Before The Killing Starts

'Don't you want to hear what I've got for you?' Guillory said.

'That can wait. Tell me what happened.'

Guillory picked a coaster up off the bar and started picking absently at it, dropping little bits of paper onto the bar. The bartender gave him a look but didn't say anything. Evan reckoned that was a good call.

'I got a bit carried away interviewing a suspect,' Guillory said quietly, still looking down and pushing the little pieces of paper around.

Evan was at a loss for words. As well as being the straightest guy he'd ever met, Guillory was also the most laid-back. Nothing got to him. Ever.

'Sorry, I got that wrong.' Guillory said and looked up. 'I should have said interviewing a low-life, cock-sucking piece of shit.' His expression said to Evan that it was important he understood the distinction.

'But that's what you deal with all day, every day.'

Guillory gave a small shrug. 'Yeah, well.'

They both sat in silence for a minute. On the jukebox Jeannie C. Riley was singing Harper Valley PTA. Beside Evan, Guillory had his eyes closed and was nodding his head along to the song.

'I love this song,' Guillory said. 'Life was a lot simpler back then. Not that you'd remember seeing as you're only about twelve. I'm surprised they serve you.'

'Okay gramps,' Evan said trying not to laugh and wanting to get him back on track. 'How carried away?'

Guillory stopped nodding along. His lips curled into a grim smile. 'Broke his jaw, knocked out most of his front teeth.' The satisfaction in his voice made it sound as if he thought it was worth the suspension.

Evan looked down at Guillory's right hand. There was a ragged v-shaped flap of skin and flesh that was swollen and scabbed on his second knuckle. The first and second knuckles were so swollen they looked a bit like a rubber glove full of air. Guillory saw him looking and flexed his hand a few times.

'Hurts like hell when I do this,' he said, wincing.

Well don't do it, dummy.

'Lucky I didn't break my hand,' he said. Then he grinned, the familiar, almost mocking grin that Evan knew so well, which made Evan wonder if he was just fooling around.

'Are you kidding me?'

Guillory shook his head. 'I wish I was.'

'I better watch what I say to you in future.'

Guillory smiled at him like he'd never heard a truer word.

'I thought you people had brass knuckles for that sort of work?'

'Ryder's got a brand new pair; just waiting to get you in that room,' Guillory said with another grin. He punched his open palm without thinking and let out a yelp. 'He gets them out every day and kisses them. He's saving up to get E-V-A-N engraved on them—did you know it's the exact right number of letters.'

'So what happened?' Evan said, ignoring him and wishing he'd never mentioned brass knuckles.

Guillory shook his head and was serious again. 'I'll tell you another time. Long story short, I'm suspended. Which is why I've got all the time in the world to run your errands for you.'

He slid his glass along the counter and Evan obliged, although he didn't get another one for himself. For once it wasn't him who needed a layer of protection from all the bad thoughts in his head.

'How comes you can get the information?'

Now it was Guillory's turn to look at him like he'd just heard the stupidest question ever. 'I might be suspended, but people still talk to me. The Captain has to suspend me, but as far as most of the guys in the department are concerned I'm a hero. They'd like to give me a medal. The dispatcher says she's going to bake me a cake.'

'Like in the good old days, eh? None of this political correctness garbage.'

'You got that right.' Guillory punched him on the shoulder with his uninjured hand and got up off the stool. 'Wait here. I'm gonna put that song on again.'

There was an exchange of words at the juke box between Guillory and a spotty-faced, white kid with dreadlocks and his jeans half way down his skinny ass. It looked like Guillory upped the ante and poked him with his finger, but the sound of the first couple of bars of Harper Valley PTA told Evan that the kid had seen sense.

'I put it on twice,' Guillory said when he got back. 'Just to piss him off. Told him to pull his pants up too. Stupid prick.' He looked round as if he was checking whether the kid had done as he'd been told but he'd disappeared. Then he told Evan what he'd found out.

'The car's registered to some outfit owned by a guy called Francisco Garcia. Everybody calls him Chico and he's some hot-shot drug dealer. A very nasty piece of work indeed. I won't bore you with the stories I've heard about him. Just think Reservoir Dogs on speed. You know that scene where Mr. Blonde cuts the cop's ear off?'

'Okay, okay, I get the picture. That makes me feel much better.'

Guillory looked directly into Evan's eyes and suddenly it was if he hadn't had a beer for a month. 'What it should do is make you drop whatever it is you're doing right now. Just walk away while you still can.'

'So what about this guy Dixie?'

'For the record,' Guillory said, holding up a finger, 'I'd like it noted that Mr. Buckley chose to ignore my last statement.'

'Just get on with it.'

'The car was easy, finding out about Dixie, not so easy.'

'But you managed to, despite all that.' He clapped a hand on Guillory's shoulder. 'I knew I picked the right man for the job.'

Guillory ignored him. 'Dixie is or was an undercover cop. Nobody seems quite sure whose side he's on now. At least nobody that I was able to talk to.'

'Can we assume that he is—or was—trying to infiltrate Chico's gang? God, that sounds so corny. Chico's gang.'

Guillory nodded. 'Amongst other things, yes. That seems to have been the reason he first went undercover. But lots of stuff has happened since then and it all seems very confused now. Some people say that he got very close to Chico personally.'

'Like he got into character a bit too well.'

'Exactly.'

Evan thought about what Guillory had just told him. Things were a lot more complicated and serious than he'd thought. He wondered how much of this Ellie knew and whether she'd deliberately set him up. Guillory interrupted his thoughts.

'There's one thing in all of this that's clear as day.'

'What's that?' Evan said, a split second before he realized what Guillory was going to say. 'I need to drop it,' he said at the exact same time as Guillory said: You need to drop it.

'At least we're both agreed on that,' Guillory said. 'So why do I get the feeling I'm wasting my breath here?'

Evan grinned at him. 'You know me—a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.'

'Bullshit. This is serious Evan.' Guillory's voice was raised now, his jaw clenched. 'I should never have told you any of this.'

Evan shrugged. 'Then I'd just be walking into it blind. You wouldn't want that on your conscience.'

Guillory took a deep breath to calm himself and leaned forward to put his hand on Evan's arm. Evan looked down at the large, cut and swollen hand and was glad he hadn't been on the other end of it. He wondered again who the unfortunate recipient had been, and what their crime could have been to provoke such an extreme reaction.

'I'm serious,' Guillory said, peering into Evan's face as if he were a horse he might buy. Evan could feel the genuine concern in his voice. He couldn't even manage a dismissive don't worry about it. 'You've got to drop this. I don't know what you're getting out of it, but it's not worth it.' Guillory took his hand off Evan's arm and jabbed at his own chest with his thumb. 'As a man who might well have just thrown away his career and everything that goes with it because of a moment's madness, I can tell you—it's not worth it.'

Evan shook his head at his friend. 'But that's just it, Ed. You don't know what I'm getting out of it.'