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stomped her way out my door. She slammed it. All right, I know I was a nasty bastard to her. Is there any law that says I shouldn’t have been?

Chapter Eight
     
     
    When I don’t know what in the hell to do next, I sit at my desk drinking rye and smoking gaspers. No, that doesn’t make me think. It makes me semi-drunk and smelling like an ashtray. I was clueless. Sylvester said Sudowsky had lots of enemies that wanted him dead. So who were they? Where were they located in this cesspool city? Would they be slurping up suds in all the bars? Why not?
     
    I know lots of ways to get myself killed. Here’s a dandy one. “I’d like to talk to anyone who hated barber Sudowsky enough to kill him.”
    Everybody in the bar eyed the table I was standing on and me. Some stood, picking up drinks in their left hand, while their right hand reached for weapons. I stepped down from the table, grabbed a chair, and became encircled by six of the meanest, steroid-muscled sons-of-bitches I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet.
    “Hi, guys, would you like a drink? I’m buying.”
    All six slammed weapons on to the table top. One ordered a pitcher of milk and six glasses. Yes, milk. Are there any rules that say you can’t drink milk in a sleazy waterhole tavern?
    The toughest-looking one talked from the right side of his mouth at me. “The name’s Sam. What’s yours?”
    “Thanet Blake.”
    “You’re that dumbass shamus we’ve heard about?”
    “Yeah, that’s me.”
    Sam’s grin showed several teeth missing. “All of us wanted to kill Sudowsky.”
    “Why?” I asked.
    “Take a look at our heads. Shit, he wasn’t a barber. He was a hair butcher.” He eyed my head and laughed. “I can tell he worked on you. You should wear a hat to hide his lack of artistry.”
    “Okay, Sam, I know what you mean. So, which one of you knocked him off?”
    A steroid to my left talked at me. “I’m Jacob. None of us stiffed him.”
    I finished my beer in one gulp and got up to leave without thanking the steroids. One grabbed my arm and jerked me back into my chair. “The name’s Pete. I saw how the barber got his. I was in that alley and heard Sudowsky and you bullshitting each other.”
    My pulse quickened. Sweat coated me. I asked the man upstairs to not let the killer be Starla as I eyeballed Pete. “So who offed the guy?”
    “Hell, Blake, I don’t know. For a few seconds I thought you did it, until I realized the flash from the killer’s gun came from where you weren’t.”
    Lord, these guys were no help at all. I paid for the pitcher of milk and mumbled a goodbye.
    “Wait a minute, Blake.”
    The guy said his name was Philip. “Draco hangs out at Smoky Renaldo’s joint. He knows every alley in this city. It’s rumored that he’s responsible for several killings. Be nice to him. He’s packs a fifty caliber Desert Eagle.”
     
    Smoky Renaldo is beauty personified. We’ve had a thing for each other since our college days together. We both know said thing will never blossom. So color me crazy. The average guy would swim in a volcano for her.
    Smoky was mixing drinks for three guys dripping saliva on the bar as they stared at her voluptuousness and inhaled her scent. She saw me and flashed a smile that heated my frame up several degrees. Smoky is terrific. I love everything about her.
    The three guys reluctantly left the bar, and I bellied up to it. With a frown that made her face even lovelier, she scolded me. “It’s great to see you, you gorgeous hunk, but you never show up here unless trouble is brewing, and you’re investigating, right?”
    “Right, I understand Draco hangs out here.”
    “He does.”
    “Is he here?”
    “Yes. What do you want him for?”
    “I’m not sure. He might know something about a murder I’m investigating.”
    Smoky motioned with her head to the left. “He’s the lone guy. Be careful. That’s a real badass gun he has on the table.”
    Draco could have fit right in with the Hollywood