XXX Shamus

by Red Hammond

  Praise for XXX SHAMUS:

  “XXX Shamus is the most transgressive PI novel ever written. It’s also one of the best.” – Allan Guthrie

  “There are a lot of people that think they like it tough and raw, a lot of hardboiled wannabes. Okay, you tough readers. You like it so raw? Time to put up or shut up, Stick your face into the pages of XXX SHAMUS. Turn away before the last page and I’ll kick your fucking teeth out. Take it. Take it all.” – Victor Gischler

  A Broken River Books original

  Broken River Books

  103 Beal Street

  Norman, OK 73069

  Copyright © 2013 by Red Hammond

  Cover art and design copyright © 2013 by Matthew Revert

  www.matthewrevert.com

  Interior design by J David Osborne

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written consent of the publisher, except where permitted by law.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Where the names of actual celebrities or corporate entities appear, they are used for fictional purposes and do not constitute assertions of fact. Any resemblance to real events or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-1-940885-04-9

  Printed in the USA.

  The girl came to Hopper’s office on a day God was punishing New Orleans for its sins again by raining down a tropical flood, the water nearly hot as the air—ninety-seven degrees. No air conditioning because the window unit fell out the week before and took the window with it. Hopper owed money to a kid who was cut by flying glass.

  A couple of box fans blew full-strength, cycloning in the middle of the hardwood floor where the chairs were covered with mist blowing in through the broken window. The office was merely a meeting place. Hopper had been thinking of quitting after the last case nearly ended in tragedy. Find one college student who didn’t want to be found and everyone treats you like Jesus. Hopper felt more like Judas—that girl tried to commit suicide two weeks after he gave away her hiding place.

  Lately, they’d all been missing girl cases, and Hopper had turned them all down. The only reason he was here today is because his new secretary, one he’d met six weeks ago on the last case, had begged. She knew a girl who knew this girl whose kid sister had gone missing. This new secretary was very persuasive.

  He didn’t want to work at all because sooner or later he knew it would happen again. It always did. He wished he understood why. Some of the women said he gave off pheromones, something spicy. Others said it was his natural expression, this comfortable sadness that caused these women to want to comfort him, mother him, show him just how kind the world could be. Maybe so. All Hopper knew was that when women got near him, it was like flicking a switch on their lust. They lost control. They took control. It had started to make him nervous.

  That was only half the problem. The rest was that he couldn’t say no. A junkie for pussy. A sweet, terrible rush.

  Rain and sweat and the smell of a city that excited and repulsed the senses all at once filled the tiny French Quarter office, in a building still half-abandoned after the storm, and Hopper was relieved the girl finally showed up. She was twenty minutes late. He was soaked to the bone in a sports coat barely able to contain his weightlifter’s bulk. His thick glasses were spotted with raindrops, cutting and magnifying what he saw.

  “Take a seat, please.”

  She tried to wipe the moisture from the chair, then surrendered and sat down. Besides, she was already saturated, the tiny umbrella in her hand like a BB gun challenging a cannon. The girl had blonde straight hair pulled tightly back. Her shorts revealed muscled legs, an athlete. Her T-shirt outlined decent tits. Hopper concentrated on her eyes. It didn’t help.

  Sweet and terrible.

  He’d written her name on a damp legal pad: Kristen Hannity.

  “Sorry about the wet, Miss Hannity,” Hopper said.

  Kristen nodded. “I expected something more high-tech.”

  “Yeah. I have a laptop at home. This place is just a formality.”

  She raised her chin towards the window hole. “You could put some cardboard up.”

  Hopper hadn’t thought of that, made a noise like he’d do it as soon as she left.

  Kristen held her knees together but her feet wide. She twisted her fingers in her lap. “What do you need to know?”

  “Let’s start with the last time anyone saw your sister.”

