Hot dogs

There were police cars everywhere. At least fifty of them drove in and out of the Levy precinct of the North Little Rock Police Department and the adjacent mini mart parking lot. Rock wasn't sure exactly what was up, but he was in the middle of it and knew it involved the Arkansas Travelers, a minor-league baseball team based in downtown North Little Rock.
Rock had been asked to investigate something involving the lack of promotion of hot dogs at Dickey-Stephens Field, the Travelers ball park, but found evidence of deeper trouble. It was currently beyond him, but it seemed there were underworld influences at play.
A contractor who worked out of Dickey-Stephens had contacted Rock months before to ask for his help in marketing his hot dogs, which he apparently sold throughout the season. Rock had ignored the request, and now with less than a month left in the season was receiving emails and letters from the man, and phone calls from numbers he didn't recognize.
Odd characters began to appear, middle-aged, hard-driven men, dressed in old blue jeans and khakis and sweat shirts or tattered wool sweaters, all of whom had dark conspiracies underway. Rock sat with one of them in an early-model Toyota Camry, dented and filthy inside and out, parked between the stream of police cars and the center of their attention, a two-story, dilapidated brick office building, from which Rock could see smoke begin to emerge. The man beside him wanted Rock to help him find something, but he couldn't remember what it was.