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Автор
The Cold Blue Blood
David Handler
THREE WEEKS LATER
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
I?”
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
EPILOGUE
The Cold Blue Blood
David Handler
PROLOGUE
APRIL 18
He called himself Stan, although Torry was pretty sure that Stan wasn’t his real name. There was something about the way it seemed to catch in his throat the first time he said it. Plus he was real nervous. His eyes kept flicking around the bar as if he were afraid someone might recognize him.
Not that he seemed like the kind of guy who ever hung out with the kind of guys who hung out at the Purple Pup.
Stan wasn’t fat. Stan wasn’t loud. Stan didn’t reek of bad cologne. He was classy and soft-spoken. He said “thank you” when Torry brought him his draft beer-Beck’s, which was a dollar more than Miller. And pretty good-looking for an older guy, too. Tall and trimly built, with nice Ralph Lauren clothes. Torry, who was not good with ages, figured he was somewhere around fifty. And a real curiosity. Because she didn’t see his type around the Pup too often. Hardly at all, actually. Stan’s type belonged in a country club in Farmington.
The Purple Pup was a scruffy roadhouse next to Kwik Lube on Highway 66-just west of Middletown on the way to Meriden. Middletown was known for Wesleyan University and for the big mental hospital that was there, Connecticut Valley Hospital. Meriden wasn’t known for anything except the inadequacy of its storm drains. Residents of the neighboring towns knew to steer clear of Meriden whenever more than a quarter-inch of rain fell. As a consequence, Meriden was not considered a good place to own and operate a small business.
Still, the Purple Pup managed to do well on the weekends when the weather was good. It was very popular with the bikers-the middle-aged firemen and postal workers who liked to toodle around in the sunshine on their vintage Harleys. It was a thing they all did, like playing golf or going bowling. They’d pull in by the dozens, drink and laugh and listen to oldies on the jukebox. It was fun when the bikers came, and Torry could make fifty bucks a shift in tips. She was a big, meaty woman, large through the breasts and hips. Not fashion magazine material-but she went over well with the Purple Pup crowd.Torry had been slinging drinks there for almost two years. For the past year, she had been a blonde.
When it was cold and rainy, the Pup was deserted. Particularly on weeknights. A few young guys who worked odd jobs and still lived with their folks would hang there, nursing a couple of beers and watching the games on the dish. Lousy tippers, to a man. And their advances toward her were crude and smirky. Not to mention unsuccessful. Curt, who owned the place and tended bar, barely broke even on such nights.
That was the kind of night it was when Stan first came in. It had been raining, a cold March rain. The parking lot out front was under four inches of water.
