Drive Me Crazy Read Online Free Page A

making me think. I told her the same thing I told everybody else, that I did time for not telling. For keeping my motherfucking mouth shut. Didn’t tell the truth then, didn’t see any reason I should now.
    Her smile broadened. Women loved bad boys. We were the men they dated and never married. The men they ran back to when they found the real world too pedestrian.
    I asked, “You did some time at the free motel?”
    She grinned and winked, set free a one-sided smile. She wasn’t telling either.
    Men loved bad girls too. For the same reasons.
    We sat and sipped. She didn’t cringe or frown when she sipped her Jack. She picked up the newspaper that Pedro had discarded on the counter, read over an article.
    She asked, “What do you do?”
    “Male exotic dancer.”
    She laughed again. “Man, what is up with you and this obsession with strippers?”
    I told her, “I’m a driver.”
    “So, do you drive getaway cars, the space shuttle, go-carts, what?”
    “You got jokes. I drive for Wolf Classic Limousine.”
    She nodded. “I bet you hear things, bet you see things.”
    “What kinda things?”
    “Things people don’t want the world to know about.”
    I stared at my drink, admired that warm liquid that soothed me. Started drinking after my divorce. The hue of my drink was the same as my ex-wife’s complexion, golden-amber.
    She pressed on, asked, “What have you seen?”
    The way she was pressing me about my job should’ve sent up a red flag. But a man sat next to woman like her and wanted to do all he could to get her not to leave.
    I shrugged. “White-collar customers get in asking me if I knew where they could score crack. Or West Hollywood bathhouses. Last month people in town for a religious convention wanted to hit the strip clubs, then came right out and asked if I knew any hookers.”
    Without looking impressed or disgusted, she sipped, said, “So you hook ‘em up.”
    “Depends. I do what I can to stimulate financial growth in our depressed economy.”
    “So, if the pay is right you’ll do a lil’ somethin‘-somethin’ on the low-low.”
    Sounded like she’d moved from flirting to interviewing me. I didn’t like that.
    I said, “Somebody sounds a little drunk.”
    She shook her head, wiped her long hair back and made a face. “Not even.”
    “Damn. I’m wasting my money.”
    “Look at this.” She’d turned the page on the newspaper. “Rent scam bilks fifteen families, nets nearly fifty thousand over one weekend.”
    Pedro was passing by. He didn’t disturb us, just moved on.
    I said, “Fifty thousand in a weekend? Amazing.”
    She smiled, gave me direct eye contact, then went back to the article.
    Arizona said, “Maybe we could do some business together.”
    “What kind of business?”
    “You hear people, Driver. Their conversations, things they don’t want anybody to know about. That information you’re sitting on, the right person gets it, it’s worth a mint.”
    The years I’d lost did a number on my stomach. I faced her, took our words eye-to-eye.
    I asked, “What you running?”
    “Who said I was running something?”
    “Don’t bullshit me. Squares don’t come up in a joint like this.”
    She smiled. “Are you a police officer?”
    “Hell no.”
    She swayed with the bluesy music, like the alcohol was making her ramble out things she should keep to herself. “Let’s just say I’m investing in a few real estate opportunities.”
    I stared at my drink, at that golden liquid that did some of us in. “Short or long?”
    She knew what I meant. “Long con, but I’m working a short to generate cash flow.”
    My eyes stayed on my drink. On its color. Drifted to an old memory. Tommy Castro was singing his electric blues. Served me right to suffer. Served me right to be alone. A man like me was born to suffer. But I didn’t like being alone. Couldn’t stand the silence. I sipped. Tonight alcohol made me remember what being with a woman might help me forget.
    She said,