Stuart Freeman Investigates
It's not easy, being a private detective. Not anywhere, but definitely not in this town...
Boston Massachusetts, the Cradle of Liberty they call it, but that’s just a pretty bit of history. Underneath the grand past and the old money, it’s just like any other town. The crazies and the crooks, the bad and the ugly all out to prey on the good. It’s as twisted and as dirty as any city, and it’s blokes like me, on the edges of law and order, away from crooked cops and government officials, who are stuck with the job of cleaning away some of the filth. The ones charged with keeping this old town, as old as they get this side of the water, safe from the monsters that walk at night – we’re the dragon slayers. I sometimes wonder if I shouldn’t have brought my Granda’s claymore.
When I caught the boat from Glasgow ten years ago I had a head full of dreams, a bright eyed lad out to make a difference in this crazy world, but God knows it’s hard to keep a positive outlook when you’ve seen the things I’ve seen. Things that’d drive the sunniest most optimistic soul to despair. Or to drink. Or both.
Hell, I was on the verge of giving it all up, disappearing into my next glass of single malt. That was when he walked into my life, one cold night in November when the moon was full and the rain fell like a widows tears…
“Excuse me, is this ‘Stuart Freeman Investigates’?”
There he stood, a vision in black pinstripes, all high cheekbones and raven curls.
A drag on a cigarette and a puff of smoke from between full lips, not hiding the sardonic arched eyebrow above gorgeous hazel eyes.
“Your sign needs repainting.”
Right from there I could tell he was trouble. The fancy suit and the cut glass accent couldn’t hide what was written in his eyes and the way he stood. On the outside a spoiled little rich kid with a silver spoon in his mouth and a trust fund in his bank account. An English prince straight out of a storybook living the New World’s idea of the high life. But, underneath that there was something dark and troubled. The kind of dark that could suck a man in so he loses himself for good. And God help me if I wasn’t intrigued.
He breezed past me, giving me a hint of some expensive cologne under the smoke and .the cold night air, and sat down without being invited. Guys like him think they own the world and everyone in it; that they can just smile and beckon and get exactly what they want from anyone. And the worst thing is how often they’re right.
Sat there in my battered armchair like it was a bloody throne, he told me his story. His name was Jesse West, and the cowboy name aside he was every bit the society butterfly I’d imagined. Straight up aristocracy who hadn’t lost the Britannia flavour any more than I had. A party boy, but with a sharp mind and a silver tongue that dispelled comparisons wit the pretty boy airheads I sometimes had to interview. I perched on the edge of my desk, a second hand thing with stains older than either of us, and listened till he’d finished his introduction.
“So, Mr West, what exactly is your problem?”
He crushed out his cigarette with a smirk.
Turns out that this Bonnie lass, in every sense of the term, was dear friend of our young Mr West; a good time gal with a heart of gold and an unfortunate taste in men to match her excellent taste in cocktails and cigarettes. Seems she’d got herself involved with some pretty rough characters, the guys smart enough to dodge the vice squad, and successful enough to pay off the ones who couldn’t be tricked.
“She’s a hell of a girl, Mr Freeman, but she’s never been good at knowing what’s good for her.”
“I know the type…so what’s happened to her?”
“That, my man, is the question.”
He leaned forward, elbows propped on his knees, and looked up at me through long lashes with a heartbreaker gaze. It would have looked like a submissive pose, if I hadn’t felt like I was being eyed by a jungle cat. When he spoke again he was deadly serious.
“Bonnie has been missing for over a week now, Mr Freeman. The police refuse to do anything, they say that girls like her take off all the time,” he sighed and looked at his hands “But I know my Bonnie, and she would have told me if she was leaving town. I need your help.”
Four words a man like me can never resist.
“Why me?” I sat back, folding my arms, “There are hundreds of private detectives in this city so, why specifically come to me?”
He laughed, a quiet, throaty sound, and leaned back, arms over the back of the chair.
“I’ve heard a great many things about you, Stuart Freeman. That you’re half mad, that you’re a terrible flirt, that you think you’ve got a better sense of humour than you do… but the main thing that everyone says about you is that you don’t give up. No matter how dire the situation, you keep on going until you’ve solved the case. That’s the sort of tenacity I’m looking for. The Scottish Terrier the call you," his eyes raked over me “Though to me you have more of the look of a wolf”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” I said, and reached to pour myself a drink, holding out the bottle to offer West one too. He smiled devilishly.
“I also heard that you were a drunk, but, well, you’re Scottish. If you couldn’t work while half cut you’d never get anything done in the first place.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle
“Alright, Sassenach, I think I’ve got the message. But, even wee lads from the Highlands don’t work for free. Looking at you, you don’t look to be short of cash.”
“Appearances can be deceiving, my family’s money is not strictly speaking my own…”
He rose from the chair and crossed the few feet of threadbare carpet to close the distance between us. He planted his hands on the desk, either side of my hips, and spoke in a whisper, close enough that the warmth of his breath touched my lips.
“But I’m sure we can come to some arrangement…”
