The Coldest Mile Read Free Page A

in and turned on the radio, found an oldies station, and felt the tuned engine hum through his bones. He shut his eyes. The music took him back to when he was a kid and his parents danced around the living room together, his mother staring over his father's shoulder and making funny faces at Chase. It brought him back to the nights when he'd drive down the ocean parkways with Lila, heading out to the point, where they'd find some stretch of beach and she'd say, “Sweetness, you get more than flirty with me down in the dunes and you're gonna scratch us both raw.” He'd say he didn't care and she'd go, “Glad to hear it, love, 'cause neither do I.”
    When he opened his eyes, he snapped off the radio and focused on the house.
    Considering how things were going down, security inside the place looked even more lax than it was outside. It was Jackie's fault. He had a habit of sending different people on small errands. Chase watched as members of the crew wandered in and out and around the house, picking up Jackie's briefcase, his gold cigarette case, his .22, checkbook, golf clubs. These were serious guys, hitters and even some made men, running to a stationary to get Jackie some Vicks VapoRub because he thought he was coming down with a cold.
    Jackie favored three fingers of scotch on the rocks, but not too many rocks. No more than two cubes. His voice was deep and calm unless something went wrong, and then it became instantly laced with near hysteria. You could hear Jackie's neurotic ranting all over the place when he didn't get exactly what he wanted.
    Wrong VapoRub, not Vicks, go get the Vicks. Two cubes, not one, not three, not crushed ice, three fingers, not two, not four, the fuck couldn't anybody listen?
    Chase finished up with the Mercedes and started drifting around inside. If Sherry Langan was anywhere around, he didn't see her or hear anything about her. He checked the windows to see what kind of a security system they had. It was bush- league at best. He looked into empty rooms. There were dens and libraries and parlors furnished with antique, fancy furniture. Statues, paintings, ornaments, andbooks no one had ever read. He watched Jackie and his men come and go. Nobody said squat to him.
    He did a quick search of Jackie's office and found a safe hidden behind a hinged oil reproduction of Rembrandt's Aristotle Contemplating a Bust of Homer. He only knew it because the high- school auto shop where he'd taught was next door to the art classes, and one of the teachers there had the same print taped to a wall.
    He'd been a thief since he was ten years old, pulling scores with his grandfather Jonah, but Chase had never actually seen a safe behind a painting before. It sort of stunned him.
    No wiring around the frame, so there was no alarm, but he wasn't a jugger, he didn't know how to crack.
    Sometimes they got cute and left the tumbler only one digit off to save time opening it. Chase tried it but the handle still wouldn't pop. Sometimes they scribbled the combination on a slip of paper and kept it close at hand, just in case they forgot. Chase checked the corners of the drawers of Jackie's desk but didn't find anything of value except a switchblade. He pocketed it and skimmed out the door.

T he next day it was threatening rain and a cold wind kept blowing through the area. Chase was under a nice SUV but he couldn't do as much on the truck as he wanted to because the fingers on his left hand began singing with pain. He'd fractured three of them a few weeks back and he wondered if this nagging ache would be a new constant he'd have to put up with for the rest of his life.
    He thought of Lila again and a distant sweeping sorrow moved through him like a storm on the horizon heading inland. He bit back a groan. He'd made a mistake, he'd relaxed too long here. Two days was already too much. He had to stay in motion. Sweat burst across his forehead. And just like that, his pulse was suddenly thundering. He dove for the cold