  Yasmin Hannity was sixteen, five months pregnant, and had been missing for two weeks, not a peep from the cops about leads or clues. At first it looked like an abduction—abandoned car and no use of her mom’s borrowed credit card—but the cops began to see runaway signs and played everything a little cooler. After all, they guessed she’d show up in a hospital or abortion clinic soon enough. The family stapled missing fliers over band fliers on power poles, which were then covered by more band fliers, like bark on a tree expanding. Neighborhood Watch went into high gear organizing search parties. The organization took all their energies.

  The parents hadn’t given up, but they were too busy bracing for the worst—and planning their foundation for runaway pregnant girls (called Yasmin’s Heart Ministries) —to pay much attention when their college senior daughter Kristen said she’d heard about a private detective who was good at finding lost girls.

  The father of Yasmin’s baby was the frat boy friend of a guy Kristen used to date until she found out her little sister was knocked up. He had rich parents, powerful coffee execs, which might give him a motive to knock her off—a guiltless life thanks to hush money and promises of political favors from Frat Boy’s daddy.

  Yasmin’s current boyfriend was a straight A high school student with a mullet who promised to help her through Lamaze classes. First thoughts had them both on a Vegas trip to elope, but the guy turned up to be out of town at a Young Republicans convention. Still, the cops were keeping an eye on him.

  Other than that, where else would she go? She didn’t have movie star looks or ambitions. She wasn’t a hippie. She was simply a half-smart girl who, before the pregnancy, had wanted to attend community college, get a nursing degree, and marry a lawyer.

  The last time anyone had seen her was on her way home from a doctor’s appointment. Yasmin waved to the receptionist on the way out, all cheery, and said, “If it’s a girl, I want to name her Florence, like the nurse.”

  And the receptionist told her, “That’s the woman from the Brady Bunch, too.”

  Hopper listened, then said, “You have a picture?”

  Kristen rifled through her purse and pulled out a mini-Polaroid. The girl in the photo wasn’t pregnant. Her blonde hair was dishwater and her face was slim. She was cute, wide-eyed, had perfect teeth. A petite body, shown off in Christmas morning pajamas and flip-flops.

  “That was this past Christmas.”

  “No pictures of her showing?”

  Kristen shrugged. “Mom was kind of embarrassed, didn’t want to memorialize it. So if they raise the baby as our brother or sister, the kid won’t run across proof later on.”

  Hopper tried to imagine Yasmin in his head with the bubble stomach, the breasts, a little puffier all over. Hard to do. This one was a pixie. He brushed moisture off a legal pad and handed it to Kristen. “Print some names. I need to talk to everyone who might know something else or something you don’t.”

  “I knew everything.”

  Hopper grinned. “No, you didn’t.”

  When she was done, the runny ink listed the baby’s daddy, the new boyfriend, two girls, and a guidance
counselor. Hopper’s heart sank a little. He would need a few Red Bulls to get through the conversations without his usual problems.

  “These girls,” he choked out. “How old are they?”

  Kristen looked a little iffy. “Probably the same age. Sixteen.”

  “They’re out of school for summer. I need home addresses. I need parental permission.”

  She stood and leaned over, jotted upside down numbers next to names. Her T-shirt sagged. Her nipples were hard from the chill. Hopper watched. He could ogle women and not get slapped, something he didn’t understand. His stomach cramped a little, as it always did when he reached this point.

  It was going to happen, without fail. He could smell it on her.

  She didn’t sit down immediately, just met his eyes and bit her lower lip.

  He cleared his throat. “My fee. I get two hundred a day plus expenses. I need the first and last days upfront.”

  Kristen crossed her arms. “I can give you eighty.”

  “That’s a start. I can kill that in a few hours, though.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m not trying to rip you off. It’s expensive doing what we do.”

  The girl began to sidestep left. At the edge of the desk, she said, “Isn’t there another way? I mean, I’ll be grateful if you can take the case and let me pay in installments. Her life could be in danger.”

  Hopper’s nerves jangled. The cyclone whistled. He took his glasses off, rubbed his eyes. “Like I said, eighty is a start. We’ll have to make up for it later.”

