Free Clint Faraday Collection C: Murder in Motion Collector's Edition by CD Moulton Page B

than to face
what can happen. It’s because of family. I’m in it at all because
my father was. They were the only ones I was ever around until I
got a job and worked with other people. I didn’t even know there
were good people in the world before that. I didn’t know I was gay,
either. I thought everybody felt the things I felt. They just never
acted on it and never talked about it because they’d be ostracized
if they did. It took a guy where I worked to show me the reality of
the world.
    “ Anyhow,
I’m really happy here. Nobody cares if I’m gay or straight or
bi.
    “ I might
be bi. Ben is, if not much. We dated girls twice and I really did
have a good time and I really did like the sex, it just isn’t the
kind of thing I like best. No girl makes me go weak in the knees
and Ben and a couple of others had that effect on me.
    “ What I’m
saying is that Ben and I will be a couple. Maybe not exclusive, but
maybe.”
    “ I wish
you all the luck in the world,” Clint replied. “Ben’s a good
person. A lot of people here are. I think you’ll fit.”
    They chatted, then Earl went back to Ben’s.
Clint called Manny, who didn’t have anything new and hoped he never
did about that bunch. If they never came up again in any way it
would be fine with him. Dave called and said he was going up the
coast. Did Clint want to go?
    No. Clint wanted to stay right there for at
least a week. No headaches and no buses or boats.
    Manolo called and said both bunches of the
nuclear deal were neutralized and wouldn’t ever have a chance to do
anything like it again. He had no doubt they’d try.
    “ Just so
they leave my friends and me out of it,” Clint replied. “If there’s
a next time the last thing they want to do is get me or any other
Ngobe involved.” Manolo said he’d heard Clint was declared a Ngobe.
Congratulations! It was an honor few ever knew. Sergio called and
said they found a body that might be Nando in the swamp on the
flatlands. He had the ID papers of Nando on him, but the body was
in bad shape. They would identify it as Nando, but this one was
about three and a half inches shorter than Nando. Too bad they
didn’t have any of his DNA.
    “ Let it
lay unless it turns out to be someone who was just there when he
needed a body,” Clint suggested. “If it’s someone from around here
who was caught up in it through no fault of their own, make it loud
and clear it wasn’t him. Those people will make sure the next
one is him!”
    He then went to the Golden Grill to talk with
people, then did a little grocery shopping for vegetables, then
went home.
    His phone buzzed. It was shown from a private
number.

Clint shrugged and answered. It was
Armakov.
    “ Clint?
Just wanted to let you know the latest. There was a minor
revolution in a certain country that replaced a few of the more
important leaders who had delusions of grandeur. The information
that initiated it was things that they had hidden so deeply they
thought it would never be found.
    “ You?”
    “ No. I’m
through with anything to do with those.”
    “ Well, if
you know who did it, tell them thanks from ninety percent of the
people in at least three countries.” He hung up. Clint wondered.
Manny?
    No way! Manny wouldn’t get involved in that
kind of thing. He wanted out of that crap and was staying out of it
very well here. He called Manolo and bluntly asked him if his
organization was behind it.
    “ They
would be the ones with that kind of information so I imagine a few
of the groups got together and solved the problem for a few months
or years. They have special operatives for that kind of thing. You
can bet what happened here had something to do with it. Nuclears?
No way will that be forgotten or forgiven!”
    “ Well,
Armakov said to tell whoever did it thanks from ninety percent of
the people in at least three countries.”
    “ They did
it to themselves. They tried to use you. Bad move!”
    “ I didn’t
have anything to do with