Free The Pressure of Darkness by Harry Shannon Page B

rolled the chair by hand and scooped the stack of papers and images from the printer tray. He turned and handed them to Burke. "And you never got these from me, right?"
    "As usual." Burke slips Doc a hundred dollar bill. "And thanks."
    * * * * *
    Burke turned, mind already elsewhere. Lincoln watched him go. Doc was always impressed by how soundlessly his old friend could move. Once Burke had left a room there was a brief moment of hollowness, like a pocket of vacuumed air; perhaps the snick of the door's tumblers closing, but little else. Burke could be quiet as death.
    Doc rolled to the door and locked it. He was beginning to tremble, and did not want to be seen with a Jones on. He flicked a switch and rolled to the bank of telephones. He activated the voice mail and turned his back to the window. A few seconds later he palmed a small vial filled with white tablets; these were time-release Oxycontin. The medication was originally created to treat the pain of terminal cancer patients and soon, after a rash of explosive and widespread drug addictions, became illegal. Doc swallowed a tablet and closed his eyes, waited for the pounding headache to recede. Agony always led to pleasure.
    Somewhere along the way, Doc had lost the essential truth of his pain. Now it was real and unreal, at once phantom and unrelenting. When the medication began to wear off and the "rebound" started—the opposite of the initial painkilling effect was always muscular aches and nausea—he took even more to soften that blow. Addiction was an old friend. He also had an electronically powered drug dispenser, of his own design, built into the wheelchair. It could supply him with intravenous Oxycontin on demand.
    Doc Washington was no fool. He knew he had a large and very hostile monkey on his back. He just didn't mind. Doc didn't have it in him any longer to give a damn. He leaned his head to the side, enjoyed the rush, and nodded off for a few moments. Less than thirty minutes later, still flushed with opiates, he turned off the voice mail and returned to work, whistling a pop song from the 80s.
     

NINE
     
    The drab, gray little office building was located in a funky strip mall near the corner of Laurel Canyon and Victory in North Hollywood, adjacent to a barrio Sears. Burke liked it because it was cheap and unassuming. He pulled his car around behind the long line of patrons waiting for the movie theaters and parked near other ordinary-looking cars, under a row of sagging, thirsty elms. Burke jogged lightly through the foot traffic leaving the latest screening. He paused in the doorway, scanned the lot. He had not been followed.
    Up the creaky wooden stairs two floors (Gina called the elevator slower than the 2000 Florida recount) to a peeling, off-white door that had been painted one too many times. The sign read BB Investigations. Burke tried the knob, found it locked. He used his key and went inside. The spacious, utility-carpeted one-room office featured computer equipment, two large desks, and several cork bulletin boards covered with seemingly random photographs and scribbled notations. But these notes were organized, and the penmanship was neat.
    "What's up, Gina?"
    The stocky, dark-haired woman behind the far desk was compact, muscular and formidable. Her facial expression generally read pleasant, but reserved. Gina Belli wore dark slacks, a simple white blouse, and a Smith & Wesson .38 on her belt. She kept her hair in the short, curt style favored by women the world over who are uncomfortable being perceived as feminine. Her fingers were pounding hell out of a computer keyboard.
    Gina had known Burke long enough to feel like both a stern mother hen and an indulgent sister. Years before, when she'd worked as a Vegas cop and Burke was a fellow officer, he'd performed a substantial service. A former lover, a rough woman given to battery, was stalking Gina and her new flame. She would not back down and her threats were becoming overt