It was a bad day. My boss was on my case, thirty years of living on burgers and fries was on my gut, and the bank kept stamping "NSF" on my checks. With a week till payday and a month till winter, I tightened both my belt and my windbreaker, looking down at the dead body at my feet.

    A dead body isn't as common in Hunter, Montana, as it is in some parts of the world. Killing is still rare here, unless it's deer season. A dead body meant a lively front page, and that was my concern. I'm Mick Robbins, and I cover the police beat for the Hunter Post.

    Getting to the body before the cops wasn't a problem. The man was killed on the wrong side of the railroad tracks, which coincidentally happens to be the location of my favorite bar. I had stopped in to Hammerhead’s for a three martini lunch, except I drank bourbon instead of Martinis and I had five instead of three. I was just heading back to the paper when the scanner in my car went off, summoning black-and-whites to a possible homicide three blocks from my location.

    I was supposed to meet with the city editor after lunch; the publisher wanted to fire me again. But a dead body was likely to be at least as interesting and twice as lively. He could wait until after I’d seen what was up.

    I made a quick left, then a right, and I was there. When I looked at the body, I could see that the man had died of a heart attack. That is, someone attacked him, and hit his heart. Unfortunately, the dead man forgot to carry his bible in his breast pocket.

    I didn't touch the body, or any surrounding evidence. That was partially because I knew the rules for a situation like this. But mostly it was because I was stunned. The dead man was Ambrose Green, city editor of the Hunter Post, the very man I’d been supposed to meet with after lunch. It was very out of character for him. Being dead was out-of-fashion, and being dead on the south side was downright gauche. Green was never one to fall behind the fashion curve.

    He worked at the paper because he loved journalism, not because he needed the money. He came from as old as the money got in Hunter, which wasn’t all that old. But he surely did know how to spend, which was one of the reasons I enjoyed drinking with him. Or at least I had enjoyed it before that day.

    Ambrose Green was also the only reason I still had my job. The publisher and the EIC – Editor-in-Chief, that is – thought I drank too much and had a bad attitude. They were right, of course, but Green always liked my writing, so he stuck up for me. With him on the obituary page, I'd soon be off the front page.

    "You kill him, Mick?" This from Sergeant Wilson, who showed up three minutes after I did.

    I shot back, "No, Bill, did you?"

    He gave me a twenty-one finger salute that was twenty fingers short, then knelt to examine the body.

    Wilson wouldn’t keep this case for long, I knew. He was married to Green’s daughter, and the department would want someone unbiased on it. I actually felt a bit sorry for him; telling his wife would be hard for the guy. But for now, the Sergeant fumbled in the jacket pocket for a wallet. I almost told him not to bother; in this part of town, Green would definitely have been robbed. Keeping my mouth shut turned out to be a good idea, as usual. The wallet was right there in the pocket of his suit, which looked like it cost as much as my car, including the after-market window tinting.

    Speaking of fashion, Tina Matthews of KTKO walked up just as Wilson opened the wallet. She was the "On the spot reporter for the Knockout News Team." In most cases, their station's call letters were sorely inaccurate; their stories floated like bees and stung like butterflies. But Tina fit the bill fairly well. She was a knockout.

    I remembered when she started work at KTKO. The first story we both covered, I took one look at her – soft in the right places, firm in the rest of them, and lipstick redder than Joey Stalin – and asked her out. Budda budda budda blam! Shot down quicker than the Goodyear blimp over Vietnam.

    Which meant I had to find out about her my usual way-snooping. She was from poor farm country outside Hunter, and hell bent for leather to get out of it, according to sources who asked to remain anonymous. Would have been my kind of girl, except that she put her nose in the air before she’d even finished getting the cow crap off her boots.

    She looked at the body and shook her too-blonde-to-be-natural hair back and forth, saying, "What a senseless tragedy."

    I did a double take. Her camera wasn't even running. Bad enough to talk like that for the viewers. But then, the job description for TV reporters stressed body over brain, which made Tina just what the doctor ordered. Nonetheless, word on the street was that Tina Matthews wouldn’t have her job for long.

    Her station was getting a new owner, said the rumor mill. The deal closed two weeks ago, and would take effect in another two weeks. Supposedly the new owners didn’t like Tina’s style. I sympathized. I didn’t like it either.

    Wilson circled his finger, and we gathered around him. He gave us an official statement, in which he successfully recounted the obvious. I was impressed. Someone heard a gunshot, called the police at quarter after one, and they came to the south side and found the body. No suspects yet. Ballistics report as soon as it was finished.

    And speaking of south side, I kept my eye on Tina's as she walked away to look for some locals to interview. Her head may have been empty, but her slacks were filled just right. I never said she was ugly, I just said she dyed her hair.

