George P. Pelecanos - Right As Rain

Copyright 2001 by George P. Pelecanos

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

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First eBook Edition: November 2008

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

ISBN: 978-0-446-54929-5

Also by George P. Pelecanos

The Sweet Forever

Shame the Devil

King Suckerman

The Big Blowdown

Down By the River Where the Dead Men Go

Shoedog

Nicks Trip

A Firing Offense

W HAT Derek Strange was worried about, looking at Jimmy Simmons sitting there, spilling over a chair on the other side of his desk, was that Simmons was going to pick some of Stranges personal shit up off the desktop in front of him and start winging it across the room. Either that or get to bawling like a damn baby. Strange didnt know which thing he wanted to happen less. He had some items on that desk that meant a lot to him: gifts women had given him over the years, tokens of gratitude from clients, and a couple of Redskins souvenirs from back in the 1960s. But watching a man cry, that was one thing he could not take.

Tell me again, Derek. Simmonss lip was trembling, and pools of tears were threatening to break from the corners of his bloodshot eyes. Tell me again what that motherfucker looked like, man.

Its all in the report, said Strange.

Im gonna kill him, see? And right after that, Im gonna kill his ass again.

Youre talkin no sense, Jimmy.

Fifteen years of marriage and my womans just now decided to go and start taking some other mans dick? Youre gonna tell me now about sense? God damn!

Jimmy Simmons struck his fist to the desktop, next to a plaster football player with a springmounted head. The player, a white dude originally whose face Janines son, Lionel, had turned dark brown with paint, wore the old gold trousers and burgundy jersey from back in the day, and he carried a football cradled in one arm. The head jiggled, and the Redskins toy tilted on its base. Strange reached over, grabbed the player, and righted it before it could tip over.

Take it easy. You break that, I cant even charge you for it, cause its priceless, hear?

Im sorry, Derek. A tear sprang loose from Simmonss right eye and ran down one of his plump cheeks. Shit.

Here you go, man. Strange ripped a Kleenex from the box atop his desk and handed it to Simmons, who dabbed tenderly at his cheek. It was a delicate gesture for a man whose last day under three hundred pounds was a faded memory.

I need to know what the man looked like, said Simmons. I need to know his name.

Its all in the report, Strange repeated, pushing a manila envelope across the desk. But you dont want to be doing nothin about it, hear?

Simmons opened the envelope and inched out its contents slowly and warily, the way a child approaches an open casket for the first time. Strange watched Simmonss eyes as they moved across the photographs and the written report.

It hadnt taken Strange all that long to get the goods on Denice Simmons. It was a tailandsurveillance job, straight up, the simplest, dullest, and most common type of work he did. He had followed Denice to her boyfriends place over in Springfield, Virginia, on two occasions and waited on the street until she came out and drove back into D.C. The third time Strange had tailed her, on a Sunday night when Jimmy Simmons was up in Atlantic City at an electronics show, he had waited the same way, but Denice did not emerge from the mans apartment. The lights went out in the thirdstory window where the man lived, and this was all Strange needed. He filled out the paperwork in the morning, picked up the photographs he had taken to a onehour shop, and called Jimmy Simmons to his office the same day.

How long? said Simmons, not looking up from the documents.

Three months, Id say.

How you know that?

Denice got no other kind of business being over in Virginia, does she?

She works in the District. Shes got no friends over in Virginia

Your own credit card bills, the ones you supplied? Denice has been charging gas at a station over there by the Franconia exit for three, three and a half months. The stations just a mile down the road from our boys apartment.

You think shed be smarter than that. Simmons nearly grinned with affection. She never does like to pay for her own gas. Always puts it on the card so Ill have to pay, come bill time. Shes tight with her money, see. Funny for a woman to be that way. And though she knows Ill be stroking the checks, she always has to stop for the cheapest gas, even if it means driving out of her way. I bet if you checked, youd see they were selling gas at that station dirt cheap.

Dollar and a penny for regular, said Strange.

Simmons rose from his chair, his belly and face quivering as if his flesh were being blown by a sudden gust of wind. Well, Ill see you, Derek. Ill take care of your services, soon as I see a bill.

Janine will get it out to you straightaway.

Right. And thanks for the good work.

Always hate it when it turns out like this, Jimmy.

Simmons placed a big hat with a red feather in its band on his big head. Youre just doing your job.

Strange sat in his office, waiting to hear Simmons go out the door. It would take a few minutes, as long as it took Simmons to flirt with Janine and for Janine to get rid of him. Strange heard the door close. He got out from behind his desk and put himself into a midlength black leather jacket lined with quilt and a thin layer of down. He took a PayDay bar, which Janine had bought for him, off the desk and slipped it into a pocket of the jacket.

Out in the reception area of the office, Strange stopped at Janine Bakers desk. Behind her, a computer terminal showed one of the Internets many sites that specialized in personal searches. Janines brightly colored outfit was set off against her dark, rich skin. Her red lipstick picked up the red of the dress. She was a pretty, middleaged woman, liquid eyed, firm breasted, wide of hip, and lean legged.

That was quick, he said.

He wasnt his usual playful self. He said I was looking lovely today

You are.

Janine blushed. But he didnt go beyond that. Didnt seem like his heart was all that in it.

I just gave him the bad news about his wife. She was getting a little somethinsomethin on the side with this young auto parts clerk, sells batteries over at the Pep Boys in northern Virginia.

Howd they meet? He see her stalled out on the side of the road or something?

Yeah, hes one of those good Samaritans you hear about.

Pulled over to give her a jump, huh.

Now, Janine.

This the same guy she was shackin up with two years ago?

Different guy. Different still than the guy she was running with three years before that.

Whats he gonna do?

He went through the motions with me, telling me what he was going to do to that guy. But alls hell do is, hell make Denice suffer a little bit. Not with his hands, nothin like that. Jimmy wouldnt touch Denice in that way. No, theyll be doing some kind of Im Sorry ceremony for the next few days, and then hell forgive her, until the next one comes along.