The Darker Side by Cody McFadyen Read Free Book Online Page A

be close to a man for so long because she got pregnant when she was fifteen and was forced to give up her child. She’s since reconciled with her long-lost daughter, and maybe that’s a part of this sea change inside her. I don’t know. I only have glimpses of her secret self, small treasures she’s entrusted me with over the years.
    Callie’s greatest gifts to me have been her unswerving demand that we enjoy the moment, the now of life, and the invulnerable constancy of her friendship. I can count on her. It was Callie who found me in the aftermath of Joseph Sands, Callie who took my gun away and pulled me to her without a second thought, Callie who held me as I shrieked and screamed and ruined her perfect suit with my blood and tears and vomit.
    “Political hoo-hah,” I say in response to her questions. “And I don’t like the cold either.”
    “It’s not so bad,” a low voice rumbles. “Least there’s no snow. I hate snow.”
    Alan Washington is the oldest member of my team and the most seasoned. He didn’t go straight into the FBI, but spent ten years working homicide as a member of the LAPD.
    Alan is African-American. He’s a big man, as in the startling “big” of a linebacker or a great oak, the kind of man who might make you cross to the other side of the street if you saw him coming your way late at night. His form hides the truth: Alan is a deep thinker with a big heart and a meticulous nature. He can sift through details for days, patient, never getting exasperated, never looking for shortcuts, sticking with it until he’s broken a complexity down into its component parts. He’s also the most skilled interrogator I know. I’ve watched him reduce the hardest of the hard to quivering, blubbering messes.
    The best testaments to the soul of Alan are that he’s married to Elaina and that he loves her so obviously, so unashamedly, with a mix of wonder and pride. I was loved that way by Matt; it’s nice, and it speaks to the character of the man who does it.
    Alan smiles at me and tips a nonexistent hat.
    “Thank God for small favors,” I reply, smiling in return.
    The next voice I hear is sour with disapproval.
    “Why are we here?”
    This question comes from the last member of my team. The tone of it—blunt, unfriendly, impatient—irritates me, as always.
    James Giron is brilliant, but he is about as unlikeable as a human being can be. We sometimes refer to him as Damien, after the son of Satan from The Omen . He has no social veneer, no interest in softening the blow, no visible regard for the feelings of others. He takes the concept of thoughtlessness to new heights.
    James is a book of blank pages. I don’t know if he even has a personal life. I’ve never heard him talk about a song or movie he enjoyed. I don’t know what TV programs he watches, if any. I’m not aware of any personal relationships he’s had. James doesn’t bring his soul to work.
    What he does bring is his mind. James is a genius in the fullest sense of the word. He graduated high school at fifteen, got a perfect score on his SATs and finished college with a PhD in criminology by the time he was twenty. He joined the FBI at twenty-one, which had been his goal all along.
    James had an older sister, Rosa, who was murdered by a serial killer when James was twelve. He decided what his path would be the day they buried her. The fact of this is the only real evidence I have of James’s humanity.
    In most ways, James and I grate against each other, two positive poles repelling, a zero attractant. There is one exception: he shares the ability I have, to peer into the minds of those who murder for pleasure.
    “Because someone’s dead and someone with the power to do so has ordered us to deal with it,” I answer him.
    He frowns. “This is out of our jurisdiction. It’s not our job to be here.”
    I glance at AD Jones. He’s glaring at James with a mix of resignation and mild disbelief.
    “Stop whining,” Callie tells