  By then she was standing at his knees. He was half-hard. She wasn’t his type. Plenty of times he’d been fine when they weren’t his type. In fact, when they were his type, he got even more nervous, sometimes had to throw up first.

  All it takes is standing up and walking her to the door. Easy. So fucking easy. So why aren’t you standing up?

  Kristen said, “If I can do something for you now, can we hold off on the eighty, even? My parents don’t even know I’m here.”

  “Do what?”

  When she opened her lips again, Hopper heard the shaky breath and hoped it wasn’t the bad kind of shaky. She dipped to her knees. “It’s all I have.”

  “You don’t have to. Don’t even worry about it. I’m on the case.”

  But Kristen’s hands were already massaging his thighs roughly, the touch of a girl who was better after a few beers with a guy who got his moves from music videos. Hopper wasn’t wearing a belt. The khakis were sweat and rain spotted. Kristen worked the button, the zipper, yanked them, Hopper having to lift his ass a little to help her out. No underwear. He never wore any. It got in the way.

  His cock was free and growing and Kristen took hold too hard, pumped a couple of strokes, then lipped it. She ran her lips along the length, more saliva each time. It felt light to him. Hopper had never been the biggest blow job fan. He preferred the pussy—going down on it, fucking it from top or behind or bottom, seeing the legs and ass, seeing the eyes, not feeling helpless. He forgot about his preferences when Kristen finally eased him into her mouth and sucked hard. It wasn’t just the sliding, but the pressure and tightness of her mouth that sent him into moans that he knew didn’t come out masculine enough.

  She was all hands and mouth, hair bobbing up and down in hip-hop rhythm, an occasional stop for breath when her gaze would float to meet his bewilderment. A small grin. He couldn’t take much more.

  “Put your mouth back on it. I’m going to come.”

  She did. More strokes, long and even to maximize the moment, and then Hopper yelled, “Shit!” and blew into her mouth, letting it all go go go.

  Her mouth slid off, then her fingers. She turned her face and spit his come to the floor, lifted the shoulder of her T-shirt and wiped her lips.

  Hopper was numb.

  Kristen said, “Sorry about the floor. It’s a texture thing.”

  “Don’t apologize. That’s good, it’s your thing and it’s good.”

  She stood and waited as Hopper pulled his khakis up, zipped, and avoided slipping on his semen.

  “As soon as I know anything,” he told her, touched the small of her back and led her towards the door.

  Before they reached the entrance she embraced him tightly. He couldn’t bend down to meet her, so he held her head to his chest while she cried, a muffled chorus of “thank you”s vibrating against his skin.

  She left. Hopper walked back his desk, beaten by the cyclone winds. He had pinned Yasmin’s photo to the desk with the note pad. He slid it out. Five months pregnant. Who knows where she is and if she wants to be found. After the last one, Cynthia, tried to kill herself, he spent a week barely awake, not eating, and when he came back into the world, his mind had frozen her away so that only dreams would thaw her. He didn’t get much sleep anymore.

  The rain hadn’t let up. The list on his note pad was fading. He ripped the sheet off and folded it, stuck it in his pocket.

  His secretary, Divinity, walked in behind him. She was a student at UNO, a Korean-American with a small hard body and a short mess of black hair that intensified her beauty. He met her while looking for the missing girl named Cynthia, her friend. Divinity loved thin sundresses. She took Hopper to a Rocky Horror Picture Show screening where he discovered Cynthia hiding in plain sight, told her parents where she was, and thought his job was done. Technically it was. Then the suicide attempt—razors, always razors with these girls. Hopper gave up on hearing that. He wanted to shut the business down and find another way to spend his days.

  After that, Hopper and Divinity would call each other at weird times of the day and have spontaneous sex in awkward places, sometimes public. He thought they were soulmates even though Divinity, especially, was single at heart and all about the variety. He hired her as a secretary because she didn’t mind the infrequent and cheap pay. She also organized his daily life a little better than he could. Plus the added bonus of fucking in the front reception area while waiting for clients to show up.

