Dragon Tears by Dean Koontz Read Free Book Online Page B

only a few seconds to find the right follow-up: “Doncha Think It’s Time?”
    And talk about bizarre: Richard Ramirez, the serial killer known as the Night Stalker, was visited regularly in prison by a stream of attractive young women who found him appealing, exciting, a romantic figure. Or what about that guy in Wisconsin not long ago, cooking parts of his victims for dinner, keeping rows of severed heads in his refrigerator, and neighbors said, well, yeah, there had been bad smells coming from his apartment for years, and now and then they heard screams and high-powered electric saws, but the screaming never lasted long, and anyway the guy seemed so nice, he seemed to
care
about people. The 1990s. No decade like it.
    “Too Much,”
the perp finally said, evidently disbelieving Connie’s professed romantic interest.
    “Poor Boy,” she said with apparently genuine sympathy.
    “Way Down.”
The perp’s voice, now annoyingly whiny, echoed off the cobwebbed rafters as he admitted his lack of self-esteem, a very ‘90s sort of excuse.
    “Wear My Ring Around Your Neck,” Connie said, romancing him as she prowled through the maze, no doubt intending to blow him away the moment she caught sight of him.
    The perp didn’t reply.
    Harry kept on the move, too, diligently searching each shadowy niche and byway, but feeling useless. He had never imagined that in the last decade of this strange century, he might have to be an expert on rock-’n’-roll trivia to be an effective cop.
    He hated crap like this, but Connie loved it. She embraced the chaos of the times; there was something dark and wild in her.
    Harry reached an aisle that was perpendicular to his. It was deserted—except for a couple of naked mannequins that had toppled over long ago, one atop the other. Hunkered down, shoulders hunched protectively, Harry moved on.
    “Wear My Ring Around Your Neck,” Connie called out again from elsewhere in the maze.
    Maybe the perp was hesitating because he thought it was an offer that a guy should make to a gal, not the other way around. Though definitely a ‘90s man, maybe the bastard still had an old-fashioned sense of gender roles.
    “Treat Me Nice,” Connie said.
    No answer.
    “Love Me Tender,” Connie said.
    The perp still did not respond, and Harry was alarmed that the conversation had become a monologue. The creep might be close to Connie, letting her talk so he could get a better, final fix on her.
    Harry was about to shout a warning when an explosion shook the building. He froze, crossing his arms protectively over his face. But the blast had not occurred in the attic; there had been no flash.
    From the floor below came cries of agony and terror, confused voices, shouts of anger.
    Evidently other cops had entered the lower room where the ladder gave access to the attic, and the perp had heard them. He’d dropped a grenade through the trapdoor.
    The gruesome screams conjured an image in Harry’s mind: some guy trying to keep his intestines from spilling out of his belly.
    He knew that he and Connie were in a rare moment of total agreement, experiencing the same dread and fury. For once he didn’t give a damn about the perp’s legal rights, excessive use of force, or the proper way of doing things. He just wanted the bastard dead.
    Above the screams, Connie tried to re-establish the dialogue: “Love Me Tender.”
    “Tell Me Why,”
the perp demanded, still doubting her sincerity.
    “My Baby Left Me,” Connie said.
    The screams were subsiding on the floor below. Either the injured man was dying, or others were moving him out of the room where the grenade had detonated.
    “Anyway You Want Me,” Connie said.
    The perp was silent for a moment. Then his voice echoed through the room, infuriatingly directionless, “
I Feel So Bad.”
    “I’m Yours,” Connie said.
    Harry couldn’t get over the speed with which she thought of the appropriate titles.
    “Lonely Man,”
the perp said, and indeed he sounded