"Dan Simmons - Joe Kurtz 03 - Hard As Nails" - читать интересную книгу автора (Simmons Dan)

In fact, things had been going strangely well for weeks. Later, he told himself that he
should have known that the universe was getting ready to readjust its balance of pain
at his expense.
And at much greater expense to the woman who was standing next to him when
the shots were fired.
He had a two P.M. appointment with his parole officer and he was there at the
Civic Center on time. Because curb parking around the courthouse was almost
impossible at that time of day, Kurtz used the parking garage under the combined
civic, justice, and family court complex. The best thing about his parole officer was
that she validated.
Actually, Kurtz realized, that wasn't the best thing about her at all. Probation
Officer Margaret "Peg" O'Toole, formerly of the Buffalo P.D. narcotics and vice
squad, had treated him decently, knew and liked his secretaryтАФArlene
DeMarcoтАФand had once helped Kurtz out of a deep hole when an overzealous
detective had tried to send him back to County lock-up on a trumped-up weapons
charge. Joe Kurtz had made more than a few enemies during his eleven and a half
years serving time for manslaughter in Attica, and odds were poor that he'd last long
in general population, even in County. In addition to validating his parking stubs, Peg
O'Toole had probably saved his life.
She was waiting for him when he knocked on the door and entered her
second-floor office. Come to think of it, O'Toole had never kept him waiting. While
many parole officers worked out of cubicles, O'Toole had earned herself a real
office with windows overlooking the Erie County Holding Center on Church Street.
Kurtz figured that on a clear day she could watch the winos being dragged into the
drunk tank.
"Mr. Kurtz." She gestured him to his usual chair.
"Agent O'Toole." He took his usual chair.
"We have an important date coming up, Mr. Kurtz," said O'Toole, looking at him
and then down at his folder.
Kurtz nodded. In a few weeks it would be one year since he left Attica and
reported to his parole officer. Since there had been no real problemsтАФor at least
none she or the cops had heard aboutтАФhe should be visiting her once a month
soon, rather than weekly. Now she asked her usual questions and Kurtz gave his
usual answers.
Peg O'Toole was an attractive woman in her late thirtiesтАФoverweight by current
standards of perfection but all the more attractive in Kurtz's eyes for that, with long,
auburn hair, green eyes, a taste for expensive but conservative clothing, and a Sig
Pro 9mm semiautomatic pistol in her purse. Kurtz knew the make because he'd seen
the weapon.
He liked O'TooleтАФand not just for helping him out of the frame-up a year ago
this coming NovemberтАФbut also because she was as no-nonsense and
non-condescending as a parole officer can be with a "client." He'd never had an
erotic thought about her, but that wasn't her fault. There was just something about
the act of imagining an ex-police officer with her clothes off that worked on Kurtz
like a 1,000-cc dose of anti-Viagra.
"Are you still working with Mrs. DeMarco on the SweetheartSearch-dot-com
business?" asked O'Toole. As a felon, Kurtz couldn't be licensed by the state of
New York for his former jobтАФP.I.тАФbut he could operate this business of finding
old high school flames, first via the InternetтАФthat was his secretary Arlene's part of
itтАФthen by a bit of elementary skip-tracing. That was Kurtz's part of it.