    After a moment, I went off on the same mission as Tina, looking for some locals who'd seen the shooting or at least heard it. I wondered how the Post would handle a story about the death of our own city editor. I was fairly certain the editor in chief would handle it by firing the reporter who covered it.

    Back at the office, I started making calls. The first one was to the receptionist in the paper's front office. Shelly Renault – whose job consisted mainly of telling people that Green wasn't available – might know something about who would kill him.

    But Shelly wouldn't talk about Green. She did tell me she’d have a drink with me at Hammerhead’s shortly after six that evening. Since I was going to be there anyway, I accepted.

    Calls to Green’s family yielded the usual range of responses – everything from "Leave me alone, you vulture!" to "Leave me alone, you slime bucket!" I never did figure out what it is that makes people so mad about being asked how they feel after a loved one dies.

    I tried calling myself to get comment from coworkers, but the line was busy every time I tried.

    I walked into the EIC’s office to get a quote from him. On my way through, I noticed his secretary with some kind of pink slip of paper in her typewriter. I got some good copy from the Editor about the pain all of us felt at the Post at the loss of one of our most beloved colleagues. He almost sounded like he meant it. By the time I left his office, his secretary had finished typing the pink slip and carried it in for him to sign. At least he didn’t try to hand it to me on the spot.

    Just before leaving the office, the phone rang. It was Tina, of all people. "Forget it, Matthews," I growled at her. "I’m not padding your story with a quote."

    "I don’t want a quote, Robbins," she replied, voice as saccharine as ever. "I want to have a drink with you. Say seven o’clock. Interested?"

    I scanned through my memory, but couldn’t find a single time I’d turned down the chance to drink with beautiful woman. And since I would be there anyway, I suggested Hammerhead’s. She knew it, sneered at it, but agreed to come anyway.

    I filed my story on Green’s murder. The meat of the article was that the police didn’t have the first clue about my boss’s death, which was a shame, because Green was a damn good man. Not exactly a scoop, but true to the last word of it.

    I walked into my favorite bar at quarter after six. I didn't go there looking for a fistfight; I was just looking for a woman. I found both, and I have to say, I enjoyed the fistfight more.

    The woman came in first — Shelly Renault, the paper's receptionist. She was a pugnacious little brunette who talked like a shipload of sailors. Other than Green, I liked her more than any other person at the paper, including myself. On the Richter scale of lust she was only a 7.5, but as far as bad attitude was concerned she was a perfect ten.

    Shelly was the kind of girl you might kick out of bed for eating crackers, but only if you were stupid enough to strike her. If you did she would just kick you back, and I can pretty much guarantee it wouldn't be in the ass. She packed a magnum wallop in a Derringer frame. She wasn't going to be a model any time soon, but on the other hand, she was better looking than the mug who manned the bar. He brought a tall, cool glass of gin for Shelly when she took the seat next to me, then walked away. I reminded myself to tip him well for not making me look at him too long.

    She muttered a string of profanity that passed for a greeting, then bummed a cigarette from the man on the other side of her. Ignoring the match he held out she turned back to me and lit it herself. "I thought you'd be willing to drink with me."

    "That's some real sharp investigative work, there, Shelly. Usually I go to church after work."

    She used a few more four-letter words about my sense of humor, then said, "I want to talk about Ambrose."

    "You couldn’t have done this with me before I filed the story?"

    "I didn’t want to go on record. The Post’s editorial policy is not to print half the words I use in a typical sentence anyway."

    I belted back my shot of Jim Beam, then yelled at the bartender for a whiskey burger and a side of fries. It’s like a hamburger, only hold the lettuce, tomato, patty and bun and substitute a shot of bourbon. Then I turned back to my companion. "Alright, what is it, Shelly?"

    "His wife was ticked off at him. Not sure what the deal was precisely, but apparently he got into a big chunk of their savings for some shady business deal or another."

    "Green? Ambrose Green? What makes you think the deal was shady? The guy was as clean as freshly washed soap."

    She shrugged. "That’s what his wife called it. Heard her in the office yelling at him t’other day. If you want to find out who killed him, that strikes me as a good place to start." She took a swig from the pint of gin she had her fingers wrapped around.

    "You think his wife killed him?"

    Shelly shrugged. "Only person I’ve ever seen mad at him."

    "When did this happen?" I asked.

    "About two weeks ago," she replied, then got up and left. "Thanks for buying my drinks, Mick. See you tomorrow."

    I was still trying to figure out when I’d committed to paying the tab when it hit me. Two weeks ago. I slapped my forehead and swore; I saw the whole plot laid out so I could see everything, like a centerfold in one of my favorite magazines. Then I looked at my watch. Five ‘til seven – maybe I still had time to get out.

    Or maybe not. The hired goons found me, right where I'm sure Tina told them I would be.

    "I need to talk to you."

