Free Drainland (Tunnel Island Book 1) by Iain Ryan Page A

a muddy sand shoe, and a half-eaten cheese platter.
    No other flyers.
    She checked her watch. Twelve-forty.
    It’d do.

    A ngel City was a weird looking black box of a building. It sat on a vacant block not far from Domino’s lone high street. It looked like a dump. The whole suburb was a shit pile: tall grass swaying in the yards, doors splayed open, bearded men standing around shirtless, lots of drinking on the sidewalk. Everyone saw her. No one reacted. Now, in the rearview, there were five kids pulling a street sign out of the ground.
    She sat there and waited for something to happen. It was a good half-hour before someone stepped out: a woman in a denim cut-offs and busted sneakers. The woman lit a smoke and stared intently into her phone.
    Romano went over. She noticed the details as she approached. The woman’s shirt ( I Love Cairns ) was threadbare, showing two large pink nipples and a patchwork of tattoos and scars.
    “How you doing?”
    The woman let out a small chuckle when she saw the uniform. “You lost, baby?”
    “I’m looking for this girl.” Romano held the photo up at eye level. “You know her? Ever seen her before?”
    “Sorry. No idea.”
    “I want to talk to some of the girls inside.”
    “No one’s stopping you.”
    “I’ve been around places like this. Is there anything happening out back? Anything likely to get me shot?”
    “Probably.” The woman looked up the street. “No one’s gonna help you.”
    The door opened. A man with a shaved head and a long grey beard—the classic violent douche-bag look—hung his torso out and said:
    “Sal, you okay out here?”
    Romano instinctually turned face-on, rested a hand on her side near the gun.
    “Sir, I’m Constable Romano, down from Point Hallahan Police. I’m looking for a girl. I want to show a photo around. Mind if I step inside?”
    “That depends,” said the man. He kept his gaze fixed on the woman.
    “Yes?” said Romano. “On what?”
    The man looked at her then back to the girl. “You know the rules? Gotta obey the rules, bitch. Rule one, you touch the girls, you pay for a full dance. Rule two, you talk shit, you get punched. Rule three, you punch someone else, no matter what, you get punched. Can you handle that?” He smiled, half his teeth missing. “Now Sal, back to work, hey. Smoke break’s over.”
    “Sounds reasonable,” said Romano.
    She went to the door, and the man stood his ground. He smelled like armpit and had a mean amphetamine twitch on. He wasn’t happy about it, but he let her past.
    The place was darker than hell inside. It got worse when the door sealed shut behind them. There was a bar down one wall, booths across. A stage with a catwalk divided the rest. A handful of punters sat around the stage taking in the early afternoon show: a plump girl in fishnets grinding away on what looked like a carpenter’s sawhorse. Music played, painfully quiet, giving the whole place an eerie vibe it didn’t need.
    Romano went to the bar and ordered a beer.
    The bartender was a huge biker. Patched up. Hair halfway down his chest. He took her money and said, “Tryouts for the policewoman show are next week.”
    “Uh-huh.” She took the photo out. He didn’t look at it.
    “Pretty dark in here,” he said. “Don’t really get to know the girls. Bad for business. Bad for my health, too.”
    Romano looked around. An ancient bain-marie sat in the corner under a single exposed light bulb. “Is that the ten-dollar buffet?”
    He nodded.
    “How is it?”
    He sniggered. “Cleaner than the pussy.”
    “I want to talk to the girls. If I go out back, I’m not going to step on anyone’s toes, am I? I just want to talk to them. I’m not here for anything else.”
    “Nah. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
    “This another one of the house rules?” She drained her glass. The beer helped.
    “We got all sorts of rules,” said the barman.
    “I actually knew a few Doomriders down in Melbourne. You guys run a