The Night Monster Read Online Free Page A

said. “We can have a couple of cold ones in the parking lot before the game.”
    Burrell rolled her eyes. “Right.”
    I slipped through the curtain with my dog.
    “See you later,” I said.

CHAPTER 5
    got out of Broward General without Frank Yonker spotting me, and drove to a nearby walk-in clinic. Parking in a shady spot, I rolled down the windows. Buster took the hint, and went to sleep in the back.
    The clinic was filled with screaming kids and moaning old people. I was put into an examination room and told by a nurse that a doctor would be in shortly. Having nothing better to do, I took apart my Colt on the examining table, and used a Q-tip and some cotton balls I filched from a medicine cabinet to clean it.
    I’d started carrying a 1908 Colt Pocket Hammerless my first day as a detective, and I considered it the best concealment weapon in the world. It was thinner than most handguns, and because there was no hammer to catch on my clothing, it was an easy draw. It had gotten me out of many tight situations, and had never let me down. They say you are in love with a gun when you see one dropped on TV and are afraid it might get scratched. That was how I felt about my Colt.
    I had my guy reassembled and back in my pocket by the time a doctor entered the room. He looked Middle Eastern and spoke with a heavy British accent. I removed my shirt and pants, and showed him the cuts on my body. He asked me how I’d gotten them.
    “Wrestling with an alligator,” I replied.
    The doctor rolled his eyes.
    “Now I’ve heard everything,” he said.
    I left the clinic covered in Band-Aids. Walking to my car, I powered up my cell phone and found a message waiting from my daughter, Jessie. She’d called from the Bank Atlantic Center, where she and her teammates were practicing for tonight’s basketball game. There was urgency to her voice, and I called her back.
    “Thanks for calling me back so fast,” my daughter said.
    “Anything for you,” I said.
    “Are you coming to the game tonight? A bunch of the girls’ fathers said they’ll be there.”
    “Of course I’m coming to the game. Now tell me what’s going on.”
    “There’s been a creepy guy with a video camera lurking around the court during practice. He kept shooting closeups of the team, even when we were just standing around listening to Coach. He’s got a press badge, but something tells me he’s a stalker. I asked one of the security guards to talk to him, but the guy disappeared.”
    Bad guys trying to get close to young women often posed as TV reporters or fashion photographers. I said, “What did he look like?”
    “He was white, kinda short and thin, in his late forties. He was wearing dirty Bermuda shorts, a faded blue T-shirt, and a baseball cap. During the break, I tried to snap a photo of him with my cell phone, but he took off running.”
    “You might have scared him away.”
    “He’ll be back, Daddy.”
    “You think so?”
    “I’d bet money on it.”
    Intuition was the messenger of fear. Jessie’s gut was telling her that this guy was a threat. It was time to stop questioning and start helping.
    “I’ll look for him at the game tonight,” I said.
    “Thank you, Daddy.”
    ———
    I drove east, to the beach, and pulled into the parking lot of the Sunset Bar and Grill, a ramshackle building that sat with one half in the sand and the other half over the ocean. I lived in a rented room above the bar with a spectacular view of the water. One day a hurricane would come and blow it all away, but for now, I called it home.
    I showered and put on my best clothes, then headed downstairs. Behind the bar was a shaven-headed, heavily tattooed ex-convict named Sonny. I’d leaned on Sonny after my life had fallen apart, and he’d never let me down. He gave me a plate of table scraps, which I placed on the floor for my dog.
    “How did you get all those Band-Aids on your arms?” Sonny asked.
    “Wrestling with an alligator,” I