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Fall Guy

Fall Guy

Titel: Fall Guy Kostenlos Bücher Online Lesen
Autoren: Carol Lea Benjamin
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promise, Rachel, will you? I told you everything, just like you wanted. You won't forget about Friday?“
    „I never forget a promise,“ I said, thinking of the promise I'd somehow made to O'Fallon even though I wasn't aware I was making it at the time.
    The leash in one hand, O'Fallon's briefcase in the other, I took a long way home. Weaving up and down some of the dark, narrow streets between Bleecker and West Fourth streets, I peered into the tall, lit-up windows of town houses, wondering what the lives of the people who lived there were like, people with chandeliers and grand central staircases, with libraries and formal dining rooms, people with money and jobs they could actually talk about. Passing their elegant homes, I wondered if the people who lived there ever thought about people who lived half in and half out of the gutter. People like Parker, O'Fallon, people like me.

CHAPTER 11
    When I was two blocks from home, my cell phone rang. The conversation was short and one-sided. „I'm on Perry Street,“ I said. Then, „Yes.“ And „Yes“ again.
    Once again there was a man waiting at the gate that led to my cottage, smoking a cigarette, this one standing with his back to me. But this one wasn't jiggling around. He was standing perfectly still and I had the feeling he was used to waiting. I had the feeling he could do it for a long, long time, no problem.
    There was a weariness in his shoulders and something about him that made him look shabby and used. I wondered what it was he had to tell me. I wondered what could be so important that it couldn't wait, and why he'd crossed the street to wait for me rather than asking me to stop by the precinct. When he turned around and I saw the mileage on his face, the wear and tear, I knew that whatever it was he'd come to say, it wasn't good.
    He didn't smile when he saw me, lift his hand, toss away the cigarette, take a step in my direction. He stood his ground, waiting until I was standing next to him, waiting for me to talk first even though this meeting had been his idea.
    „What happened?“
    He pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers, let his hand drop. I thought it would go right back where it had been, to his side, but he put it around my arm instead. „Where can we talk for a minute?“
    I thought about the way I'd felt a couple of hours before, not taking out my key, leading Parker away from where I lived, from where I felt safe. Then I took out the keys and opened the gate. Brody held it, closing it behind us, stepping aside to let me lock it, then testing it to make sure, a careful man. We walked down the tunnel made by the town house I took care of arid the one next door, brick all around us, our footsteps loud and hollow, coming back at us as we walked. The only light in the garden was the one on a timer, at the back of the Siegal house. The house lights were on, too, a ploy to induce people into thinking that someone was at home, a ploy that hadn't even fooled a homeless woman who'd barely had her wits about her. My lights were off, the cottage dark. No one could see it from the street. Lights on, lights off, it didn't make a dime's worth of difference.
    We walked over to the steps. I moved the key toward the lock. Brody took my arm again.
    „Let's stay out here,“ he said. „This is nice.“
    We sat on the steps. I leaned the briefcase against the rail and unhooked Dashiell's leash. There was a blue ceramic bowl outside, nearly as dark as lapis. He walked over to it, took a noisy drink, checked the perimeter, then lay down in his favorite spot, under the oak.
    There were lights on in some of the apartments that backed onto the garden, and air conditioners making a white noise, so that aside from an occasional horn or passing motorcycle, we couldn't hear the traffic on Hudson Street.
    „I had no idea this was back here,“ Brody said.
    „That's one of the things I like about it. That, and this, being able to sit outside, think my own thoughts, look at the stars without worrying about getting mugged.“
    „You just let a strange man in here. You're much too trusting.“
    I turned to look at him. „A man with a gun.“ I reached out to touch it through his jacket, changing my mind before I did. „But you're not going to mug me with your service revolver, are you, Detective? You're going to do it with words.“
    He unbuttoned his jacket, letting it fall open.
    „Have you spoken to Parker yet?“
    „Yes, why?“
    „When did you

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