Chase Baker and the God Boy: (A Chase Baker Thriller Series Book No. 3) (10 page)

“But he’s here in Nepal?”

“Last I heard, he’s in Kathmandu,
working for the university archeological teams that are constantly moving
through here and northern India.”

“What’s his name?”

“Anthony Casale…he was born in
Italy. Naples. He moved to Brooklyn when he was still just a boy.” I slip on my
work boots, turn and smile at her. “A bit of a hot head.”

“All your friends are hotheads.”
She smirks. “They like to throw you out windows. Or, so I’m told.”

“I tend to have that kind of impact
on people.”

“It’s your charming personality. Do
you know how to find Anthony?”

“Not precisely. But I know how to
get started finding him.”

“How?”

“We start at the first bar on one
side of the city, then begin working our way to the opposite side of the city
until we find him.”

“Big drinker?”

“You have no idea.”

“Well,” she says, tossing off the
sheet. “I am a bit thirsty after that spicy lunch.”

My eyes lock on to her perfect
naked posterior.

“Bottoms up, boss lady,” I say.

The plan for finding Tony is more than just looking for a
toothpick inside a box of toothpicks…a little more scientific than just taking
a chance on spotting him in any one of a thousand bars operating inside
Kathmandu. Back in my room, I retrieve Elizabeth’s suicide letter, stuff it
into my pocket. Then, lifting the computer lid, I Google Anthony Casale
Excavating. Thank Providence, or Brahma, because unlike my experience when
searching for Elizabeth, not only do I get a website that advertises his
digging services, but I also get a map of his shop’s whereabouts.

Anjali comes up behind me, pulling
her hair into a ponytail when she peeks over my shoulder at the Google map.
She’s wearing black jeans, black combat boots with her pants tucked into them,
and an olive green blouse with pockets over both breasts, the tails hanging
out.

“He’s not far from here,” I say. “We’ll
take a rickshaw.”

She points to the map and the
orange arrow that indicates the precise location of Casale Excavating. “Is that
where we’ll find him? In his office?”

“There’s bound to be a bar next
door or close by.
That’s
where we’ll find him. I guarantee it.” I slip
into my bush jacket, fold the sleeves up to my elbows. Raising my right hand, I
pat the now empty space over my heart, and recall my .45 flying out of the hole
in the plane. “Crap.”

“What is it?” Anjali says.

“I forgot to look into a weapon. I…
we
…should
have an equalizer or two now that word of our operation has reached the bad
guys.”

She grabs hold of my arm while
biting down on her bottom lip.

“I almost forgot.” She goes back
into her room. When she returns, she’s carrying a heavy-duty, plastic case
which she sets on the bed.

“This was already in the room
waiting for us when we got here, care of my ex-husband. I told you I would take
care of everything you need for finding Rajesh.”

I set my hands on the briefcase-like
latches, thumb them open, lift the lid. There’s a pistol pressed inside a foam
holding core. A Colt .45 automatic and two additional clips. Also two stacks of
cash laid out on top. Nepalese rupees and Indian rupees. All large denominations.
The final item inside the box is a shoulder holster with elastic straps.

I pocket both stacks of cash, then
remove the weapon and the clips.

“Nice work, boss lady. My preferred
caliber, even.”

Punching one of the clips into the
stock, I pull back the slide, loading a round into the chamber. The second clip
gets pocketed in the right-hand pocket of my jacket, easy access. Once again, slipping
the jacket off, I fit the holster over my shoulders and store the Colt under my
left arm, grip inverted. I pull the jacket back on, concealing the weapon
entirely.

Back to the Google page and the
address of Casale Excavating. Retrieving a pen and paper from the desk, I write
the address down and stuff it in my pocket along with Elizabeth’s letter.

“What about you, Anjali. You
packing?”

She reaches around back, lifts up
her blouse, produces a small caliber automatic. Also a Colt.

“That makes me feel better,” I say.
“We should go.”

Going for the door, I open it.

“Chase,” Anjali says before I step
out.

I turn. “What is it?”

“What we did this afternoon…our
lunch. Just so you know, I’m not going to hold you to anything.” She inhales,
exhales. “And if Elizabeth is alive…” Her sentence trails off. But her point is
received loud and clear.

“I understand…two ships passing in
the late morning far, far away from home.”

Once again, she bites down on her
bottom lip. I find myself doing the same thing.

I walk out.

It takes the rickshaw a few minutes to negotiate the busy
downtown street to what serves as the Casale Excavation Company. The sinewy
driver, who can’t weigh more than one hundred fifteen pounds, pedals with bare
feet, the soles of which have certainly turned to leather. He shoots and scoots
in between people, cattle, and taxi cabs, creating a plume of dust in his wake.
If we’d taken a car, it might have cost us a half an hour to travel the same
distance.

As predicted, located directly
beside the Casale office is a bar. Judging by the red neon mounted to the
interior of the establishment’s front picture window, the name of the joint is
Rudy’s New Orleans Jazz Revival.

Catchy.

Dismounting the rickshaw, I pay the
man double what he asks for and immediately head to the front door of the bar, Anjali
on my tail.

“Aren’t you going to at least check
the office first, Chase?”

“That’s funny,” I say, opening the wood
door, stepping inside.

