Fear the Darkness: A Thriller by Becky Masterman Read Free Book Online Page A

sign that we were repeating ourselves.
    Mallory said, “Did I tell you it’s kind of self-serving, my inviting them, that the father is Owen’s doctor?”
    “Yes, you did. I don’t care. I’ve been working really hard on the aunt thing and could use a night off.”
    “How did the date go?”
    “Okay, I guess. She seems to like Peter, but she doesn’t talk a lot. When she does talk it’s like she’s considered every word before speaking it. She’s quiet. Really polite but quiet. And then I’m really polite back. It gets to me a little.”
    “She’s probably just trying to be what she thinks you expect.” Mallory threw the suit back on the rack with ill-hidden disgust. “I should have had more wine.”
    “You’re only going to wear it in your own pool. What do you even need a suit for?”
    “Don’t be gross, darling.” She looked at me appraisingly.
    “Well, it’s not like I parade around flaunting it,” I said, thinking of the time I was undercover as a stripper, flaunting it very nicely, thank you. It’s hard to not grow comfortable with your own skin once you’ve pole-danced in public. That Mafia hit man never dreamed a Fed could writhe that way. “I’m just saying if I come out of the shower and I want something from the kitchen I don’t put a robe on to go get it. Does anyone?”
    “Yes,” Mallory said, pulling in her upper lip. “They do.”
    Speaking of children, “Well, it’s sort of moot with Gemma-Kate in the house. I have to be more modest.”
    “Quelle horreur.”
    “It’s actually not as bad as I thought it would be. She’s getting on well with Carlo. And she’s a really good cook. She’s teaching me.”
    Funny how in retrospect that exchange sounded so ominous. Everything became so ominous.
    Mallory said, “Does she always make inappropriate comments like the one about the Pugs eating your face?”
    “Did she say my face? I don’t remember. Anyway, it’s an occupational hazard in a cop family. You toughen up. Not much in the way of empathy.”
    That, too.

 
    Eight
    At one time a thriving parish, St. Martin’s sat on twelve acres of prime land on La Cholla, next to a golf course. The style was mission adobe, the church itself standing out stark white against the land that had been allowed to stay natural, dotted with creosote, prickly pear, and cholla. At most, a hundred people would attend the later service in which Father Elias Manwaring, potluck portly, delivered those rambling sermons that made you want to stand up from your pew and shout, “Shut the fuck up, already!” But overall he was a pretty good man, and I had never before had as much time to stop thinking as I did in the church.
    After the service we all filed out to shake Manwaring’s mushy hand and be rewarded with his receiving-line smile. For Carlo the smile was always a little more genuine, like for a comrade in arms. Manwaring leaned into Carlo, saying something I couldn’t hear. Then we went with a couple dozen of the hard-core parishioners to a separate parish hall for coffee and kuchen.
    Carlo looked around at the entrance until he spotted a guy with a ponytail, bald on top so it looked like his hair was sliding off at a glacial pace. “Visitor,” Carlo said. “Elias wants me to connect.” Carlo took my hand and pulled me to the coffee table, where the guy stood meekly in line, looking like a church wallflower. Fifty-something. Nice shirt, but it felt like a veneer over a surface that needs sanding. An earring, and a bit of military tattoo peeking out from beneath a rolled-up shirtsleeve, markings of a bad boy gone to seed, or tired out and looking for Jesus.
    Carlo put out his hand and the guy took it. “Hi. Carlo DiForenza, and my wife, Brigid. Sorry for the line. The banana cake with chocolate morsels trumps greeting a guest.”
    The man took Carlo’s hand, but his eyes and smile were all for me, and in that moment the ponytail and the earring and the tattoo became as sexy as they must