  “She was crying. You must have done something,” Divinity said.

  Hopper shrugged. “I took her case. I have work to do.”

  “Can I have some of the retainer? Need a textbook.”

  His head turned to the spot on the floor by his desk where Kristen had spit.

  Divinity looked down. “Okay, I’ll get the mop.”

  In a cheap file cabinet at his apartment, Hopper kept a notebook with a growing list of names—all the women (and one man) he’d ever had sex with. He’d started the list about ten years ago, a college junior who had finally broken out of his shy shell, finally gotten his body in shape, and finally started drinking a little. So in bars it didn’t take long for the sluts to find him. He could tell in three minutes if they were going to fuck him or not.

  The list actually began before that, a couple of high school fumblings and fingerings, deep kisses and “feel ups” that didn’t amount to anything, and even his first true girlfriend, the one he wanted to marry. Their first time together was bad, but she was sweet about it and helped him make it better the second time (which was the last fuck they shared). They were engaged for a while, a secret he held back from the older sister who had raised him after their parents died, before the girlfriend realized she was too young for marriage and wanted much more out of life. At least that was her story then. Hopper got a call six months later—she was married, living with the guy’s parents, and miserable.

  “Can’t I see you one more time?” she sang softly.

  Hopper told her no. Never spoke to her again. Plenty of regret.

  Then he got this job while attending the University of New Orleans, pretending to chase an English degree but really not doing much at all. A couple of private eyes needed an extra set of legs. One was closing in on sixty and had lived a rough life, couldn’t keep up anymore. The other was thirty-seven and dressed like Miami Vice was still all the rage—smooth hairstyle and stubble and gold. They mentored him and treated him like shit at the same time, liked to make f
un of his goofy looks and the awkward way he spoke. Still, he was their guy. They defended him when others insulted him, even taking it to blows with fists and a bat once or twice. Most of all, they taught him confidence, how to carry himself, and that got him attention from more than just the sluts in the bars. The troubled souls, drama queens, dual-faced “good girls” taking a walk on the wild side, the rebounds, decent-looking or stunning or unique, they all flocked to Hopper.

  The sex wasn’t always good. Sometimes it was good, and sometimes it was bad, even painful, and sometimes he felt nothing much at all. He let it happen more often than he initiated. He saw very few again, only a handful of repeats on the list.

  His tryst with Divinity was shaping up to be his second-longest “relationship” ever. With her, the fucking was always something, never left him numb, and he was afraid that he was developing real feelings for the girl. Sometimes he thought she was crazy about him and him alone, but other days he thought she’d take the closest hard dick in the room.

  Hopper had inherited the office and an apartment when the older man died (suicide, shotgun, after learning he had cancer) and the Don Johnson wannabe “retired” (drank himself into cirrhosis, then caught the clap off a drunk widow).

  Hopper had lost count on the list. He was shorthanding the sex with Divinity, a D and a smiley. For the others, he sometimes listed a full name, sometimes a last, sometimes a first. There was the occasional paragraph or two if it was really memorable, electric, nut-busting sex. Mostly it was a few words, boiling down to today’s “Kristen Hannity, Blowjob. Wet from Rain. Blonde.”

  Actually, he didn’t list every name after all. There was one glaring omission, and she would never find a place on his list.

  On the way home from the office, the rain finally fading and the steam from the concrete boiling his skin, Hopper looked at the list of names Kristen had given him. The guys sounded weak, ineffective, so they wouldn’t be much of an issue to talk with. No nerves there. His only sexual encounter with a man was when he questioned Cynthia’s ex-boyfriend, a mechanic. The guy got irritated at the questions, hit Hopper with a wrench, forced him to suck cock and then raped his ass. Hopper didn’t report it, too embarrassed. Still, some nights he would stake out the rapist’s garage, think about going after the bastard—work him over with one of the firm’s blood-stained bats. In the end, he couldn’t get up the nerve.