Deadly Waters Read Online Free Page B

the Coconino County sheriff’s department was located.
    “When I said ‘identity,’” said Wayland, “I meant I was the one what knew his secrets. A man’s secrets are his real identity. He’s going to get me a job, a good job, one of these days.”
    “Punks don’t give anybody good jobs,” said Bob as he parked the car in front of the single-story adobe building. “They only get you into deeper trouble.”
    He took Wayland from the back of the car and helped him climb the steps to the doorway. Once Bob had the young man safely inside one of the small holding cells the sheriff’s department reserved for the town’s few habitual drunks, Wayland laid himself on the cot and began singing “Feelings,” a tune he knew Sheriff Anderson hated.
    “Feelings, wo-o-o, feelings.
    Feeling like I’ll never have you
    Again in my life.”
    “You sound exactly like Barry Manilow,” Bob told him.
    He was not flattering Wayland; the young man had an uncanny talent for imitating the voices of others, and he truly did sound much like the famous crooner. From other portions of the building, from the night guards playing poker in the back and from the two other prisoners in their cells, there arose a loud, pained groan in response to Wayland’s performance.
    “Shut that Injun up, Christ’s sake!” yelled the guards. “Why do you keep bringing that son-of-a-bitch in, Mathers? He sings all damned night and gets sick on his bed!”
    “For my next number,” announced Wayland in a loud voice, “I will do Kenny Rogers’ ‘The Gambler.’”
    “You gotta know when to hold ‘em—”
    Bob put a finger to his mouth to signal him to be quiet. “Couldn’t you go to sleep, buddy? Rest up and I’ll see you get out in the morning.”

 
    IV
     
    02/18/06 12:54 Eastern Standard Time
     
    Earnest Gusman opened his mailbox on the ground floor of his decaying tenement building and found the letter he had been hoping for, yet only half expecting. He hid it in the inside pocket of his shiny corduroy coat and quickly glanced around, making certain no one was watching him. Earnest backed up the first steps of the stairwell, keeping one eye on the busy street traffic he could see through the lobby door that was always open.
    One of Earnest’s oldest fantasies, the one that kept him awake on hot, muggy nights, was the notion he was being pursued by killers, perhaps by some of the boys who sometimes machine-gunned people from the backs of motorcycles for their paymasters in the drug cartels.
    Earnest passed up the five flights of stairs as silently as a ghost, tip-toeing past Senora Mendoza’s apartment on his floor, as he knew she watched him from the peephole in her door if she heard him. Earnest hated her. He hated her with an irrational hatred he had for everything that might harm him, and that was everything and everyone he met during his waking hours, and every phantom he encountered while he slept. He could see, in his mind’s eye, Senora Mendoza spying on him, her tiny white poodle tucked under one flabby arm while with the other hand she made notes that Earnest imagined her handing to the police or--even worse--to members of the underworld.
    Earnest counted the steps from the fifth floor landing to his door, as he did every time: sixteen, seventeen...and he wiped away a few drops of sweat from his face as he reached for his key.
    “No need to make any phone calls, you old bag,” he mumbled. “See how steady I am. Nothing for me to hide. My hand is barely shaking as I unlock my door.”
    Earnest Gusman told himself not to look around like someone with something to fear, even as he glanced at the shadows farther down the hall way, where someone dangerous might be hiding. He undid the thread he strung across the bottom of his doorway each time he went out; it was unbroken, so he knew no one had been there while he was gone.
    He bolted the door behind him and propped the diagonal steel bar against the middle of the door to make