Broken Dolls by James Carol Read Free Book Online Page A

slotted into their rightful places.
    When the music finally got too much, I drained my glass and headed upstairs. My suite at the Cosmopolitan was nothing special. On a scale of one to Vegas it scored a four. The decoration was as bland as the bar downstairs. The walls were white. So were the towels and the bedlinen. The sofa and chairs were cream. White rugs on the beige carpet, and black-and-white framed photographs on the walls. It was like all the colour had been leached from the room.
    For the past eighteen months since the execution, home had been a series of hotel suites, each one as anonymous as this one. Whenever I take on a case I always insist on a suite instead of a room. This is non-negotiable. During my time with the FBI I’d slummed it in too many cheap motel rooms. This suite was my sanctuary, somewhere to escape to even if it was just for a few hours. The last thing I wanted was a bed where you could feel the springs, and a shower that didn’t work, and walls so thin you could hear the neighbours breathing.
    Everything I needed to get through the day was in my suitcase. It was still packed because there was no point unpacking. I’d be in London for a few days, a week max, then I’d move on to the next hotel. Off chasing the next monster. I still owned a house in Virginia. It had two bedrooms and a living room big enough for my Steinway baby grand not to look out of place. Once a week someone went in and checked the place hadn’t been burgled, and once a month a groundskeeping firm tidied up the yard. I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t sold it. I guess everyone needs a place to call home, even if it is only a token effort.
    My second condition when I take a case is that the suite comes with a complimentary bottle of single malt. The blended stuff is fine for everyday use, but when it comes to unwinding you can’t beat a good single malt. Twelve-year-old is acceptable, fifteen-year-old is better than acceptable, and anything older is a bonus. Hatcher had come up with an eighteen-year-old Glenlivet that ticked all the appropriate boxes. I wired my portable speakers to my laptop, found Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony, and hit play. Then I poured a drink and took a sip, savouring the smoky, peaty flavour.
    Eyes closed, I let the beauty of the music wash over me. Mozart has the power to transport me into another world, a world that’s light years from the one I usually inhabit. This is a place of beauty and life rather than a place of torture and screams, a place of hope rather than despair. My laptop contained the best performances I’d managed to find of Mozart’s work. Everything the great man had ever written was on there. My goal was to own the defining performances of every single piece. It was a work in progress, a lifelong task.
    The first movement drifted to an end and I opened my eyes. For a moment I just sat there and sipped my whisky. I’d lost track of how long it had been since I last slept, but even though I was so exhausted I could barely see straight, I wasn’t ready to sleep. The second movement started up and I checked my emails. There was nothing much there. An update on the Maine case, a request from the San Francisco Police Department, a couple of junk emails.
    I headed out to the balcony for a last smoke, the rich sound of the second movement following me, gentle and soothing. A blanket of snow lay over London, painting the city clean. Sounds were more muffled than usual, the streets emptier. High overhead, a lone passenger jet roared through the stratosphere. The London Eye stood still in the distance, lit up in blue and white. I finished my cigarette and flicked it out into the dark. The glowing orange tip tumbled end over end, getting smaller and smaller until it disappeared altogether. I went back inside and chased a sleeping tablet down with a shot of Glenlivet. My last thought before crashing in to sleep was of victim number five. We had no idea who she was yet, but the one thing I