Read Shady Cross for Free Online Page B

the Escalade’s backseat. He hoped he’d counted it right, but he’d done it largely by feel, stealing glances down when he could, so he wasn’t certain. He removed the last of the bundles from his jeans, shut the drawer, and turned around. He handed Nickerson the money. The old Chinese guy’s eyes widened, seeing thousands of dollars apparently coming from his desk. His words ceased for a brief moment before tumbling out again, a hell of a lot more rapidly than before.
    “It’s OK, Mr. Chang,” Stokes assured the old man, who didn’t seem the least bit placated.
    Nickerson eyed the money in his hands suspiciously. He stepped over to the desk and opened several drawers. Satisfied that there was no more cash to be had there, he headed out of the office, back toward the dining room, riffling through the money in his hands. Stokes followed. On Stokes’s heels was an ancient and very upset Chinese man who may or may not have been named Chang.
    The old man jabbered at Stokes and Nickerson all the way through the dining room and kept jabbering away at them from his doorway. Once they reached the Escalade, Stokes tuned him out. He wondered briefly if this episode would bring the old guy trouble from the Nickersons, but he didn’t think so. Plus, he didn’t care all that much.
    The passenger window of the luxury SUV zipped down and Chatty leaned down and looked at them from behind the wheel.
    “He really had the money?” he asked.
    “Looks that way,” Non-Chatty said. He looked at Stokes. “Why’s that old guy still yelling at us?”
    “Beats me,” Stokes said. “He knew I’d be back for my money, so I don’t know what his problem is.”
    Non-Chatty probably had a lot of questions—like why the guy was holding Stokes’s money in the first place, and how he knew that Stokes would be back for it, when neither of them spoke the other’s language—but in the end, all that seemed to matter to him was the money.
    “Looks like a hundred and two thousand here.”
    Shit. Stokes thought he’d grabbed ten bundles of hundred-dollar bills. Must have grabbed a bundle of twenties, too. “Oh, that’s a mistake. Give me back the two grand.”
    Non-Chatty nodded like that sounded reasonable to him. But he kept the money. “Guess you’re paid up now.”
    He opened the passenger door and slid inside, placing the money on his lap. He fastened his seat belt.
    “See you, Stokes,” he said. “Nice doing business with you.”
    “Wanna give me a ride home?”
    “Let me think about it.”
    Stokes watched the tinted window rise as the Escalade pulled away. He shifted the backpack on his shoulder and headed down the street to look for a pay phone so he could call a cab. He knew there was one in Too Good Food, but he didn’t think he’d be welcome back in there for a while.
    He spotted a cab idling in front of the drugstore on the corner, the “On Duty” light glowing on its roof. He walked toward it, feeling comforted by the weight of the bag on his back. Maybe twelve pounds of money. Sure, it was a $102,000 lighter now, but he’d managed to keep a lot of the money on his back while getting Frank Nickerson off of it. Equally important, he was still alive and in one piece. Things were OK. As he walked, he glanced at his watch. It was 4:49 p.m.

SIX
    4:50 P.M.
    TWO HUNDRED FORTY-EIGHT THOUSAND DOLLARS. He’d counted it.
    Jesus.
    That meant the backpack originally held $350,000 before he paid off the Nickersons, which had been a shame. Still, $248,000 was a whole lot of money. What the hell? He’d call it $250,000. It was a nice round number, and it was close enough.
    A quarter of a million dollars. Jesus.
    He was sitting in the back of the cab, heading away from Too Good Food, on his way to his trailer on the outskirts of town. The route followed the one he’d just taken with the Nickersons, only in reverse. He’d go back past the bus station and out to where his twenty-five-year-old silver Airstream trailer squatted