Page 17 of The Last Grift
The pilings were encrusted with years’ worth of barnaclesas well as other clingy and sharp sea creatures. At the far end, a pile of netting had been forgotten long ago and had subsequently tangled itself around several faded orange floats.
Damn.
Abandoning his inspection of the pier, Gabriel stared out across the tiny body of water. It was called Riddle Bay for reasons he didn’t yet know, but Elton would probably happily tell him. Gabriel instinctively liked the old man, but trust was still going to take a while. Even little old men could be con men—Gabe’s sweet, angelic-looking mother had taught him that.
On a bank across from the pier, towering fir and cedar trees stood shoulder to shoulder, their boughs tangled together, making it seem like they were holding hands.
Christ, Chance, quit trying to be poetic.
The gusting wind made the tops of the trees bend in their direction, almost as if the forest also wanted to hear what Elton had to say.
“Obviously, you shouldn’t stay aboard until it’s been cleaned up inside, but it’s doable. I’ve slept in worse places in my time.”
“So, it’s possible.” Gabriel just needed a bit more confirmation than “doable.”
“It won’t be comfortable. The cassette head doesn’t work, there’s no stove, and the electrical system is shot. It would just be a roof over your head.”
“A roof would be a good thing.”
A jaw-cracking yawn escaped Gabe. It had been a long twenty-four hours and, he noted grimly, it was starting to get dark already. Gabriel glared at the decrepit sailboat again. It didn’t look any better than it had forty seconds ago.
His inheritance.The Golden Ticket. If there was an afterlife, his mother was there laughing her ass off. What had she gained from keeping its existence a secret? Gabe hadno idea.
“This is beyond fucked up.”
Elton kept his opinion to himself. Maybe he sensed Gabriel’s need to vent.
This… this shitty boat was his end game. If he wanted any kind of future, he was going to have to deal with it. Or at least do a good job faking it.
“Seriously fucked up.” Louder this time, Gabriel’s words echoed out over the water, bouncing off the bluffs on either side of the tiny port. Was it even a port?
“Too bad I quit drinking,” he muttered. “A shot of ten-year-old McClellan’s would be nice right about now.” And maybe take the edge off the ache in his thigh. But no, alcohol would be a bad choice. Worse than conning Bart and Paul Anderson out of buckets of money.
Again, Elton didn’t respond. Maybe he was done with the Elton Cox version of a pep talk. He seemed oblivious to Gabriel’s crisis, instead choosing to stare at the boat. What was the older man thinking? Perhaps he was giving Gabe space to shout into the void.
“The void can’t handle me today,” Gabriel said, pushing away thoughts of amber liquid poured over ice with a lemon twist perched on the rim of the glass. In the past, Gabriel would have called it a day and headed to the closest bar. But his drinking days were behind him, and he was keeping to that. Too many lost hours, sometimes days. A new life and all that.
“It’s going to be a bitch to clean up,” Elton said, breaking his silence. “No doubt about that.”
Gabriel turned toward the gravelly voice. “Ya think?”
Elton blithely stared back at him. Gabriel had been around the block once or twice and wasn’t fooled by the older man’s innocent expression.
“I used to do a lot of this kind of work too, but these old bones don’t let me anymore,” Elton said with a shrug. “There’s aplace in Westfort that will clean the hull. In the spring. But you’d have to get it there.”
Westfort was the closest large town. Gabe had seen a couple of highway signs indicating it was just twenty miles from Heartstone.
“And pay for it.” It wasn’t that Gabe didn’t have money. He did. But his emergency accounts were hard to access for the very reason that they were for emergencies only. His go-bag of cash needed to last as long as possible. If the Colavitos decided to monitor his accounts—and they would, dammit—Gabe wasn’t going to lead them right to him. For Christ’s sake, he felt exposed just standing out on this anonymous dock.
“And pay for it,” Elton repeated with a nod. Elton may have looked like a sucker but he was sharp as a fillet knife. Maybe sharper.
Elton Cox was nobody’s fool. Which was probably why Heidi Karne had taken to him.
Gabriel released one last soft sigh. He was angry, furious with all of it. But he was too tired to unpack everything on his mind, and Elton didn’t deserve his ire. What he really wanted—aside from a drink that he knew hedidn’twant—was a decent night’s sleep.
“You’re certain you don’t want to stay at my place?” Elton asked as if he’d been reading Gabriel’s thoughts.
Elton had offered his spare room, but Gabriel worried that, regardless of his efforts, he had been followed. It was best to be on his own until he was more certain. Maybe accepting would have been smarter, but he wasn’t going to, not today.
