Loren D. Estleman - Amos Walker 16 - Poison Blonde Read Free Page A

the wheel, watching the door, when it opened and half of San Ignacio spilled out into the moonlight. All four men were built like the super, but they looked more like one another in the face than they looked like him, and they were younger by at least fifteen years. They bore a resemblance to someone else as well. I was working on just who when they spotted me. They fanned out like professional gunfighters and came my way, not bothering to look for traffic as they crossed. They wore construction workers’ uniforms, heavy-duty overalls over cotton twill shirts, and their heads were sunk between their shoulders in a way no one ever has to teach anyone. I popped open the special compartment I’d had built into the dash, took out the unregistered Luger, got out, and closed the door behind me with the Luger stuck under my belt in front where they could see it.
    That stopped them, but only long enough to run the odds. You have to be very good to place four slugs where they need to be
placed in the time you need to do it. They decided I wasn’t that good. They came on. I drew the pistol and snicked off the safety.
    “Pedro! Pablo! Juan! Diego!”
    The names rang out in bursts like someone testing a machine gun. The men stopped on the center line. The woman who had shouted at them charged down the front stoop of the apartment house and crossed the street. The four parted to let her through and she closed the distance between us, pumping her arms and slapping the frozen pavement with the thin soles of her slippers. Her black eyes were fierce and her hair sparked bright copper above the ridiculous poncho.
    I put away the Luger. I know when I’m outgunned.

THREE
    B ig Bad Benny put down his prop copy of Don Quixote and got up from his chair when I came off the elevator. He’d changed into a windowpane plaid sport coat and brown turtleneck, but he still looked like a massive piece of furniture.
    I wasn’t in the mood for him. I hit him without missing a step and he tripped over his feet and fell back against the wall, jarring the whole floor. I used the meaty part of my fist on the door to the suite.
    The door swung away while I was pounding and I had to check myself to avoid hitting Gilia, not that the idea lacked merit. It was morning at the Hyatt, the drapes were wide-open, and she stood against the light in green-and-silver lounging pajamas with white espadrilles on her feet. Her hair hung free to her waist, casting a white-gold halo. “Mr. Walker,” she said.
    I lowered my fist and held up the eight-by-ten photograph I had in my other hand. It was a color shot of Gilia in her butterfly wings, with the suspending wires airbrushed out so she appeared to be flying under her own power. Someone had used a black felt-tip pen to write, “ A Pablo, con amore de Gilia,” in the lower right-hand corner.
    “Caterina had eight of these in an envelope,” I said. “The others were signed to Pedro, Juan, Diego, and four of the lesser apostles. She said you signed them.”
    Her nose twitched. “Have you been drinking?”
    “Mescal. That’s what the Muñoz family serves in Mexicantown. We got on like Cisco and Pancho, once we moved past that business of wanting to beat me to death on a public street. But I slept it off, or tried to. You’re smelling it on my clothes on account of I couldn’t decide what shirt to put on this morning to come down here and throw you out a window. You shouldn’t have left the wings at Cobo.”
    Something tickled me behind the right ear. I knew it was a pistol. “Let’s go to the basement.” Benny’s breath was warm on the back of my neck.
    “Thank you, Benito. Mr. Walker and I have some things to talk about.”
    “I don’t think so, senorita . He’s no good for you.”
    “Should I call Hector and get his opinion?”
    There was a little silence. Then my ear stopped tickling.
    “Come in, Mr. Walker. Can I offer you breakfast? They always bring too much.” She turned and walked away from the