Bubbles Ablaze Read Free Page A

appeared to be in his mid-fifties. His hair was black and plastered neatly to the side into a hair-sprayed helmet. He was wearing a pink Izod polo shirt, an Eddie Bauer green down vest, spiffy khaki Dockers and a pair of brown Rockport Professional Walkers. His only adornments were a Rolex rip-off watch, a thick gold chain around his neck and a salesman’s smile despite a six-inch bloody hole blown into the middle of his chest.
    â€œI’m guessing he was the target of the gunshots you heard.” Stiletto was putting his tiny Japanese job to work, shooting like a madman.
    It was not Stinky. For one thing, no pocket protector. “Is he dead?”
    Stiletto paused from shooting and looked at me like I was an idiot. “You could drive a truck through that hole. Of course he’s dead.”
    I studied the corpse while Stiletto continued clicking away. For some reason this man’s face was familiar. Familiar in the way movie stars and TV actors are. As though you know them when you really don’t.
    Stiletto stooped down to get a tasteful profile shot. Newspapers are generally reluctant to plaster bloody corpses on page one, unless the corpses belong to impoverished foreign rebels and refugees. Inside the newsroom, however, up-close murder scene photos are hot property. We journalists aren’t much more than voyeurs and gossips when you get right down to it.
    â€œI guess this whole evening wasn’t a hoax after all,” Stiletto said.
    I nodded in agreement. “The fax said there’d been a businessman shot dead in a coal mine and what do you know. . . By the way,” I looked up at him, “what do you know?”
    â€œDon’t tell me you don’t recognize him,” Stiletto said.“Haven’t you been keeping up with the news like Tony Salvo keeps nagging you?”
    I bit my lip. Truth was, although I was supposed to read the News-Times cover to cover, including, ugh, sports and stock quotes, usually I couldn’t get past the comics, marriage announcements and coupons. The rest was too boring. It was obvious from Stiletto’s response, though, that our Mr. Body had been some big shot. But who?
    I never had a chance to ask because at that moment there was an abrupt flash of yellow and white light that reflected off the tunnel’s walls. For a nanosecond I cheerfully hallucinated that the police had heard reports of the gunfire and had come to our rescue. I didn’t have a chance to discount that as ridiculous because my attention turned to what sounded like a tremendous explosion followed by an odd rumbling and rolling sound. Stiletto took two strides and grabbed my hand.
    â€œWhat was that?” I asked.
    â€œI don’t know, but we better run.”
    Next thing, we were scrambling down the tunnel, away from the coal car and the body. Little stones were slipping into my sandals and digging painfully into my toes, but I didn’t dare stop to remove them. We sloshed through puddles and came up against rocks that forced us to turn left or right. Stiletto’s headlamp cast eerie shadows against the wood beams supporting the black rock walls.
    I was getting short of breath and I couldn’t take it anymore. Stiletto was dragging me, but to where? We were stuck in a tunnel. There was no way out. Or was there?
    As we passed what Stiletto’s headlamp showed to be a deep crevice, I dug my heels in and tugged at him.
    â€œC’mon, Bubbles,” he urged. “What’re you—”
    Breathless, I pointed to the crevice. Stiletto nodded and I stepped in, crouching as far as I could against the wall while the rumble roared louder. Stiletto shielded me with his body and weboth closed our eyes. I tried to pray, but all I could think about was my teenage daughter Jane and whether or not she was going to go along with her boyfriend G’s asinine plan to pick grapes in France after graduation from Liberty High School.
    And then it hit