who’d listen what a cool guy he was.”
    â€œYeah, but still—”
    She kissed me on the cheek. “But you’re doing the right thing. Go in and tell Kenny to rest for a while. He needs a break.”
    Sue had turned the small silver trailer into a home. The floor was carpeted, the furniture was new, as was the gas range and washerdryer. And gone from the walls were the framed covers of a few of the soft-core novels Kenny had written. All that remained was the framed photograph of Jack Kerouac. Most people had Jesus on their walls, Kenny had Jack.
    Kenny worked at a small oak desk pushed against the west wall. Sometimes he worked with music in the background. His taste ran to Miles Davis and John Coltrane and Hank Williams. He could type ninety words a minute perfectly. I never mentioned that to Jamie.
    He usually worked nonstop. He wasn’t aware of me until I was two feet from his desk and said, “I don’t think there’s enough sex in that scene.”
    He looked up, smiling. “Hey, I hear you’re working for Doran. Good, because the radio makes it sound like he’s already convicted. He’s an asshole, but he deserves somebody helping him.”
    I pointed to the paper in his typewriter. “What’s this one?”
    â€œâ€˜Twisted Twilight.’”
    â€œLesbians?”
    â€œYou can’t go wrong with lesbians.”
    â€œGuy comes along and rescues one of them from decadence?”
    â€œRance Haggarty’s his name. Pro football player and world-class lover. Got a schlong that spoils women for life.” He laughed. “There’s some very cold Pepsi in the fridge. Why don’t you get both of us one?”
    â€œRance as in ‘rancid’?”
    â€œI keep wanting to write a book where the lesbians end up happily together. You know I correspond with gay women who write soft-core. They’re very bright nice women. Fortunately for me, they understand the market and what you have to do, so they don’t hate me. But then, hell, their own books have to have the endings when one of the women goes off with a guy. Or gets hit by a train.” His laugh hadn’t changed in twenty-two years.
    I got our Pepsis. I sat on the couch. Kenny turned his chair around so he could face me. “Time for me to pull out my deerstalker cap?”
    â€œI really need some help. Linda Raines isn’t going to help me and neither is William Hughes. I need to know who really had it in for Bennett.”
    â€œPlenty of people, from what I’ve always heard.”
    â€œBut I need to narrow the list down.”
    â€œI can probably do that for you.”
    Kenny knew as much about our little town as anybody in it. He started a novel set here when he was still in high school. In doing research, he learned not only our history but also who was who and why in our own time. Despite the books he writes, most people like Kenny. They’ll talk to him because his boyishness puts them at ease.
    â€œWho’re you going to talk to next?”
    â€œLynn Shanlon. She knows a lot about the Bennett family. I know they never accepted Karen.”
    â€œNo surprise there, Sam.