Orphans of Wonderland by Greg F. Gifune Read Free Book Online

conscious when it was done.”
    â€œWhat kind of person brands a human being?”
    â€œWhat kind of person brands any living being?”
    â€œI don’t mean to badmouth your friend or his memory, but odds are he was into some bad shit or pissed off the wrong kind of folks. People don’t get shot in the head on the street for no reason. You know that. Could it be a random thing? Sure, it’s possible. But how often does that really happen?”
    â€œMaybe it was a mistake.” Joel shrugged. “Shooter got the wrong guy.”
    â€œThat’s the problem—you don’t know much of anything at this point.”
    â€œNo, I don’t. I have no idea what the hell I’m walking into.”
    â€œThat’s never wise, my friend.”
    â€œSometimes it’s necessary. I’m guessing it won’t amount to much.”
    â€œGuessing or hoping?”
    â€œLittle of both. Either way, I’ve been out of the game a long time, Billy.”
    â€œYou’re still a reporter. It’s not like you’re selling furniture or something.”
    Joel stared at him. “My last story was about the school lunch program and how pizza is still being featured. Hard-hitting investigative journalism at its best. I don’t want to come off arrogant or anything, but I’m thinking Pulitzer.”
    â€œOnce a reporter, always a reporter.”
    â€œI thought that was priests.”
    â€œFine. Them too.”
    â€œMy point is the last real investigative work I did was twenty years ago, and I haven’t stepped foot in that part of Massachusetts in all that time. My old stomping grounds probably don’t even exist anymore, and any connections I had back then are likely long gone. So I figure I knock the rust off as best I can, go poke around a little, see if I can come up with anything or make some sense of things. If I come up empty—which is probably exactly what’ll happen—I come home none the worse for wear and able to live with myself because at least I’ll know I gave it an honest shot.”
    Billy smoked his cigarette a while, thinking. “I realize we didn’t know each other back when all that other stuff went down and you had those problems, but I know enough to realize that’s not something you need to get anywhere near again.”
    â€œYou think I don’t know that?”
    Flashes of memories blinked before Joel’s eyes. Photos of the Catholic church…the altar on which Cindy Mello had been slaughtered and sacrificed…the symbols and sacrilegious writings in her blood and fecal matter smeared across the walls and floors…the desecration…the madness and evil falling through his mind like black rain…
    He forced them away. It had been years since such things had tormented him or come to him so vividly.
    â€œIt’s not like I didn’t read your book,” Billy said. “I do know something about what happened and—”
    â€œIt was a long time ago.”
    â€œBut it also nearly killed you. You almost didn’t recover.”
    He and Billy had never really talked in-depth about those days, and Joel had no intention of starting now. “It was a completely different time, a different case and an entirely different situation. This has nothing to do with that sort of thing.”
    â€œThat you know of.”
    â€œLook, man, I appreciate your concern, okay? But I’m fine, and I’ll be fine.”
    â€œYou’ve got a good life here, Joel. A damn fine woman, a nice home, a badass best friend.” He grinned, then grew serious again. “Don’t fuck it up. Some people would kill for what you have. And by some people I mean me.”
    Joel gave a quiet, obligatory laugh, but both he and Billy knew there really wasn’t anything funny about any of this. As an awkward silence fell over them, a chilly but gentle breeze slipped through the trees at the edge of the