Three gins past midnight, Richard McNally sat hunched over the bar at Sun Valley Parlour, considering his penchant for bad locales. The slouch was a habit picked up years ago after Gas Munce broke parole and decided to check his pulse with a sap. The gin was an older story. He was about to call Gladys for a fourth when cherries began to wink through the rain-bleary windows. Two reds skidded into the Casa Mendoza lot across the street. Automatically he stubbed his butt and made to get up, then eased back down on the stool. It wasn’t his business anymore. Besides, it was soaking outside and the civvies hadn’t even arrived.
‘Gladys, blow me one more of your liquid kisses.’ The Mendoza, one of Aldridge Pick’s places, squatted on a strip of mean dime-novel bars, addict flops and dingy bungalow motels. A place whose neon forever flashed Vacancy, but hour by hour managed a healthy head of cabbage. Ray ‘Boy’ Robertson, a homicide badge, saw McNally coming and stopped him at the door to room 12.
‘Dickie the Dick. Hell.’ Ray, decked out in a compelling argument against fashion, complete with clashing tie, stood close enough to him to swing something heavy and connect.
‘You smell like my third wife. On the hire, or chasing sirens and whores now?’ he asked, slicking the drizzle through his thinning blond hair.
‘Just ruining my life at the Parlour, looking for second chances,’ McNally said, sparking a damp cigarette. ‘Got one?’
‘No boss in it for you, but go ahead. A dirty mash job.’
Like most corpses, hers wasn’t keen to offer up any secrets. She’d been tussled all right, so firmly no words could cling to her pulped features long enough to settle on a description. But the scene was too tidy for a

The Secrets Cadavers Keep 1