Big City Heat Read online

  Praise for the Brack Pelton Mystery Series

  “Burnsworth nails the voice of new Southern noir. This talented author will win you over with his engaging and multi-faceted hero, then keep you turning pages with his suspense.”

  – Hank Phillippi Ryan,

  Mary Higgins Clark Award-Winning Author of Say No More

  “Hop on board for a hard-edged debut that’s fully loaded with car chases (particularly Mustangs), war veterans, old grudges, and abundant greed. A choppy start belies a well-executed plotline enhanced by the atmospheric Palmetto State setting.”

  – Library Journal

  “This second case for Brack is marked by a challenging mystery, quirky characters, and nonstop action.”

  ― Kirkus Reviews

  “In Brack Pelton, Burnsworth introduces a jaded yet empathetic character I hope to visit again and again.”

  – Susan M. Boyer,

  Agatha Award-Winning Author of Lowcountry Book Club

  “Burnsworth is outstanding as he brings out the heat, the smells, the colors, and the history of Charleston during Pelton’s mission to bring the killer to justice.”

  – John Carenen,

  Author of A Far Gone Night

  “If you have always suspected there is more to Charleston than quaint Southern charm and ghost stories, then David Burnsworth’s noir series, featuring ex-soldier, tiki bar owner, and part time beach bum, Brack Pelton may just be the antidote to a surfeit of sweet tea.”

  – Michael Sears,

  Shamus Award-Winning Author of Black Fridays

  Books by David Burnsworth

  Books in the Brack Pelton Mystery Series

  SOUTHERN HEAT (#1)

  BURNING HEAT (#2)

  BIG CITY HEAT (#3)

  Books in the Blu Carraway Mystery Series

  BLU HEAT (Prequel Novella)

  IN IT FOR THE MONEY (#1)

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  Copyright

  BIG CITY HEAT

  A Brack Pelton Mystery

  Part of the Henery Press Mystery Collection

  First Edition | April 2017

  Henery Press, LLC

  www.henerypress.com

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including internet usage, without written permission from Henery Press, LLC, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Copyright © 2017 by David Burnsworth

  This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Trade Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-199-6

  Digital epub ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-200-9

  Kindle ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-201-6

  Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-202-3

  Printed in the United States of America

  To my parents, Mom and Ron, and Dad,

  for their unrelenting love and support.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book almost wasn’t published. The publishing industry is just like any other type of business. It has ups and downs and, like life, changes. The first person I want to thank is Kendel Lynn, the managing editor at Henery Press. It was at a meeting during Bouchercon 2016 that the subject of Big City Heat came up. At the time it was a mostly complete manuscript sitting on the shelf because I had moved on to a second series. She agreed it should be published and made it happen. So thank you, Kendel!

  My wife Patty, if you didn’t know, is responsible for all of this in that she encouraged me to pursue my dream of being a published author. She believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself, and her unrelenting faith in God is a blessing.

  Every writer needs a support system. If you don’t think so, try to work a day job, crank out prose, plan events, manage social media, come up with promotion ideas, find a beta reader that can be trusted, and maintain a website. The only reason I can perform the first two is because I have Rowe Carenen, the Book Concierge, for the rest. Thanks, Rowe, for all your efforts over the past three years.

  My agent, Jill Marr, has been the faithful, steady force behind the scenes. When the aforementioned change occurred, she moved me on to bigger and better things. Thanks to you, Jill, and everyone at the Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency. I am in good hands.

  I’m so glad my work has landed at a new home in Henery Press. They welcomed me in even before I was one of their own. Special thanks to Rachel Jackson for excellent skills in managing me, Art Molinares for giving me a bear hug as a welcoming gesture, Erin George for helping with promotion, Amber Parker for her proofreading skills, and Jesica Pena for working behind the scenes to make everything run so smoothly.

  My road to Henery Press was paved by Susan Boyer. She has been the trusted friend and fellow author I’ve gone to for the tough publishing questions—the ones that I was embarrassed to ask but needed answers to. And she introduced me to Kendel and the gang at Henery. Susan, thank you for everything you have done to get me here.

  The Brack Pelton series has, I feel, a certain nuance to it. It is this extra kick that makes it special. This kick is Chris Roerden. Like with Southern Heat and Burning Heat, Chris took my prose (garble) and polished and sharpened the words into what became Big City Heat. If you like what you read, it’s due to her. If you find any fault herein, it’s because I didn’t listen to her close enough.

  A special recognition to a wonderful family of friends: Stephen Black, Katie Black, Anna Kate Black, and Emma Grace Black. Thank you all so much!

  And, as always, thank you, South Carolina Writers Association.

