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Ten nodded and picked up his book. “Don’t do anything else stupid.”
“I’ll try.” Danny carried the folded paper and hidden phone out of the Waffle House. When he got out of his truck, he checked out the phone. It was one of those contract flip phones made by TCL. He had used and tossed plenty of these burners and had a charging cable that would fit. He found it in the center console and jammed it into the port.
Some writing on the margins of the newspaper caught his eye. Ten had scratched out an address that Google told him was a seedy motel in a bad part of town. There was a room number under the address. While the phone charged, Danny decided to drive over that way and scope out the area. Maybe he would get lucky and stumble across Burt passed out in an alley somewhere.
He didn’t get lucky. There was no sign of Burt in any of the neighborhoods around the motel. He pulled into the parking lot, avoiding the potholes and beer bottles, and found a space near the pool. It looked sketchy as fuck with its cracked plaster and yellow-green water. He eyed a tweaker digging through the dumpster, probably looking for something he could sell.
Danny worried he would come out of Brandi’s motel room to find his truck missing its catalytic converter and wheels. He locked it and made sure that the tweaker saw him tucking his gun into the waistband of his jeans. His warning given, Danny walked to the right door and rapped his knuckles against it. Bits of peeling red paint flaked off on his skin, and he grimaced.
He heard the deadbolt thunk and took a step back. The door opened only as wide as the chain would allow, and a pair of tired brown eyes peered at him through the space. There was a terrible bruise on her cheek, and her mouth was busted up. Her voice was rough as she asked, “Yeah?”
“Brandi?” After she nodded, he explained, “Ten told me that I could find you here. He said you had a run-in with Burt Garner.”
“Yeah? So?” she asked testily.
“Do you have any idea where he might have gone? Or where he’s been hiding out?”
She narrowed her tired eyes. “Why would I tell you that?”
“Right.” He tugged his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a couple of twenties. He handed them to Brandi. “Please?”
She snatched the money with her bony fingers and stuffed it into her bra. “He was in Louisiana for a while. Coushatta.”
“The casino?”
“Yeah.”
Danny wasn’t surprised Burt had left behind his wife and kids to gamble in another state rather than face his problems like a man. “Do you think he went back there?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
She eyed the wallet still in his hand.
“Right.” He withdrew a few more bills, and she snatched those away just as quickly.
“He borrowed money and owes big. Some small-time loan shark.” She shrugged. “He came running back here to pick up more cash from one of his stashes, but he said there was a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
“He didn’t tell me, but he was scared.”
“Of?”
“Someone named Lung or Lungs,” she said, her gaze drifting back to his wallet.
“Lungs?” He suspected she meant Leung.
“What’s Burt to you? You’re too handsome to be his brother.”
“No, I’m a friend of the family.”
“Uh-huh,” she said skeptically. “Well, a friend of the family, you know I can’t work looking like this. Burt owes me.”
“You’ll have to get in line behind everyone else.” Nevertheless, he took pity on her and gave her some more money. “That’s all I got, Brandi.”
“That’s all right.”