For a few seconds, I stand inside
the old bar, soaking in the timber plank floor, its wood walls and dark, smoky
interior. To my right is a large, stone fireplace. Even with the outside temperature
close to eighty degrees, a small fire burns inside the hearth. To my left is a
long bar. A man is seated at the far end of it. I know him like I would a
brother. If I had a brother.

After a beat, the door opens again,
and Anjali enters.

“Is that him?” she whispers.

“That’s him. Watch yourself. He
starts swinging, you’ll be glad you kept your distance.”

“Sounds like a real nice guy.”

“He’s a sandhog and an angry one at
that. How much nicer can he get?”

The center of my chest goes tight.
I begin to make my way towards the opposite end of the bar, my shadow growing
on the wall behind Casale with each step I take, like a giant dark ghost.

“That’s far enough, Baker,” the
short, muscle-bound, mustached man says in his Brooklyn-accented English.

“You call that a greeting, Tone?”

“I should have known that I’d run
into you sooner than later. So, how’s the writing going, Renaissance man? You
famous yet? Was it worth putting me out of a career?”

“There was no business left to give
you a career when Dad died. You know that. He
was
the business. I had no
choice but to bury it along with his casket. Besides, judging from the sign out
front on the joint next door, looks like you’ve done pretty well for yourself
over here.”

He chugs the rest of his beer, sets
the bottle back down onto its condensation ring, wipes his mouth with the back
of his meaty hand. “Who’s the dame? You on your honeymoon? A pretty girl like
that deserves a
Sandals
vacation in the Bahamas. Not this shit hole.”
Then, raising a hand to his mouth, as if to make a megaphone. “Run now honey,
this one will bail as soon as he feels like it. Not a loyal vein in his body.
Take it from one who knows.”

My face fills with blood, heart
pounds against my ribs like it wants to get out.

“Listen, Tony,” I say, taking a
couple of steps forward. “I know you don’t like what happened with the
business, but maybe we can help each other out now.”

A short, beer-gutted man appears
from behind a curtain that hangs over a door-sized opening behind the bar. The clean-shaven
white man, who is definitely a westerner, smiles, attempts to straighten out
his head full of salt and pepper hair, asks me if I’d like something to drink.
But when he sees that Tony and I are not exactly locked in welcome embrace, his
face tightens up.

“How about beers all around?” he
suggests in a British accent. West London if I have to guess.

“That would be swell, Rudy,” Tony
says. “My friend Chase here is buying. Isn’t that right, Chase?”

“But, Mr. Tony,” Rudy says, “you
own the bar now.”

It takes some effort, but I manage
to work up a grin. “Wow, a bar plus an excavating company. You must be doing
better than well, Tone. Best thing that could have happened to you was my old
man’s business biting the dust.”

“Yeah, I’m making a fortune. You
looked at what the Nepalese rupee is worth against the dollar these days? So
what do I have that you can possibly want?”

“Information.”

“Regarding?”

“Elizabeth…Elizabeth—”

“—Flynn,” he says in my stead. He
takes on a smile. The same kind of smile he used to take on from up in the
cockpit of a backhoe excavator when he would hit something solid and promising.
Like the stone lid of a sarcophagus in Egypt or an underground tomb at the base
of the Andes Mountains in Peru. Despite his thick hands and sausage fingers,
Tony had the touch of an “angel,” or so my dad used to say. He wasn’t just an
excavating operator. He was a magician.

“You still carrying a torch for
that poor girl, Chase?” he says. “Not a very nice thing for your new lady to
hear, especially when she’s standing right behind you.”

“Anjali,” I say, “please meet Tony
Casale. Tony, Anjali. And we are not what you think we are. We’re business
associates at present.”

He lets loose with a belly laugh.
If this were one of my novels, I’d describe the laugh as sardonic.

“Sure you are,” he says. “But what
the hell do you want from me? You come all this way just to ask me something?
You could have called for that. Or texted.”

He slips off the bar stool, stands.
He tops out at maybe five feet six inches with his boots on, but with a thick
neck, barrel chest, and hands as big as sledge hammers, he resembles a steel
fireplug. A powerful fireplug. And damned if he doesn’t know it.

I turn, shoot Anjali a look like,
well,
so far so good.
Then, turning back to Tony, “I need some info on her
whereabouts. Word on the street is that she’s not dead…”

The punch comes from out of
nowhere. I never saw the right hook coming. Suddenly, I’m down on my back on
the bar room floor, bright white stars flying past my eyes.

“Chase!” Anjali shouts. She comes to
me, helps me up into a sitting position.

“Happy?!” I say to Tony, rubbing
the punch out of my jaw while climbing back up onto my feet.

“I’ve been waiting years to throw
that punch,” he says, massaging the now bruised knuckles on his punching hand. “I
used to dream about it, day in and day out.” Then, his happy face returning. “Yeah,
I’d say I’m pretty fucking pleased with myself right now.”

Rudy sets the beers on the bar. “Please,
sir
and
sir, no fighting.” He points to a sign mounted above the fireplace.
It reads, “No Fighting!” in six or seven languages.

Commotion comes from behind me, and
suddenly Anjali is handing me a beer, and then offering one to Tony.

“Let’s calm things down, drink to
something,” she suggests. “To old times.”

She raises her beer up as if to
make a toast.

His eyes no longer glaring with
hatred for me now that he’s punched my lights out, Tony raises his beer up.

“What the hell,” I say, raising
mine.

Suddenly the phrase “O Kali!” is shouted
out from across the vast room, and the beer bottle explodes in my face.