Page 8 of Silver-Tongued Devil
“Well, there you go,” Blake said. “I’m not all that much of a city guy. That rig might be new, but she’s not my first. My first—now, she was a bass boat, and that’s being charitable. Only room for two, and one of ’em had better not be fat. It’s been what you’d call a gradual upgrade.”
“Thought you were from Portland,” the owner said.
Everybody else, including the city guys, was still listening, and Blakedidn’tallow himself to feel a stab of annoyance. Par for the course. Attention was the price you paid for that twenty million a year. Put that way, it was a mighty small price.
“Nah,” he said. “Virginia boy, by way of Mississippi. Did a few years in Georgia, too. I know lakes a little, and I know oceans a little more. But I sure don’t know Idaho, and I don’t know Chinook and kokanee, either, but I’d like to.”
The owner looked at the guy in the paint cap, who was standing stiffly, canted to one side. Old injury, probably. “Nah,” Paint-Cap Guy said to the owner. “You go on. It’s over and done with.” Which was cryptic.
“You sure?” the owner asked him, ignoring Blake.
Paint-Cap Guy didn’t answer, just shoved off the counter, limped a couple steps forward, put out a hand, and said, “Russell Matthews.” Nothing wrong with his handshake, whatever was messed up with the rest of him.
The owner hauled in a breath and said, “Larry Nagle here. This is my store.”
“I figured,” Blake said, staying patient.
He spent a half hour after that asking questions, listening, and amassing a collection of flies, flashers, herring to use as bait, and a whole lot more. The two city guys left, but Paint-Cap Guy—Matthews—stuck around for all of it, along with his dog. Moving slow and rough and not talking much, but what he did say seemed worth listening to.
“You want to troll slow out there,” Matthews said. “Call it one-point-three, one-point-five a hour. And this time of year, the Chinook are maybe thirty, fifty feet deep, that’s all, so you don’t want to go too far down.”
“Good to know,” Blake said. “Now, here’s the real question. Best spots?”
Larry and Russell looked at each other, and even the dog seemed to be holding her breath. Blake said into the silence, “I’m happy to pay for a guide, if you know somebody who wants to earn a couple hundred bucks tomorrow or Sunday to show me the ropes. Either day works for me, and anything he catches on his own line belongs to him. I’ve got rods and all out on the boat.”
“You got a license?” Russell asked.
“Yes, sir. Sure do.”
“Well, hell,” Russell said. “For two hundred bucks, I’ll go out with you. Bella comes too, though. My dog.”
Blake cast an eye at her. Nobody could have called her noisy, and she’d moved about two feet this whole time. “Long as she doesn’t scare the fish.”
“Nah.”
“You sure, Russ?” Larry asked quietly.
“For two hundred bucks, I’d strip naked and do a lap dance,” Russell said. “I’ve got a mortgage.”
“There you go, then,” Larry told Blake. “You can’t do better than that. Russell doesn’t get out much anymore, but nobody knows the lake better.”
“Can’t get into those low boats, that’s why,” Russell said. “A Hatteras, though—I might be able to haul my ass on board her. Eight o’clock tomorrow morning,” he told Blake. “Pick Bella and me up at my place.”
Blake thought the timing over for a second. He had a date tonight, yeah. But he wasn’t expecting it to last all night. He had a game plan, and for the marriage deal, he was pretty sure, it would involve going slow. He was going to have to be a gentleman. He hoped he still remembered how.
“Sure,” he said. “Except I don’t want the lap dance.”
When Dakota had arrived at the resort on Wednesday morning, they’d let her in. So there was that. She hadn’t seen Blake again during the next couple days, which was good. As long as she managed to behave herself, she could probably finish the job without getting herself, her partner, and their entire crew fired.
“Got any plans for the weekend?” she asked Evan as they were cleaning up on Friday afternoon. It was as hot as ever, but she’d save her longing for the lake until she got to City Beach. No place for the high jumps out there, but on the other hand, you weren’t risking your livelihood.
“You know the answer to that,” Evan said. “Why? You need some help?”
“Yeah, if you wouldn’t mind coming over for an hour and giving me a hand to hang the storage unit Russ built me. I hate to ask, but otherwise, he’ll insist on helping me, and you know how much that’d hurt.”
“You got it. I’ll do it tonight, if you want. My mom took Gracie up to Sandpoint to visit a friend. Not back till late.”
“Oh, yeah?” He wasn’t looking at her; just carefully folding dropcloths. “That’s exciting for you, then. Been a while since you had an evening off dad duty, hasn’t it?”
