Page 111 of Shadow's Surrender
Chapter Twenty-Three
Three weeks later
Afew starsfreckled the inky black night, and Shadow stood in a darkened corner, waiting.
The alley behind the building was lined with empty crates and dumpsters that reeked of rotting food. Tall weeds and clumps of grass grew from the cracked asphalt of the lot.
The sound of a door slamming shut and the tapping of heels on pavement drew him out of the shadows and toward the burly man who was walking with his head down across the tarmac. The jangle of keys echoed eerily in the deserted parking lot, and Charlie Bowen, as if sensing Shadow’s presence, paused at his car and looked over his shoulder. Shadow took a few steps back into obscurity, avoiding the only light in the lot: a dim spotlight focused on the alley. From Charlie’s small, jerky movements, Shadow knew fear was creeping up his spine, and just as the private investigator opened his car door, Shadow was beside him.
Charlie cried out, the keys dropping from his hands with aclunkas he turned around, his eyes widened in fear.
“How are you, Charlie?” Shadow asked, his voice low.
“Fuck, you startled me.” A sheen of sweat glistened across his face. “I’m good.”
“So you decided to come out of hiding?” Shadow wedged himself between the open car door and Charlie.
“Hiding?” A nervous laugh. “Why would I be hiding? I just took my family on a vacation before the summer ends. We went to Gunnison. It was so much cooler there. Did some fishing, hiking—”
“Cut the shit—I don’t want your fuckin’ itinerary. I want you to tell me what you know about someone throwing a tire iron at my bike.”
“Why would I know aboutthat?”
Shadow laughed dryly. “Because my gut tells me you do.”
The footage Hawk was able to pull from the security cameras was grainy at best, and the two fuckers had their sweatshirt hoods pulled down low over their faces. The license plate of the two-door Mercedes sports car was illegible, but from the physical characteristics Shadow, Hawk, Banger, and Smokey could see, the guys were not old men, and the car was a convertible.
“I didn’t do anything.” Charlie ran his hand over his face. “I swear.”
“Were you asked to?”
Charlie shuffled a foot across the gravel, eyes darting everywhere, but avoiding any eye contact with Shadow. “I don’t want any trouble.”
He was on Charlie like a shot, grabbing the front of his shirt, then lifting him on his toes, his face only inches from the private eye’s.
“This is youronlychance to tell me the fuckin’ truth.”
“Okay … okay. I was asked to do it, but I said no. He offered me a ton of money, but I refused it, then I cut out of town. You can check. The night it happened, I wasn’t here, I was in Gunnison with my family.”
Shadow pushed Charlie back hard, and the burly man slammed against the opened car door.
“Did that fucker Mansfield try to pay you to do it?”
Charlie Bowen’s head shook vigorously. “No, it wasn’t Mansfield. It was Bruce Huntington. He said something about ridding the town of scum like you. He was angry about you screwing something up between his son and Mr. Mansfield’s daughter.”
Rage swirled inside him like a tornado, and he clenched his scarred hands into fists as he tried to control his emotions.
“Did he say anything else?”
Charlie looked away, a pained expression spreading across his face.
“Spill it—tell me what the fuck he said.”
Bowen’s shoulders slumped, and stress showed on his face from the frown lines between his brows to the flat line of his lips.
“He mentioned your … uh … mother.” He said the last word so low Shadow could barely hear him.
“My mother?” The rage turned white hot and burned through every nerve in his body.
