The Drifter (Peter Ash #1)(50)

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll see you at six.”

He broke the connection and cruised, watching the traffic. Waiting for the black Ford. Feeling the cold wind on his face. He caught sight of his face in the rearview, the bruise turning truly interesting colors now. Purple, yellow, green. He sure looked like a solid citizen.

He passed an old Pathfinder with a crumpled front passenger side, the glass missing, plastic sheeting taped up in its place. That was a great look. No bullet holes, though. You needed bullet holes for the truly custom effect.

Peter knew he should be making some kind of plan. Some kind of plan for his life. Find some new glass for his truck. That wouldn’t be easy, with a forty-year-old truck. Then fix the sheet metal, fix whatever other damage the bullets had done to the truck he’d taken hundreds of hours to restore. Figure out what to do next. With the rest of his life.

After he figured out Jimmy, he told himself.

After he saved Dinah and the boys.

After that, he’d do the next thing, whatever it was.

The bruise would heal itself in time. A shower and a change of clothes would make all the difference. Maybe he could shower at the Y.

Mingus leaned up against him, tongue hanging, stinking up the cab. Weren’t dogs supposed to have a fantastic sense of smell? Peter didn’t know how the animal could stand himself.

Maybe the stink was like canine cologne. And all the bitches thought Mingus smelled like an investment banker.

He passed a car wash and had an idea. He circled around and parked facing out, mostly hidden from the street, with a straight line to the exit.

It was a self-serve place. Eight chrome washing bays, each with a coin-op control and a spray wand. But you could wash more than a truck in a place like that.

Peter plugged in a dozen quarters and turned the setting to plain warm water.

“C’mere, Mingus.”

He got a good grip on the dog’s rope collar and dragged him over. It wasn’t easy to drag a hundred-and-fifty-pound dog somewhere he didn’t want to go. But Peter made it happen, straddled the dog, grabbed the spray wand, dialed down the pressure to the lowest level, and got to work, using his hand to minimize the force of the water.

It wasn’t a lot of fun.

When Mingus got wet, the stink got worse. As if the water somehow rehydrated the stench.

Shit and death and pepper spray mixed with a deep animal funk, worse than anything Peter had ever smelled. It was unspeakable.

Peter tried to breathe through his mouth.

Mingus, of course, couldn’t care less about the smell. It was the bath he didn’t like. He whined and flattened his ears and hunkered down close to the pavement while Peter worked his way around, closing his pitiful dog eyes when the water got close to his face. When the time came to wash his chest and belly, Peter had to roll him over by main force, kneeling on him again and talking in the same calm voice as he had under the porch, when the dog had been trying to rip off his face. Mingus whined louder.

Peter didn’t blame him. The day hadn’t warmed up any, and having some guy you just met wash your belly was bad for a tough dog’s image.

The soap was listed as nontoxic, so he figured that would be okay. He’d skip the wax setting, though. When the bubbles came out, the stench improved, but Mingus tried to bolt. Peter had a good grip on the collar and almost got pulled into traffic. Soaked through himself, he had to tie the dog’s rope collar to the coin-op machine.

The soap smelled like plastic strawberries, but that was a definite improvement over the original stench. Mingus tucked his tail and cowered on the wet concrete as Peter used his own hairbrush on the dog’s matted fur. Maybe a haircut was the best solution. For both of them. He’d have to buy some clippers. He sure wouldn’t be using that hairbrush again.

Then back to the warm water, rinsing away the strawberry-smelling soap, talking gently. They were both shivering in the late-autumn air. When Mingus growled, Peter said, “Watch your manners, dog. I’d rather be somewhere else, too, but this has got to get done.”

The dog growled again. This time it was the tank-engine rumble, the sound that meant business.

Peter looked up to see a black Chevy Caprice roll slowly into the car wash. It had no city seal on the door, no light bar on the roof, but the tan municipal plates and folded spotlights by the side mirrors clearly marked it as a police car.

The driver parked in a way that would appear casual to someone who hadn’t run tactical missions in three countries. But the Caprice now blocked Peter’s truck from an easy exit. Unless he was willing to jump a high curb and crash through a fence in a restored forty-year-old truck with a custom mahogany cargo box. Which he wasn’t. Even with the bullet holes.

The cruiser door opened and Detective Lipsky unfolded his lean marathoner’s frame, surveying the scene. Peter remained crouched over Mingus. Hairbrush in one hand, collar in the other. Man and dog both soaked to the skin.

Lipsky looked down at him, those X-ray eyes surprisingly pale in the daylight. “I guess you really are a dog lover,” he said. “That’s illegal in fifty states, but I keep an open mind. You two need a little more private time?”

It didn’t look good, Peter had to admit. He said, “The dog didn’t mind the pepper spray, but I did.”

Lipsky wore a chocolate-colored topcoat over a moss-green blazer and dark blue dress pants, no tie. “Yeah, I took a nice long shower myself,” he said, crossing his arms comfortably. “In my own house. Where I happen to live. Suit’s already at the dry cleaner’s.” He glanced at Peter’s jeans and shirt, the same he’d worn two days before. “You do have more than one change of clothes, right?”