Free Hard Play by Kurt Douglas Page A

the uneven trail, but none of them, not even the dogs, looked the slightest bit disturbed. The yuppie jogging couple heaving chunks, however—they knew something Frank wanted to know.
    Frank approached them and flashed his wallet.
    “Show me the body,” he demanded as he took the man by the arm, pulling the cell phone away from his face.
    The man blabbered, “Wait. What? What?”
    But, Frank’s fiery glare shut him up quick. He was a lot smaller than Frank. It was easy for Frank to manhandle him, leaving a trail of half-steps and drag marks in the dirt behind them as Frank pulled him up the hill, right past his wife.
    Still recovering, she cried out, “You’re not going back up there, are you, Dave? Please tell me yo—”
    She covered her mouth, stopping her sentence short. She could feel her stomach turning just by the mention of what was up the hill. Dave, now realizing her state, reached out for his wife, pulling against Frank. It was no use. Frank’s grip was strong and his determination was stronger and he was still mad about his broken Pall Mall.
    “She’ll be fine, Dave,” Frank assured as he yanked, pulling Dave toward him. “Show me the body.”
    Dave struggled and pulled for about three hundred yards up the hill. The rolling trail was cut deep, severed with cracks and veins where the water would spill down after a long rain. To the east, the trail continued upward to the Hollywood sign, climbing through trees that grew in size the higher you went. To the west, the path was lined with scrub brush and patches of wildflowers. Frank continued dragging on Dave until they had reached a spot where the brush cleared up and the trees grew short enough to show you the sprawling skyline of downtown. Wrapped in brown, smoggy clouds, the city glistened in the warm summer sun and the ocean shone behind it. Dave pointed down into the bushes.
    “There,” he murmured. “Down there.”
    “How’d you see it from up here?” Frank asked, tugging again on Dave’s arm.
    This time, Dave pulled away, saying, “My water bottle rolled away. I was fishing it out of the bushes when...”
    He didn’t finish his sentence. He knelt in place and cupped his hands over his mouth, panting into his palms. As he regained control, a woman came down the hiking trail. Frank’s eyes followed her as she jogged toward them. Ignoring Dave’s hyperventilation, Frank watched her breasts as they bounced, hanging freely behind her thin cotton tank. He made no effort to hide his stare as she came closer and then passed. Pivoting on his heel, he watched her backside, in nothing but gray tights, rise and fall as she ran down the hill. Dave just continued half-hyperventilating on the ground. Shaking his head, Frank moved down the hill and into the bushes, leaving Dave in the dirt.
    He pushed his way through the tendrils of greasewood and claws of scrub oak, lifting his jacket to avoid the snags. As he tripped into a dirt clearing a few feet below, Frank shouted over his shoulder, “I’d have let the bottle go, Dave.”
    “I think not,” Dave rebutted down to him, “Tasmanian rainwater. It’s flown in from the rainforest. The rainforest . There’s no better water than rainforest water. That’s what Style magazine says. Crisp. Fresh. Clean. It’s bottled without ever touching the ground.”
    It appeared Dave’s wind had returned to him. Frank rolled his eyes and took out a cigarette. As he flipped shut his Zippo, smoke billowing round him, he saw the toe of a brown loafer and the left hem of a pair of gray slacks sticking out from behind a hedge of deer grass. Inspecting the dirt around him, he saw only the jumbled footprints of the couple running circles in a panic before heading back up to the trail. No steps of the man arriving. No steps of another going.
    Coming around the bush, Frank saw the corpse. A man in a neatly pressed gray suit, in his late forties or early fifties. He was lying in the grass with his hands behind his head.