  My mom and dad had the foresight to pack up and move to Atlanta back in 1982, dragging me with them. Brack Pelton resides in Charleston, South Carolina. But this book is set in Atlanta because I lived there, grew up there, and was changed there. Thank you, Atlanta, for everything you gave me. I might not be the man I am today if you hadn’t helped shape me during that crucial part of my life.

  And lastly, thanks to all the Brack Pelton followers! This book is for you.

  Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me...

  Psalm 23:4

  Chapter One

  Atlanta, Georgia, Wednesday night, Mid-May

  Brack Pelton waited in his Porsche by a no-parking zone in a very bad part of the city and watched someone he thought he knew well climb out of an old Eldorado convertible. The man entered a ramshackle building with a neon beer mug shining through its one dirty window.

  Easing away from the red-marked bus stop, Brack found a better location down the block and pulled in. Before getting out of the Porsche, he woke Shelby, his tan mixed-breed dog slumbering in the backseat, and pulled a forty-five from the glovebox. He verified a round was chambered.

  Shelby licked his lips and gave a quick bark as Brack slid the pistol down the back waistband of his cargo shorts.

  Patting his dog on the head, Brack asked, “Ready?”

  A needless question. Another bark affirmed Shelby’s stand on things.

  “When we get inside, your job is to find Mutt. Okay?”

  Shelby licked his fac
e. Brack knew that as long as their target hadn’t escaped out some back door, Shelby would find him. Mutt was one of his favorite people. Brack’s too. That was why tracking him like this went against everything he believed in doing.

  Mutt was the one who often rode shotgun with Brack as they’d right Charleston’s wrongs. Now Mutt was the one in the crosshairs. Thanks to an early morning phone call from Cassie, Mutt’s girlfriend, a life depended on answers his friend would give. The forty-five wouldn’t come out unless trouble came up.

  The barroom’s rusty screen door screeched open. Shelby darted ahead, already focused on his objective. Brack entered a time warp. Uncanny how even the sour bar wash fragrance and cigarette smoke were the same. Through the old familiar haze, he imagined Mutt standing behind a peeling Formica counter pouring drinks to patrons who could barely afford their rent. Somehow, Mutt had managed to replicate his termite-infested watering hole three hundred miles west of where his original joint stood before some spoiled neighborhood brat burned it down.

  “You lost?” A very large African-American man wearing a soiled wife-beater chalking a pool cue confronted the white newcomer.

  Meeting his gaze, Brack said, “No. I’m looking for a loudmouth Marine named Mutt. If he’s here drinking, the rounds are on me. If he owns this place, I’m going to beat the life out of him.”

  “Big talk coming from someone in yo’ shoes,” he said.

  Four other men flanked him, two on each side, all with arms folded across their meaty chests. Five soiled wife-beaters in a row. A worn-out AC unit clicked and sputtered, failing to condition the polluted air in the establishment.

  Shelby seemed to take longer than usual to find Mutt. Only one thing could sidetrack him. But no women had ever been present in the original Mutt’s Bar in Charleston. They’d been afraid to enter the place.

  Maybe Atlanta women were different.

  Casually Brack removed the half-smoked cigar he’d been saving in his pocket and lit it. The only faithful friend he had left at the moment was his own adrenaline. Brack was angry at Mutt and wouldn’t mind working it out of his system on these five gentlemen facing him.

  Three more joined them.

  Okay, these eight gentlemen.

  Brack felt more gather behind him.

  His wayward dog better have a real good excuse for not warning him.

  Taking a drag on the stogie, he exhaled a cloud of smoke to add to the carcinogenic fog. “It’s going to be a bad day for some of you.”

  Chuckles echoed around the room, undoubtedly at his expense.

  Mutt pushed his way through the gathering mob. A few inches over six feet, he’d replaced his boxed Afro with a close trim since the last time Brack had seen him. His clothes were of a more recent vintage, another change, and to Brack’s untrained eye, quite stylish.

  “Opie, you always got to do things the hard way, don’t ’cha?”

  Brack couldn’t decide if he wanted to punch him or shake his hand. The fact that his friend sported a bridge that replaced his missing front teeth also caught him off guard.

  Shelby was not with Mutt.

  From behind, Brack heard the gruff words, “You want us to take this cracker out back, Mutt?”

  Mutt knew as well as Brack did that they were greatly outnumbered. But Brack figured Mutt also knew that a few of his patrons would spend the next few weeks in the hospital if things went south.

  Before either of them could say anything, a husky female voice came from somewhere in the crowd.

  “You got the prettiest dog.”

  All the men turned in the direction of the voice. Through a break in the undershirt line, Brack observed a heavyset black woman in a way-too-tight purple body suit. Clearly she’d fallen in love with his dog. Her extra-long orange day-glo fingernails scratched behind his ears.

  Sitting on his haunches with closed eyes, Shelby flapped his tongue and panted in what Brack recognized as pure bliss. Two other women wearing similar attire also gave Shelby their full attention.