    The voice came from a towering pile of low IQ wearing jeans and a T-shirt with a baseball cap down low. I gave him a quick looking over and replied, "You need to talk to a plastic surgeon, too, but I'll bet you can't afford that either."

    "I got three bucks in my wallet, Robbins. What's it cost to talk to you?" He grabbed a fistful of my windbreaker and yanked me out of my seat, spilling my drink. That's what got me really mad.

    They say that everyone has their own cross to bear. I carry a right cross myself, and I let him have it on the chin when he adjusted his grip on my jacket.

    The incredible shrinking brain reeled back and took a swing at me, but the bright spots in his eyes must have put his aim off, because the blow missed my nose and landed on my left shoulder. I used his teeth to polish my knuckles, and he was on the floor, just like my bourbon. But the waitress would need more than a mop to clean him up.

    "Looks like there's going to be a vacancy on the goon squad," I said. "Maybe I'll apply." That's when his partner got me from behind.

    I woke up some time later, not too sure where I was. It was totally dark, the floor was hard, and the space was very confined. At first I thought it was my apartment, but it turned out to be the trunk of a car.

    Someone opened the trunk. In the glare from the outside world, I couldn't make out a face, but I recognized my old friends Smith and Wesson. They still had the same in-your-face attitude they usually did with me.

    "Bellboy, grab my bags," I said. "I'd like to check out of the Hotel Man-I-warned-ya."

    "We'll see if you're so wise when you go bungee jumping without a cord, punk." With that he yanked me out of the trunk by my jacket.

    I was in an open field. It looked like every other vacant lot I'd ever thrown up in, with one exception. Reaching for the sky in front of me was KTKO's antenna tower, like some kind of smaller, and less classy version of the Eiffel tower. With his gun in my back the hired goon pushed me toward the ladder. "Start climbing, wise guy." He followed me up.

    When I'd reached the second landing, about a hundred feet in the air, I could see the mountains rising in the distance, capped with clouds. I also saw Tina Matthews. "Hey, Mick, how do you like the view," she asked, leaning against a metal strut.

    "The Rockies look just great from here," I replied, "and the Grand Tetons in front of me aren't so shabby either."

    She added her name to the long list of women who’ve slapped me, and left me rubbing my jaw. "Enjoy it, scribbler. It’ll be the last thing you see. Besides the ground that is."

    She pulled a pistol out of her purse, and pointed it at my solar plexus. The pen is mightier than the sword, they say, but a .38 special beats them both, hands down. Tina had a gun, and I didn't, so things looked grim.

    I let her have a good look at my middle finger. "I always knew there was only one way you’d ever beat me to a scoop, Tina. I don’t really mind you killing me – I’ve got my will made out, and I left you all my student loans. But did you have to kill my boss? Is your job really worth that much?"

    "It’s the only one I have, Robbins. I know how little you can afford the firing you’re about to get, you ought to sympathize. It took me a lot of work to get out of the gutter; I’m not going back. I wouldn’t care if the bastard had just bought the station. But when he let on I wasn’t going to make it through the change of ownership, I didn’t have much choice. This job is my ticket out of the junkyard, Robbins, and no one’s going to screw it up. Not Green, and not you either."

    She shrugged. "Actually, I didn’t want to kill you. Unfortunately, you heard about Green’s death before your EIC did. If he would have heard first, I figured you’d be canned before you could start sniffing around, and I wouldn’t have had to worry about it."

    I rolled my eyes. "At least try to make the story good. Most of the crap you file merits creating a special category for the Pulitzer prize: maudlin tripe."

    "Oh, this one’ll be a heartbreaker, Robbins. Hard-working police reporter can’t stand the thought of losing his job now that his patron’s dead, and goes to the highest building in town to jump to his death. What a senseless tragedy."

    "Driven to suicide by having to listen to you blab for too long is more like it."

    Her hand flew out to slap me again, and that’s when I took my chance. I dodged the slap, stuck out my foot, and wished her a safe trip. Off balance from missing, she stumbled over my foot. She grabbed for one of the tower’s steel beams but missed, dropping her gun in the process. Then she went over the edge. I always said she had a good set of lungs – she screamed all the way down, then filed her final story all over the dirt below.

    The hired goon just stood there staring for a moment, watching his paycheck fail to bounce. That gave me all the time I needed. With a dive that carried me dangerously close to the same fate as Tina, I landed right next to her gun, grabbed it, and rolled over to face him. I put his nose in my sight-picture, pulled the trigger, and gave him three column-inches on tomorrow's obituary page.

    None of this did me any good. My only friend in the paper’s management was still dead, and I was still broke. I crossed my fingers and hoped good old Sergeant Wilson got the case: if I pissed him off enough, maybe he’d throw me in the clink. I knew the food was for crap there, but it would be free. And for a guy about to be fired, it helps to know where your next meal is coming from.