The Perfect Woman by James Andrus Page A

off the cheap siding, and a front door with the screen drooping down from one corner like a puppy’s ear.
    Stallings noticed the run-down house also had a new, interlocking roof that could withstand a category-five hurricane and still not leak a drop inside. The reinforced storm windows were tinted tempered glass, and the door behind the screen was reinforced to discourage home invasions and withstand storm winds whipping off the Atlantic.
    A surveillance system of linked cameras covered the front door all the way to the end of the driveway and a trip line ran along each side of the yard. A dark green H3 Hummer was partially hidden behind the house. Someone had invested a lot of cash to keep this house safe, dry, and very low key.
    Stallings didn’t try to hide his approach; he didn’t have time. He needed information, but he also needed to let this asshole know it wasn’t cool to choke women. It would only take him a few minutes out of his way. He whispered to himself, “Is this the day that changes my life?” He checked his pistol in a sturdy polymer holster on his right hip, then headed for the front door.
    As he started up the five wooden stairs to the porch, the inner door opened and a white guy wearing a bathrobe, with thinning blond hair, a goatee, and glasses stood in the doorway with the fake rickety screen door between them. He had the look of a college professor in his midthirties and was about six foot one with a little beef on him.
    Stallings said, “You Davey?”
    “Yep,” was all the man got out before Stallings threw a straight right punch through the screen and into Davey’s face, knocking the clunky man backward into the house.
    Stallings didn’t hesitate to jerk the screen door open and follow the dizzy man into the house.
    Davey was on his back trying to sit up when Stallings offered him a hand. Davey accepted without thinking and as he rose to his feet, Stallings head-butted him, knocking him into a sitting position on a small, expensive leather couch against the wall.
    “What the hell, man,” cried out Davey, checking his nose for blood. “This is very uncool. You don’t know the fucking week I’ve had.” He took a moment, then said in a quieter voice, “Who the hell are you?”
    Stallings calmly sat down across from him in a leather chair. “My name is John Stallings, and I’m a detective with JSO.” He crossed his legs like he was doing a TV talk show.
    Davey said, “You’re Stall? I don’t work with underaged girls or runaways. I swear it, man.” The pattern of the screen was embedded into his face where Stallings had punched him. It already looked like it might bruise in that odd, woven pattern. “Why’d you punch me?”
    “I don’t like pimps.”
    “I don’t like cops, but I don’t go around smacking them.”
    Stallings was sure he’d never met the man but was happy to know he had that kind of reputation on the street.
    The pimp said, “Tabby told me all about you and what you did over on North Broad Street last year when they had a sixteen-year-old girl working there.” Davey shuddered. “I run a different, respectable operation, mainly over the Internet.”
    “But you got girls walking the streets right now.”
    “I have to so I can make the bills. Some asshole knocked me off-line for a few days.”
    Stallings turned his head and looked in to the larger living room and saw six computers in various states of disassembly. He stood up to take a closer look. Davey followed him in.
    “You’re not busting me for prostitution, are you? I thought you had better things to worry about.”
    Stallings turned and made a fist. “This is an unofficial visit to make sure you don’t mistreat any of your employees again.”
    Davey held up his hands in surrender. “I know I’ve been a dick this week. It’s a reaction to having my home dissed and shit trashed. I swear it won’t happen again.” He looked around the room at smashed computers and lines ripped from the wall.