  Brack was about to get pummeled by eight or more hulks itching to right the wrongs of their world, yet his dog had managed to pick up what looked like all the women in the establishment.

  The spokesman for the wife-beater ensemble said, “We ain’t finished wit you, white boy.”

  Brack turned back to him.

  Mutt got between them.

  “Easy, Charlie. He’s my brother.”

  The men looked at each other as if Mutt and Brack could possibly be related. Of course, they weren’t in the traditional sense.

  “Summertime” by Billy Stewart began to play somewhere in the room. A real classic.

  Circling Shelby, the women moved their ample hips to the beat. The dog, in plus-sized heaven, spun around, not sure which lady to kiss first.

  A fourth woman Brack hadn’t noticed until now came from behind the bar to stand beside Mutt. Almost as tall as Brack, with dark brown skin, a buzzed haircut, and toned figure bordering on muscular. Her inked-up arms momentarily distracted Brack.

  The man Mutt called Charlie said, “I don’t care who you think he is. He ain’t got the juice to come in here talking about beatin’ you up.”

  Mutt turned to his old friend. “You said you was gonna beat me up?”

  “Something like that.” Brack cocked his head. “I get a call begging me to drive here from Charleston. It’s Cassie. She’s scared half to death because some men threatened her, and she doesn’t know what you do when you leave her house late at night. Put yourself in her shoes.”

  The woman bartender looked at him. “You must be Brack.”

  Mutt interrupted. “Opie, I’ma tell you like I tol’ Cassie. What I do is my bidness. She ain’t got no right to ask.”

  Charlie moved in like he was about to throw a punch.

  Before Brack could react, the toned female bartender grabbed Charlie by the shirt collar and said, “You really don’t want to do that.”

  Mutt said, “Easy there, Tara. We all friends here.”

  She didn’t let go.

  Charlie backed off.

  Brack dropped what was left of his cigar on the floor, crushed it with his foot, and turned back to Mutt. “You better tell me what’s going on, or I will beat the ever-living daylights out of you.”

  Chapter Two

  Thursday morning, two a.m.

  Mutt and Brack cruised along Peachtree Street in the Porsche, top down, with Shelby asleep in the backseat. It was way past Brack’s bedtime, and traffic was light. Tara stayed behind to close up the bar. She could definitely handle herself.

  “Cassie told me on the phone that her kid sister’s missing. What do you know about it?”

  Mutt pulled out an electronic cigarette contraption Brack had heard called a vaporizer. “Regan been gone ’bout a month.”

  “And now Cassie is in danger?”

  He took two drags off the vaporizer. “I started asking around and found out Regan got in wit some bad people.”

  “How bad?”

  “Lemme put it to you this way,” he said. “All I did was ask a few peoples if they knew where she was at, and the next day these dudes on motorcycles threaten Cassie.”

  “Threatened like how?”

  “They caught her when she was leaving the restaurant late one night. Tol’ her I shouldn’t ask no more questions or someone might get hurt.”

  He looked at Brack. “All I did was ask if anyone’d seen her sister.”

  Brack slowed for a light. “Who’d you ask?”

  “Everyone we know.”

  “That doesn’t help.”

  “This ain’t Charleston, Opie. You mighta gotten away with a lot there, but the playas here mean bidness.”

  Brack said, “When did you start vaping?”

  “Cassie seemed to think it was a good idea.”

>   “Well, you look good, Mutt. You look good.”

  He lifted the collar of his new sport coat. “You like this?”

  “I couldn’t wear something that nice on a regular basis, but it looks good on you.”

  Mutt checked out Brack’s faded Blue Oyster Cult t-shirt and frayed shorts. “You in the big city now, Opie. We gotta get you something else to wear.”

  “What we need to do is take care of the bikers and find Regan.”

  After another puff on his fake smoke, Mutt said, “I found out where she is.”

  It was Brack’s turn to look at his friend. “Where?”

  “There’s a guy here, runs most of the illegal stuff in the city. Name’s Vito. She workin’ for him.”

  The light turned green and Brack accelerated. “I guess we know where to go next.”

  “We can’t go bustin’ up in his crib and expect him to just hand her over.”

  “Maybe you can’t,” Brack said. “Where we headed, anyway?”

  “Turn right at the next light.”

  “That still doesn’t answer my question.”

  “My house,” he said. “You and Shelby need a place to stay, don’cha?”

  Eleven a.m., Thursday

  After oversleeping, Brack and Shelby drove out to Midtown to see Cassie Thibedeaux at her new restaurant. They’d slept at Mutt’s house, a pretty decent rental a few blocks from his bar. Brack awoke and found Mutt already gone, which irritated him to no end. He must have walked back to get his car.