King & Moretti Partners

Chapter One

Ugh. She did not want to have to fight this guy, he was six foot three and probably two hundred and ninety pounds if he was an ounce. Meanwhile, she was a five foot six inch woman who was just one hundred and thirty six pounds this morning before three pancakes and three strips of bacon. She was not worried about kicking this fat schlub's ass though, she was angry enough to do it because she had a wicked hangover and just wanted to crawl in bed and pull the covers over her head for about a hundred years or so, she calculated that her frustration would give her fists the strength enough to take him down. But a job is a job, and bringing this guy in was going to pay off five grand, and mama's gotta pay the rent, she thought in resignation.

Five thousand dollars seemed a lot of money for a guy who looked like an out of work contractor with a hard on for twelve packs and cheeseburgers, so he must have pissed off someone in the Salvador family really bad. That was not really her concern though, whatever he had done to earn the contract on his head, the money was already in her bank account and his carcass was due for delivery by midnight. She looked at her phone and saw that it was already quarter after eleven. This was going to be cutting it close. She figured a drive to Winnetka to Don Salvador's place at this time of night would take about thirty minutes from there to the drop off if she was lucky, forty five minutes if she was not. Who knows how long it will take to put this guy in the van though, she mused, with a load like that she would have to remember to lift with her legs.

The window in the bathroom was way too small to try and get him out that way, but she had to thank God for 'do good' legislators for passing the no smoking laws in public places. The big man was a smoker so now she just had to wait until he got the craving and went outside to light up. As if on cue he got up and was making his way to the front entrance while pulling out his pack of cigarettes. "About damn time." She muttered under her breath.

She waited ten seconds and followed him outside. He was blowing out his first drag by the time she stepped out, pulling out a pack of her own. He thinks he's being slick as he checks out my ass. She was about to ask him for a light when he jumps the gun on her. Slow down buckaroo! Ha! This guy really thinks he has a chance with me. She had to hold in her laughter at the fact that he was barking up the wrong tree.

"Need a light, sweetheart?"

Sweetheart? What a charmer this guy was, she thought. She put on her best 'buzzed white girl' smile and chuckled drunkenly.

"Yasss, I think I left mine inside!" She slurred her words and wobbled so he would think that she was really hammered. He handed her the lighter and she fumbled it during the exchange from his meaty fingers on purpose. "Oops!" She chuckled again as it tumbled towards her old panel van a few cars down. It didn't tumble far enough though and she bent over, acting as though she was attempting to pick it up, and shifted her ass into his field of vision as a distraction. She knew she had a nice ass, add to that the short red dress she was wearing that showed off her athletic legs and the big idiot didn't stand a chance. The lugnut isn't even trying to help me, she thought as she gave her buttocks a little wiggle. Chivalry is dead. While he admired the view, she pretended to accidentally kick the lighter with her red pumps and slide it down the sidewalk closer to her van.

"I must be drunker than I thought!" She said about two notches too loud and stumbled over to her van like it was the first time she had ever worn high heels. He followed her like a good puppy and she picked up the lighter with one hand while sneaking out her baton from the inside of her little black leather jacket. As she stood with the lighter in one hand and a stupid grin on her face, she extended the steel baton with a flick of her wrist. In the split second it took for him to look down at the baton, she punched him in his Adam's apple with her hand that still held his lighter. Not enough to crush the throat, but just hard enough to make it the center of his attention for a few minutes. Now that he was gasping for air she could wind up and give him a hard enough whack on the side of his kneecap with the baton to make it relocate to the other side of his leg.