All Mortal Flesh by Julia Spencer-Fleming Read Free Book Online Page A

swinging it back and forth like a bell, and the look on his face was the look of something terrible trying to be born. Russ was suddenly afraid. Terrified of what was coming.
    “There hasn’t been any car accident. Russ, she was killed. Stabbed to death. In your—in the kitchen.”
    “Killed,” he echoed stupidly.
    “Entwhistle and McCrea and Flynn are all over there right now, along with the state CS team. We’re going to find who did it, Chief. I swear to you, we’re going to find who did it. And when we do, he’s going to spend the rest of his life regretting he was ever born.”
    The terrible thing was here. He felt himself crack open, his jaw unhinge, his lungs constrict. His field of vision shrank, and his head filled with a loud, dry-edged shuffle as his mind laid down every card in its deck. Linda relaxing in her favorite chair at the end of the day. The two of them shouting at each other over the hood of her car. A funeral—he had never planned a funeral, didn’t know how to do it, didn’t know who to call. Oh, God, he was going to grow old and feeble alone, without his wife, his beautiful wife…
    The way it would feel, his finger tightening on the trigger as he pumped onetwothreefourfive rounds into her killer. Just like that.
    Memory. Guilt. Confusion. Self-pity.
    Rage.
    He held on to the rage. All the rest flapped and fluttered around him, and he knew that if he stopped to consider them he would fall apart. He couldn’t fall apart. He had a job to do.
    He held on to the rage.
    “Harlene! Is the chief’s mother here yet?” Lyle’s voice, harsh with fear, seemed to be coming from a long way away. “Chief? Russ?” Someone shook his shoulders.
    His vision cleared. Lyle was out of his chair, leaning over the desk, his hands tightening Russ’s flannel shirt into uncomfortable knots. “Jesus Christ, Chief. I thought you was having a stroke. Are you okay? Do you want to lie down?”
    “No.” He held on to the rage. He had a job to do. “I want to be brought up to date on the investigation.”
    “We’re not going to be able to put together anything like a coherent picture until tomorrow. The CS team is at the—is at your house right now. The ME ought to be over there as well. I can have Noble and Mark talk to the neighbors, see if anyone saw anything.”
    Russ tried to snort. It came out a wheeze. “Not likely.”
    “I know.”
    “I want to see the scene. I’ll need to—to identify anything that might be out of place.” It felt as if he were pushing his thoughts, one at a time, down a long, dark track. “You think… home invasion?”
    “You mean a burglary? Not from what I could see. Nothing missing that jumped out at me, unless you’ve loaded up on silver or electronics since last summer’s open house. There weren’t any signs of forced entry. The storm windows were all in place. She”—Lyle swallowed hard and went on—“she always locked the door when she was alone at home, right?”
    Russ nodded. There was a noise, outside his door, down the hall.
    “I think your mother’s here.”
    “I need to see the scene.” He looked up into Lyle’s face.
    “You will. Just not tonight. Trust me on this, Russ. Not tonight. Go home with your mother.” The noises grew closer. Footsteps, and voices. A rap on frosted glass, and before he could answer, the door swung open and his mother stood there, short and squat and beautiful.
    “Oh, my darling boy,” she said, her eyes filling. Then she was there, beside him, wrapping her arms around him. Sitting down, his head came to her shoulder, and he pressed his face into a purple sweatshirt that would forevermore be the color of grief to him, while she rubbed his back and said, “My boy. Oh, my sweet boy,” and wept tears he could not allow himself.
     
     
     
SEVEN
     
     
Tuesday, January 15
     
     
    Clare awoke early to a cold cabin and the realization that she was due to return to civilization today. To meet the new deacon the bishop