Long nodded. “Name’s Jeremy Bolt. One of the best in the biz-ness. Got a reputation of walking away clean, no evidence, nothin’—leastways not unless he left it there apurpose.”
“Looks like he set up Haines’s ex-wife to take the fall for the murder.”
“Sounds like Bolt.”
“You know where I can find him?”
Long sipped his beer. “Can’t help ya there. Bolt likes to gamble, hangs around the casinos. That’s all I know.”
“Anything else?” Jase asked, sliding a crisp hundred-dollar bill across the table.
“I get sump-un, I know how to find y’all.” Long picked up the money, shoved back his chair, and stood up.
“Good to see you, Long,” Hawk said. “Thanks for the help.”
Long just nodded and sauntered back toward the door.
Hawk finished his last swallow of beer, set the bottle on the table, and followed. As he walked out into the night, he spotted Long’s thin frame beneath an overhead parking light, sauntering toward his old beater Chevy pickup. Just as Long stepped off the porch, Hawk caught a flash of metal in the dense shrubbery at the edge of the lot.
“Gun!” he shouted an instant before a rifle shot echoed in the darkness. Hawk pulled his Kimber semiauto and fired as he raced toward his friend. The shooter was running, sprinting through the leafy foliage, rapidly disappearing out of sight. Hawk pulled off a couple more rounds, but his target was nowhere to be seen and Long was down.
Hawk veered off the path and raced toward his friend, lying in a yellow circle of light, his shirt covered with blood. Long’s eyes were open and he was breathing.
“How bad is it?” Hawk asked as he knelt beside him, his Kimber still gripped in one hand.
“Shoulder wound. Be dead if it wasn’t for you.”
“Just hold on.” Hawk shoved the Kimber into the holster at his waist and stripped off the denim shirt he was wearing over it. Wadding it up, he took Long’s hand and pressed the shirt against the wound. “Keep pressure on it.”
He pulled his cell, hit the button for 9-1-1, and spoke to dispatch, reported the shooting and the urgent need for an ambulance.
“Ambulance ain’t gonna help,” Long said. “Bolt gonna come for me. I’m already a dead man.”
Hawk reached down and gripped Long’s hand. “I’ve got friends. You’ll have a guard 24/7 at the hospital. In the meantime, I’m going after Bolt. He’s the dead man, not you—and that’s a promise. Understood?”
Long managed a single nod and closed his eyes. As Hawk waited for the ambulance, he phoned Chase and asked him to set up protection for Long at the hospital.
“I’ll make some calls,” Chase said. “Consider it done.”
“Thanks. I’ll stick around the room till your guy shows up. I’ve got a few things to do after that, then I’m going hunting.”
THIRTY
“That’s Hawk,” Reese said, nodding toward the door.
Kenzie turned to see a tall, good-looking man with thick dark brown hair walking into the Vagabond Steakhouse. Hawk had phoned Reese earlier, said he had news. Just finished with supper, Reese suggested they meet in the bar.
The soft notes of a piano and low amber lighting complemented the dark walls and brown leather chairs. Kenzie sat across from Reese at a quiet corner table, both of them sipping after-dinner drinks, a Kahlua and cream for her, a single malt for Reese.
They drank slowly, mostly pretending. What they were doing was dangerous. They couldn’t afford to lose their focus.
Hawk slid into one of the round-backed leather chairs at the table.
“Kenzie, this is Jason Maddox,” Reese said.
Hawk just nodded. She had imagined a man who smiled more often, but he wasn’t smiling tonight.
“Nice to finally meet you,” he said.
“You, too, Hawk. I hope you don’t mind me calling you that. Seems like everyone else does.”
“Don’t mind at all. So many people call me that, half the time I think of myself as Hawk instead of Jason.” Maddox turned to Reese, apparently not into small talk.
“What’s going on?” Reese asked, picking up on the tense vibes coming off his friend in waves.
“Guy who shot Lee Haines? Name’s Jeremy Bolt. He’s a hit man, one of the best. Had a little run-in with him tonight. No way to prove it was Bolt, but the guy he shot is one of my informants, Long Bailey. Long came to me with intel on Bolt. Twenty minutes later, someone shot him in the parking lot .”
“Oh, my God.” Kenzie’s heart jerked. “Is he...is he...?”
“Took a round in the shoulder, but he should be okay. Be dead if I hadn’t spotted the gun in time to shout a warning. Chase is setting up protection for him at the hospital until I can track Bolt down.”
“Bolt is the man who shot Lee,” Kenzie said. “Now he shot your friend. I feel as if this is somehow my fault.”
Reese turned toward her, a dark look on his face. “It’s not your fault. None of this is your fault. Arthur Haines is responsible for all of this.”
She shivered. It was true. Arthur and his gambling. Because of him, all of them were in danger, especially her son.
“Keep in mind, you and Griff aren’t his only victims,” Reese said. “The selfish bastard managed to get his own son killed.”
Her throat tightened. Lee was a rotten husband and father, but he didn’t deserve to be murdered.
“Long wasn’t able to get Bolt’s location,” Hawk said, “just that he likes to gamble and hangs around the casinos.”
It occurred to her that if they could prove Jeremy Bolt had killed Lee, she would no longer be the primary suspect in his murder.
“I’m going to find him,” Hawk said. “Long’s a friend. He won’t be safe until Bolt’s dead.”
Reese gripped his friend’s heavily muscled shoulder. “We need him alive, Hawk. We need proof he killed Lee Haines. It’s the only way to prove Kenzie’s innocence.”
Hawk’s gaze swung back to her, held for several seconds. “Locked up or dead. Either way works for me.”
* * *
Reese checked his watch. It was two o’clock in the morning and all of them were exhausted.
“There’s nothing more we can do here tonight,” he said. “We’ll start searching for Griff again in the morning.”
Kenzie wearily nodded.