Racked (A Lt. Jack Daniels / Nicholas Colt mystery)

About RACKED

A
private investigator, a police lieutenant, and a man wearing a Bugs Bunny mask walk into a bar…

Unfortunately, it’s no joke when Bugsy rigs the barrel of a twelve-gauge pump to the back of the bartender’s neck.

Together for the first time in this explosive, lightning-paced tale of greed, betrayal, and blood-soaked terror (not really, but it’s a fast-paced and funny mystery-thriller), Florida PI Nicholas Colt (Crosscut, Key Death) and Chicago cop Jacqueline Daniels (Whiskey Sour, Shaken) team up to stop the robber before another shotgun shell gets
RACKED
.

RACKED

A Lt. Jack Daniels/Nicolas Colt Mystery

JUDE HARDIN
J.A. KONRATH

CONTENTS

Begin reading RACKED

About the Authors

Also by Jude Hardin

Ebooks by J.A. Konrath

Copyright

“I’ve always wanted to end a book with:
And then the zombies came
.”

—Jack Kilborn

THE PRIVATE EYE

2:04
P.M.

T
here was blood on the floor.

And the walls.

And the ceiling.

I’d seen my share of fights at Kelly’s, but whatever happened last night must have been extreme. As I walked in, I stepped on a spot of it and almost lost my footing. I managed not to fall, and then made a beeline for the bar. I sat on a stool, reached behind the bartender’s garnish bin and grabbed one of those skinny little red straws to chew on. It helped keep my mind off cigarettes.

It was two o’clock in the afternoon, and the place was dead. I was starting to think maybe all the employees were too when a twenty-something redhead stepped around the corner and asked me what I was having.

“You’re new here,” I said.

“Just started last week.”

“Did they tell you drinks are free from two to four every Friday?”

I winked at her. She winked back.

She wore tight black shorts and a Kelly’s t-shirt cut to expose the shiny gold thing in her belly button. Her nametag said Molly.

I handed her a business card. She looked at it, and then she tucked it into the back pocket of her shorts. She had really nice back pockets.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Colt.”

“You can call me Nicholas,” I said. “I’m a regular.”

“Well, maybe you need more fiber in your diet.”

A regular.
Irregular.
I got it. The joke wasn’t very funny, but I got it.

I laughed politely. “Maybe,” I said. “Let me get an Old Fitz on the rocks. Hold the Metamucil.”

She slapped a cocktail napkin on the bar, built the drink and set it in front of me.

“Anything else?” she said.

“No thanks. You by yourself this afternoon?”

“Rey’s in the kitchen. Let me know if you want something to eat.”

Rey Aquino had been peeling potatoes and cooking some incredible shepherd’s pie at Kelly’s for years. Good man. He’d bought me a shot of tequila more than once. He’d started taking some college classes recently, and was planning on getting a business degree. Said he wanted to have his own restaurant someday. Said it was his dream.

I took a sip of my drink.

“What’s with all the blood splatters?” I said. “Rowdy crowd last night?”

Molly smiled. “Think about what day it is.”

I thought about it. Nothing was ringing a bell.

I shrugged. “I give up. What day is it?”

She pointed to the chalkboard easel at the end of the bar. It said
HAPPY HALLOWEEN
.

“Big costume party tonight,” she said. “I’ve been squirting fake blood everywhere all morning. I used a super soaker squirt gun. I hope Anil isn’t mad, because I got it all over the place. Now I need to hang some spider webs and other decorations. Isn’t it great? Halloween is my favorite holiday.”

“Great.”

So great it had completely slipped my mind.

“Right now I’m trying to figure out a drink to put on special,” she said. “Any ideas?”

“Old Fitz on the rocks,” I said.

“You’re funny,” she said, her tone teetering between dubious and insincere. “No, I think it should be something tall and fruity. A rum drink, maybe. One of the distributers left us a box of those silly little paper umbrellas, and tonight might be a good night to unload a bunch of them.”

“Good luck with that. Is the table upstairs open?”

Most of the pool tables at Kelly’s are coin-op, the variety you can find at any dive in any part of the country. Beer stains, cigarette burns, spongy rails, warped cues. Those tables don’t interest me, but there’s a nine-foot Brunswick in a room on the second floor that Minnesota Fats once played on. It’s a professional table, clean as a virgin’s bathwater.

“We don’t open the upstairs until six,” Molly said.

“I know, but Anil usually—”

“Anyway, there’s already someone up there.”

“So much for not opening until six,” I said.

Molly walked over to the chalkboard and started writing the name of the drink special she’d decided on. “Well, this lady came in and ordered lunch a while ago, just passing through and all, and after she ate, she asked about the ‘famous table’ upstairs. She looked really disappointed when I told her the room was closed, so—”

“She’s alone?”

“Yeah. She’s from Chicago. And get this—her name is Jack Daniels.”

THE COP

2:12
P.M.

I
’d flown into Jacksonville International the day before Halloween, desperate for a little R&R and some quality time with my mother. It had been a helluva plane ride, one of those near-death flights complete with nationwide news coverage afterward, and I needed some time to wind down. Hopefully somewhere without any guns.

Mom lived near Orlando, so it would have made more sense to land there, but I never did care for that airport. Energetic pasty white smiles flying in, bedraggled sunburned frowns flying out. Kind of depressing.

Plus, I’d seen Kelly’s Pool Hall on a cable television show called
Grills, Game Rooms, and Greasy Spoons
, and I wanted to try the cheeseburger and the antique billiards table—the one that Willie Mosconi had supposedly beaten Minnesota Fats on back in the day. According to the show, the table had started its life in Illinois, so this massive hunk of wood and slate and leather and I had a connection. We were kindred spirits.

Kelly’s was in a little town called Hallows Cove, which was sort of on the way to Mom’s from Jacksonville. I figured I’d do lunch, play a little pool, and then head on over.

I lined up some balls, started shooting them into one of the side pockets. Different angles, different English. I was practicing, and doing pretty well considering my frazzled nerves.

I called a bank in my head, sunk it, and the cue rolled more or less to where I wanted it to be for the next shot. Not perfect, but enough. I guessed my game was at about eighty percent.

“Nice stroke.”

A guy with a drink in one hand and a leather satchel in the other darkened the doorway to the billiards room.

“I bet you say that to all the girls,” I said.

“Only when it’s true. Mind if I come in?”

He was slim but solid. Long hair and a beard, both the color of sand. I figured him to be about my age, mid-forties or maybe a little younger. He was handsome, if you go for the Brad Pitt type.

I looked at my watch. “I have the room for another forty-five minutes. Then it’s all yours.”

“I didn’t mean to disturb your practice session or anything,” he said. “Just thought you might like to play a game or two.”

I pointed to his case. “Is that real alligator skin?”

“It was a gift. Just because I have a nice stick, it doesn’t mean—”

“It always means
something
,” I said, trying to avoid the obvious double entendre this time.

He walked over to the round bistro table against the wall and opened the case. My purse was there on one of the stools, and I didn’t like him being so close to the .38 caliber revolver that was tucked inside it. The airline didn’t allow me to do a concealed carry, but a gun in a checked bag was fine. After my flight, I didn’t want to go anywhere unarmed ever again.