Page 30 of Tell Me (Savannah 3)

“Here ya go.”

The guy pulled the drawstring tight on the last sack and cinched it, the bags moving as the snakes jostled inside. Easily, he clipped them to his belt.

“Good doin’ business with you,” Alfred said as the customer reached the ladder with his new purchases strapped to his belt.

“You too.”

Alfred was already thinking about his whiskey on the side table, ice melting as the news had already started, when the customer stepped on the first rung of the metal ladder. Alfred took one last look around the bunker and didn’t see the blow coming, a sharp, painful crack to his skull.

“What the fuck,” he whispered before his bad knee buckled and he went down. He was already losing consciousness when the client jumped over him and quickly took off the lids of the terrariums, one after the other. Alfred tried to reach for his gun, but it was too late: blackness was coming over him, and the guy had already vaulted him and was climbing quickly up the ladder.

He saw the first rattler moving in its case, raising its head, flicking its tongue, and then, sensing freedom, slide upward over the Plexiglas wall and slide down the side, dropping to the floor less than three feet from where Alfred lay, unable to stay awake.

“Sleep tight,” the customer said as he climbed the rungs and snapped off the light before slamming the trapdoor shut.

CHAPTER 9

“I’ll take a small caramel Jazzachino,” Nikki said, placing her order at the local coffee shop, All That Jazzed. She’d spent a couple of days at the computer, digging up addresses and phone numbers, hoping for a call from Jada Hill, Blondell’s defense attorney, that had never come through, and she was frustrated as hell.

But things were going to break, even if she had to force them, she decided as the coffee grinder whirred and shots of steaming water hissed into cups. The tiny shop was full, not a table to be found, customers lounging in overstuffed chairs, or working on laptops, or reading or doing crossword puzzles, or playing games on phones or tablets or whatever electronic device they had with them. The buzz of conversation was low, but constant, the lights a soft amber.

“Hey,” a voice behind her in line called, “Nikki!”

Turning, she spied Effie Savoy three people behind her. She tried to muster some enthusiasm when she answered, “Hi.” Sliding her debit card through the card machine, she left a tip, then moved to the end of the counter to wait. In the time it took for her drink to appear, Effie had caught up with her at the “pickup” end of the counter.

Great.

There was nothing really wrong with Effie, at least nothing Nikki could put her finger on, but the woman, a few years older than she was, bothered her. She always stood just a little too close, as she did now, not giving Nikki her space, and it seemed to Nikki that she was nosy, too nosy, a quality that of course came with the job, to some extent. The long and the short of it was, Effie was pushy and she had instantly made Nikki want to avoid her.

“How’re the wedding plans coming?” Effie asked as they stood in the cluster of customers awaiting their drinks. She was a couple of inches taller than Nikki and, though not heavy, a big-boned woman whose blue eyes stared a little too intensely when you spoke with her, as if she was trying to figure out all the hidden meanings to what you were saying. She was just too damned intense, and she rarely cracked a smile.

“I’ve got everything put together.” A bit of a lie, but who cared? What business was it of Effie’s?

“It’s coming up now, isn’t it? Next month?”

“Around Christmas.”

Where was her damned drink?

“A busy time,” Effie pointed out. “Especially now, huh? Since you’re, like, the go-to person at the paper about Blondell O’Henry.”

“I suppose.”

“Kinda funny,” she mused aloud. “You getting that assignment and your fiancé investigating the case, or reinvestigating it, I guess. Oh, here. That’s mine!” she said as the server was about to shout out the order. “Regular coffee with room for soy milk? Right?”

The barista, a redhead, nodded without looking up, and Effie snagged the steaming cup.

“Perfect.”

The waitress was already handing out the next drink.

“Tom told me that I’m supposed to work with you on the O’Henry pieces,” she said.

“What? I didn’t hear this. I thought you did more homey, domestic stuff.”

“Well, my blog’s gotten big, y’know. Got men readers, and this story about a mom who killed her kids and is getting out of jail is perfect.”

“One kid,” Nikki corrected. “And now that’s in question, and she’s in prison, not jail.”

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