step closer to that knife, swung the tire iron and came down on the guy’s wrist. The meth head screamed, dropped the blade and grabbed his wrist. Before he could run or call for his backup, Blake had him up against the bricks, the tire iron against his throat. “Where is it?” he asked as threateningly as he could.
“Ach. What?”
“You know what. The box.”
“Let go and I’ll tell you.”
Now it was Blake’s turn to grin. “Not a chance in hell. Where?”
“Bruster’s got it!”
“Who’s Bruster?”
“You know. The manager.”
And probably the biggest dealer in here, he thought. Some things were as predictable as sunrise. It was always the one in charge, the one who seldom got his hands dirty. “And did it get you a hit?” he asked.
“Not even.” He choked and Blake stepped back a little. He was an addict; it could get messy.
“Let’s go get you a hit, loser.”
“You gonna roll me?”
“I’m gonna buy you a hit if I can get my box back.”
“You’d do that?”
“I want the box!”
Blake turned him around, twisted his arm up behind his back and counted his blessings. If this charged-up idiot decided to fight him, he might have a real problem on his hands. He’d seen three and four cops have trouble bringing down a one-hundred-and-twenty-pound meth addict when he was high. His flashlight was under his arm, light pointing forward, and the tire iron in his hand, ready.
“Let’s go get it,” Blake said, steering him in the direction of the manager’s trailer. When they stood outside the door, he saw a little trash on the ground right outside the trailer door.
“There it is,” the guy said, looking down.
He saw what looked like a small amount of smashed teak wood on the ground and a little unidentifiable trash—paper, cloth, picture, chain. “That’s my box?” Blake asked, incredulous.
“He wasn’t impressed.”
“What’s a hit go for in your neighborhood?”
“Twenty,” he said. “I mean, forty. Fifty.”
Blake felt himself smile. It had been a long time. He had forgotten how much drugs rotted the brain and what liars addicts were. “Here are your choices,” he said. “I can give you some money and you can run, get out of sight, or you can stay and talk to the manager with me. Or I can beat you stupid with this iron, but I think you already are stupid.”
“You kidding me? Give me fifty and I’m gone.”
Without turning the guy around, he pulled one bill out of his pocket. It was a twenty. He shoved the man away from him and he stumbled a few feet. Blake braced himself, wielding the tire iron in one hand and flashlight in the other. The twenty fluttered in the hand that held the iron. “Do you want to disappear with twenty or would you prefer to negotiate?”
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