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“Unfortunately, there’s no way to take my dick back out of all those whores. I should have worked harder to get her to see that being with the club girls is nothing like being in love. I don’t know that she could ever square herself with the occasional killing, but it destroys me that I didn’t even try to explain to her how bad shit can get around here. The bottom line is, she can’t understand if I don’t explain it.”
Listening to his tirade, Ace’s expression continued to get progressively grimmer. “It used to be that club business was club business. We didn’t tell bitches nothing.”
“That was back when we mostly took whores for old ladies,” Ryder told him. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but that little red-headed archeologist you got your eye on ain’t no whore.”
Ignoring his jibe, Ace pointed out the obvious. “You’re investing a lot of time and money in a woman with high moral standards who might not end up staying after you explain all that shit.”
“Call me stupid,” Ryder volleyed back, “but I don’t want her to end up being abused by that shithead ex-husband of hers. She never talked much about him, but what she did say left me in a murderous rage.”
Jumping right on board, Ace asked, “Where do we start?”
“My old man and Hickory left out this morning on a flight to her hometown. They’re gonna gather firsthand information on Stuart Chamberlain. He was at a charity event last night and got pictures of him in the local paper. What do you think about that?”
Ace’s gaze grew distant as he mulled the information over. “It sounds like last night was the night she was supposed to get grabbed, and he wanted an alibi.”
Shit, Ryder hadn’t considered that possibility, but Ace had a point. “Maybe,” he conceded. “Then again, it could be that he’s just some stupid, rich fucker who goes to events like that all the damn time. My pops will get to the heart of the matter. I want to see this fucker who was at my place last night.”
Ace glanced nervously back at the shop. “We’ve got his body in the garage. I was just getting ready to dump him.”
Heading in that direction, Ryder slipped in through a side door. Flipping on the lights, he walked over to a body rolled in a large, thick black tarp, as per their usual protocol. The body had been stripped bare. The man’s clothing and personal effects were lying in a pile nearby. Pulling back both flaps of the tarp, the body of a man in his mid-thirties was revealed. He had pale white skin that looked as if it had never seen the light of day and there were several tattoos. One was an image of a swastika and another an image of a bandoleer of bullets wrapped all the way up his right arm.
“Why do I always feel less conflicted about a Nazi winding up dead on our watch?” Ryder asked rhetorically.
Tossing him a dark look, Ace pointed to the man’s chest, which had five distinct bullet holes. “Even super heroes kill Nazis, brother. Look around that hole in the lower abdomen. It looks like there might have been a surgery scar of some type.”
Ryder ran a hand over the man’s body. “My gramps had something like this from laparoscopic surgery. See here and here?” Pointing to two other tiny scars on either side of his stomach, Ryder explained, “I think they poke the main instrument in the larger incision, and the smaller ones are for smaller surgical tools. They work inside there using a little camera or something. This type of surgery is mostly used on the stomach and shit like that.”
Ace frowned. “That’s kind of vague, brother. And useless information, since thousands of people have the surgery every year.”
“Well, these scars look old,” Ryder told him. “So far we’ve got a few clues. He’s a fit male in his thirties with gastric problems who is an actual Nazi or Nazi sympathizer.”
“I’m gonna go with actual Nazi, ‘cause I sympathize with a lot of causes, but I don’t want their images inked on my skin. I reserve that shit for ideals that run deep.”
Closing the tarp, Ryder began going through the man’s personal effects and pulled out a small coin made of a gold alloy. Holding it up, Ryder read the inscription.
“Do we add video game arcade player or Alf pog collector to our list of clues?” Ace asked with a touch of amusement in his voice.
Shooting Ace a lopsided smile, Ryder tossed him the token. “You’re showing your age on that last one. This one’s an AA sobriety coin. Looks like our dead Nazi enjoyed three years of sobriety before he broke into my place and got himself shot.”
Holding the token up in the air, Ace eyed it under the florescent lighting of the garage. “Yep, it has the sobriety prayer on the back and everything.”
Digging through the rest of the dead man’s possessions, Ryder mumbled, “We’re gathering up a shitload of barely interesting clues leading down the path to nowhere.”
“Information is power. Never forget that, brother.”
“Goddamn, you are fuckin’ full of meaningless catch phrases today, aren’t you?”
Ace pinned him with a disgusted stare. “What is your problem?”
“I think the phrase you’re looking for is knowledge is power, you dimwit,” Ryder jabbed back.
Ace was clearly growing agitated. “You get knowledge from information, so it’s the same fuckin’ thing.”
“Clearly it’s not the same thing at all.” Waving one arm arrogantly in the air, Ryder continued. “The world’s full of fucking information. In any given situation, only relevant information is power.”
“All I meant was—”
Darkness’ annoyed voice interrupted from the doorway. “If you two ladies are finished stroking your own egos, maybe you could meet us in my office. Your old man landed and is gathering intel already.”
