Shadow Dragon by Lance Horton Read Free Book Online Page A

through the trees at a speed no skier could match. It made a wide sweeping arc, its motion fluid and graceful. As the shadow swept down the hillside, Adam realized it was coming toward him, its speed increasing as it drew nearer. He grabbed at the other ski pole lying a few feet away.
    He was too slow.
    The shadow slammed into him, knocking the breath from him and driving him deeper into the powdery snow. He flailed wildly, trying to knock it loose, but it bore down on him like an avalanche and drove him down into darkness.
    *
    He wasn’t sure how long he was out, but he awoke to the pressure of something on his midsection. He screamed hysterically as, one by one, his ribs began to snap. Blood geysered from his torso, spattering his face and goggles and steaming as it splashed onto the snow.
    The lonely scream echoed down the valley before it was suddenly silenced as darkness settled upon the mountain.
     

CHAPTER 9
    Seattle
    Kyle made his way up the walk to the house. As he stepped onto the porch, a drop of cold rain fell on the back of his neck and trickled down his spine. Shuddering, he pulled up the collar of his overcoat. He reached for the brass knocker, but the door opened before him.
    Bobbi Darrell stood in the doorway, wearing a pair of jeans and a faded Seahawks sweatshirt. It was an old one, with the old blue and silver logo. She was an attractive woman in her midfifties, but today, she looked older than her years. The dark circles beneath her eyes made it appear as if she hadn’t slept in days.
    “I heard your car,” she said, a hint of hope in her voice.
    Kyle nodded. Before he could say anything, she read the look on his face, and her expression fell immediately.
    “Come in,” she said as she turned and went back inside.
    After they had returned from Montana, Kyle and Lewis had spent days questioning the family, friends, and coworkers of the victims in an effort to dig up leads on people who might have had a reason to kill the men. They had reviewed the backgrounds of the men and interviewed dozens of employees at the three body shops that James Darrell owned, but they had yet to find anything that suggested the murders had been committed by anyone working there.
    Darrell had been the sole proprietor of the business, and therefore, no one outside of his wife, Bobbi, stood to gain anything from his murder. According to everyone they had interviewed, Darrell and his wife had been happily married for thirty-one years.
    Kyle knew she didn’t have anything to do with it simply from the look of utter devastation on her face the first time they had met with her. It was a look he had grown accustomed to seeing over the past few years.
    Kyle followed her into the living room. It was tastefully decorated in warm earth tones, with a watercolor of the Pacific Northwest coastline hanging above the fireplace. Several photo albums lay on the coffee table along with a box of Kleenex. Videotapes with handwritten labels that read “Wedding Video” and “Paris” and “Christmas ’03” were scattered across the floor in front of the TV.
    Bobbi picked up the rumpled afghan lying on the sofa and folded it. She laid it across one of the arms before she sat down. Her movements were slow, mechanical.
    Without sitting, Kyle took the small envelope from his pocket. Bobbi looked at it for a moment as if afraid to touch it and then slowly held out a trembling hand. Kyle gently handed her the envelope. She opened it, and then tilted it upward so that the contents slid out into the palm of her other hand.
    The only thing they had recovered of James Darrell had been his severed left hand. In spite of evidence to the contrary, a part of Bobbi had clung to the hope that her husband might still be found alive. But now, looking at the gold wedding band in her hand, it was as if the finality of his death suddenly hit home.
    “No,” she whimpered, clutching the ring against her chest as she burst into tears.
    Kyle sat next to her,