Detroit Combat by Randy Wayne White Page B

don’t stop, never stop, please, please, please never stop.…”
    The woman pushed the hair back from her face and yawned. “What time is it, darling?”
    â€œAfter three.”
    â€œYou mean that we’ve been … we’ve been on this blanket for more than an hour and a half?”
    Naked, Hawker reached out and put another log on the fire. A meteor of sparks flew up the chimney as he did. “An hour and forty-five minutes.”
    â€œMy God, it seemed more like five minutes.”
    â€œThanks.”
    She laughed. “You know I didn’t mean it that way.”
    Hawker hugged her close to him and kissed her forehead. “I hope not. I used up more calories on you tonight then I did in my four-mile run. Got just as bruised up though, I think.”
    There was a Mona Lisa smile on her lips. “I told you I wasn’t going to hold back. I told you it had been a long time.”
    â€œMaybe those old stories about traveling men dying of exhaustion at remote nunneries are true, huh?”
    She slapped at him. “I’m hardly a nun.”
    â€œThe Vatican can thank its lucky stars for that.”
    Hawker got up, pulled on his sweat pants against the cold, and walked across the living room. He found a tin of snuff in the drawer and took a discreet dip. The tobacco made him slightly lightheaded and gave him a little charge of energy. He found a paper cup to spit in.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” Hawker asked.
    Naked, the woman was collecting her clothes from the floor. Hawker realized again that he had never seen a more perfect female body in his life. She said, “I’m going to get dressed. Maybe I can borrow your car until tomorrow. I’ll have a wrecker pull my car out of the drift, and I’ll drive your Corvette back here—”
    â€œYou’re not leaving—you’re staying here; you’re sleeping with me.”
    She looked up at him gratefully. Hawker realized she had been hoping he would ask. She dropped the clothes in a heap and took him in her arms. “Are you sure?”
    â€œI’ve got no one to keep me warm. Besides, we still have ‘details’ to discuss.”
    The woman looked closely at his face. She began to trace the outline of a small half-moon scar at the corner of his eye. “I’ll keep you warm,” she whispered. “And tomorrow we’ll go to work?”
    â€œTomorrow we will be makers of pornographic films. I will wear dark glasses and maybe even a wig, and you will be cold and businesslike and order people around who come to see us.”
    She kissed him softly. In his ear, she whispered. “You could star in a pornographic movie, James Hawker.”
    Laughing, he answered, “I already have, Clare. I already have.”

FOURTEEN
    â€œI hear you’re looking for talent?” The boy appeared to be no older than thirteen. He had curly blond hair combed into a punkish rat’s nest and an eye twitch that he couldn’t quite control.
    Hawker, feeling ridiculous in an expensive black wig and an open-necked shirt, nodded. “We’re always looking for the right kind of talent. You’re an actor?”
    â€œYeah, I’ve done some stuff. You know, some skin projects. But I have a rep, and the rep would have to okay any job I took. But this rep is good. If you need actors, she can get you all you want—and any age you want. If you’re interested in me, maybe she can do the whole cast for you.”
    Hawker drummed his fingers on the desk. “You mean like an agent?”
    â€œYeah, right, a rep or agent—whatever you want to call it.” The kid shifted nervously back and forth on the balls of his feet. Hawker began to understand why he wore long sleeves. The kid was in the room, but his glassy eyes were about a hundred miles west on the heroin highway.
    â€œWe usually don’t have any trouble getting our own people.”
    The kid nodded,