“Real drunk.”
“Ooooookay.” Apparently, there was a party.
“Yep.”
The fuck? “Good to know, kid.”
“Like, talkative drunk,” he reiterates. Now I’m not only ticked with the situation at hand, but with the under-aged smart ass too.
“There a point to this conversation?” I turn to head back downstairs. This lead is officially dead.
“Well.” Stix follows me down. “I mean only if you wanted to know that he happened to say something about how he remembered Donnie hanging around in this other homeless community he used to frequent a while back.”
This peaks my interest.
I stop and wait for him to catch up. At my side, Stix gives me another golden nugget of information.
“And how he remembered these cops who used to drive through all the time getting people all riled up.”
“Yeah?” I start heading down again, this time I wait for him to keep up. Stix nods. “And how they zeroed in on Donnie and had a little talk with him one day.”
“Really.”
“Yup, and then he said he remembers specifically how freaked out Donnie seemed after they left. That he mumbled something about how he was screwed if he stuck around here much longer.”
“A drunk remembered all that, huh?”
Call me impressed. Or more like skeptical.
“Yeah. Only he wasn’t always a drunk, homeless dude, it turns out.”
Make that curious.
“Okay, I’ll bite. What’d he used to be?”
“Cop.”
“Um.” What? “The fuck?”
“That’s what he said.”
Outside on the street, my bubble for the day is officially busted. “The guy was fucking with you, Stix.” I shake my head and grab my keys, disappointed I even entertained the idea this conversation might be going somewhere.
“I don’t think so, Jackson.”
“He saw you as an easy target, thought he’d steal your money if he made like your buddy. Or maybe he wanted more than that.” I look over at him. “He try anything last night?”
“No. Ew. Gross man.”
I shake my head and unlock the car. The car door sticks for the umpteenth time this month so I have to jiggle the handle a little but it opens. Eventually.
Stix laughs and tries to hide it.
He fucking sucks at hiding it.
Jimmy’s insistent, though. “I’m telling you, I think he was on the up and up.”
“Why in the hell would an ex-cop be on the streets, Stix? Think about it.”
“He didn’t go into that much.”
“Of course not.”
“But he did say the reason he was still there was because he needed to finish the job.”
“What job?”
“He told me, back in the day, his captain had heard some rumors about high traffic drug deals going on around here. Told him he was the only guy they felt they trusted enough to put him in the zone.”
Of course, he was.
And of course now I’m wondering how very “back in the day” he’s talking here.
Like, my father’s time “back in the day”?
The engine revs when I start up the car. To most, she probably sounds pretty normal, but I can hear the rattling as we head out. There’s not much that gets under my skin more than sinking money into a car. I’ve got a lot more interesting things I’d rather be in debt over. Trust me. When it comes to the Chevelle, I make it happen. She needs to be treated right.
I’m about to consider this conversation over when something Stix said strikes a chord inside my gut.
“What did you say?”
“What?”
“Something about rumors and drug deals.”
“Yeah, yeah, he said that’s why he was there staking out some high traffic drug deals that they heard were going down in the area. He said their informant told them cops were dealing.”
Okay, I’m not gonna pretend that scenario doesn’t get me thinking. This could be my best bet at nabbing Jim Galley and whomever the fuck he’s got working for him.
“He say why he wasn’t with the force anymore?”
Or, maybe not.
“Nope, didn’t really wanna talk about that much.”
Figures.
“Your brother happens to tell this ex-cop, turned drunk homeless guy, why he was screwed?”
“Nope. He said after that, Donnie kinda disappeared. He looked for him but said the next thing he saw on Donnie was…” The crack in his voice tells me where he’s going with this.
“When he was murdered.” I finish the kid’s sentence at almost a whisper.
Stix’s eyes focus on the street outside when I say it. I’m not one to beat around the bush, and I’m not about to start so I can spare the kid’s feelings. They’re pretty much crushed anyway.
How he got this guy to start talking about Donnie is beyond me, but the details he’s giving, I gotta admit, doesn’t sound like something he could have made up. The part about the drug deals going on, that puts my already suspicious nature on high alert.
“He give you a name?”
“Nope.”
“Okay. Where was he off to this morning? I’m game for taking a crack at getting it from him.”
“That’s the thing.”