Veil of Night Read Free Page B

“Sadie,” who happened to be the scrawny redneck bartender. “Sadie” obviously wasn’t his name—that was Will Aster—and whatever ambience he’d been trying to project by choosing a woman’s name for his bar had long since been swamped under a tide of uniforms, weaponry, and testosterone. Sure, some of the female cops came in, and sometimes one of the guys would bring in a wife or girlfriend, or civilians would wander in, but Sadie’s was now solidly a cop bar.
    If Will had ever intended his bar to be more sophisticated, he’d long since given up on the effort. The drinks served were mainly beer and bourbon, and the food offerings didn’t have much variety but tended toward the hefty side. You could get a basket of fried chicken fingers and fries in Sadie’s, but you couldn’t get a salad; peanuts were available, but not popcorn. Occasionally, if Will was in the mood, there would be “Wing Night,” and nothing was served except hot wings. The limited menu was fine with Eric, because he didn’t come to Sadie’s to eat.
    He liked the place, liked the way he could relax here. The atmosphere was almost cavelike, with dim lighting, dark redbrick walls, rough tile flooring, and a row of small black tables along the wall. An aisle about six feet wide separated the long bar from the tables, giving the two waitresses room to maneuver. A jukebox stood in one corner, and that was Sadie’s nod to the idea of entertainment. There wasn’t a dance floor, but if enough people were in the mood they’d shove the tables to the back of the bar and make themselves a space for gyrating. The bar was usually noisy with loud laughter and sick jokes, which was how cops unwound after a rough day. Whenever Eric stepped through that door, he could almost feel the tension begin to ease from his neck and shoulders. By the time he’d made it to the bar, Will would have pulled him a Bud and was ready to slide the foamy glass to him. You couldn’t beat service like that.
    After a day spent testifying in court, he needed a beer before he headed home. There were few things that frustrated him as much as lawyers and the entire court system, even when the outcome was a good one. A bad outcome was when some slick legal eagle got a drug case dismissed because some unimportant i hadn’t been dotted, which pissed him off big-time, and he wasn’t above hoping that the druggie would then burgle the lawyer’s house looking for quick-sell items to support his habit. Today, though the cases had been relatively minor and justice had prevailed, he’d still had to spend too many hours hanging around just to give five minutes of testimony when he could have been out working cases. It was all part of the job, but it was the part he liked least.
    He’d been there about fifteen minutes, long enough for the pleasure of not doing anything to begin seeping into his muscles, when the outside door opened, letting in street noise and warm humid air. All the cops in the bar automatically glanced over to check out the new arrival. It was reflex, an unconscious threat assessment: Was the new arrival friend or foe, cop or civilian? Eric did the same, and immediately recognized the newcomer. A warm jolt hit his midsection. No doubt about it: she was the woman he’d bumped into that morning in city hall, just outside one of the municipal courtrooms. She was still wearing the same stylish black suit, which meant her day had been as long as his.
    He liked what he saw now just as much as he had in the hallway at city hall. Everything about her said “classy,” from the suit she wore to the way she pulled her thick black hair into a smooth, heavy knot at the back of her head. She had legs, capital L , holy-shit, wrap-them-around-me Legs: long, shapely, nicely muscled and toned. He could almost feel the interest level in the bar rising several notches as the guys looked her over. The women cops who came in almost always dressed down, suppressing their femininity