Big Red Tiquila - Rick Riordan Read Free Page B

his coattails to fame. Now, ten years later, Beau and Lillian
were selling curios.
    "I don’t get as much time as I did in
college," she said. "But soon. I have some new ideas."
    I decided not to push it. After a large waiter with
an even larger mustache came to take our order, Lillian changed
subjects.
    "How about you? Now that I’ve got you out here
without a job, I mean. It can’t be that easy without an
investigator’s license. "
    I shrugged. "Some legal firms like that—informal
help for the messy jobs, no records on the payroll. I’ve got a few
leads. Maia has lots of friends of friends."
    The minute I said her name I wished I hadn’t. It
landed in the middle of the table between us like a brick. Lillian
slowly licked some salt from the rim of her glass. There was no
change in her face.
    "You could always get a job evicting wayward
tenants," she suggested.
    “ Or I could help sell art for you."
    She gave me a lopsided smile. "When I have to
pin a customer in a joint lock to buy my work, I’ll know it’s
him; to put down the camera and the paintbrush for good."
    The waiter returned quickly with a bowl of butter and
a basket the size of a top hat filled with handmade tortillas.
Unfortunately Fernando Asante came up to our table right behind him.
    "I’ll be damned!" he said. “If it isn’t
Jack Navarre’s boy. "
    Before I could put down my half-buttered tortilla I
was shaking hands with him, staring up at his weathered brown face
and a row of smiling, gold-outlined teeth. Asante’s hair was so
thin and well greased, combed back from his forehead, that it
could’ve been drawn on with a Marksalot.
    I stood up, introducing Lillian to San Antonio’s
eldest city councilman. As if she didn’t know who he was. As if
anybody in town who read the Express-News tabloid section didn’t
know.
    " ’ Course," Asante said. “I remember
Miss Cambridge. Fiesta Week. The Travis Center opening, with Dan
Sheff. "
    Asante had a gift for names, and that one fell onto
the table like another brick. Lillian winced a little. The councilman
just smiled. I smiled back. An Anglo man had come up behind Asante
and was waiting patiently with that distracted, brooding expression
most bodyguards develop. About six feet, curly black hair, boots and
jeans, T-shirt and linen jacket. Lots of muscles. He didn’t smile.
    "Councilman. You made it into the San Francisco
paper a while back."
    He did his best modest look. "The Travis Center
opening. Millions in new revenue to the city. Friends called me up
from all over the country, said they saw the coverage."
    “ Actually it was that piece about the secretary and
you in Brackenridge Park."
    Lillian suppressed a laugh by choking on her
margarita. Asante’s smile wavered momentarily, then came back
different—more of a snarl. We were all quiet for a few seconds. I’d
seen him give that look plenty to my dad in the years they had been
at each other’s throats. I was downright proud to see it turned on
me. I figured wherever my father was he would probably be biting the
end off a new cigar and laughing his ass off about then.
    Asante’s large friend felt the change of mood, I
guess. He moved around to the side of the table.
    "Love to have you join us for dinner," I
offered. "Double date?"
    "No thanks, Jack," the councilman said.
That was the second time today someone had called me by my father’s
name. It sounded strange.
    "I hear you’re in town for good." He
didn’t seem to like the sound of that. "It can be tough
finding jobs down here. You have any trouble, let me know."
    “ Thanks."
    "Least I can do." A politician’s grin
smoothed over his face again. "Not every day a Bexar County
sheriff gets shot down. Your dad . . . that was a bad way to go."
    Asante kept smiling. I was counting the gold caps on
his teeth, wondering how hard they would be to break off.
    “ I always wished I could do something more for your
family, jack, but, well, you left town so fast. Like a jackrabbit,
heard