The Silver Ring by Robert Swartwood Read Free Book Online Page A

rang.
    “I’ll get it,” Dad said, already turning to leave the study, but he wasn’t fast enough.
    I flew around the desk, past my parents and sister, through the kitchen, back into the main hallway to the front door.
    Holding my breath, I peeked out the window. Then exhaling, I turned the lock and opened the door.
    Officer Titus stood on the other side. Wearing street clothes like he had this morning, he wasn’t the first cop I wanted to see, but he certainly wasn’t the last.
    “Hi, David,” he said, smiling brightly this time, “I was in the neighborhood and wanted to stop by again to—”
    I reached out and grabbed his arm and yanked him into the house. Slamming the door shut, I said, “Thank God you’re here.”
    Dad was standing in the kitchen doorway now, completely perplexed. “David, what the hell is going on?”
    I looked at him and Officer Titus and shook my head. For the first time the miles I’d run caught up with me and I leaned forward, gripping onto my knees, and took a deep breath.
    “You’re not going to believe me even when I tell you.”
    Dad said, “What is that supposed to mean?”
    The phone rang. Mom answered the extension in the kitchen. She said a few words, then called out my name.
    “It’s for you.”
    I looked at Dad and Officer Titus again, wanting to tell them everything but realizing just how difficult that was going to be. I hurried into the kitchen, took the phone from my wary-looking mother, and placed the handset to my ear.
    “Hello?”
    “David, this is Frank Mallory calling you back.”
    “Oh, it’s okay now.”
    “What’s okay now?”
    “Officer Titus is here.”
    There was a silence.
    Then: “What the fuck are you talking about?”
    The tone was one I never thought Frank Mallory could produce.
    “Look,” I said, turning and finding that everyone was in the kitchen now—my parents, Emma, Officer Titus—“I’m sorry to have bothered you or whatever, but I needed help and that’s why I called you. But now Officer Titus is here and he’ll take care of the situation.”
    “Kid”—Mallory’s voice completely toneless now—“I don’t know what your game is, but that’s impossible. James Titus was found dead this morning. He was murdered.”

 
     
     
    23
     
    Mallory disconnected the call—had he been on a landline, he no doubt would have slammed it—and I slowly glanced back up to see my parents and sister and Officer Titus.
    Only the man standing beside my father wasn’t Officer Titus.
    It said, “Uh-oh,” and then its eyes rolled back in its head, its skin began to change color, hair began to grow on its chin, and seconds later Cashman was grinning back at me. “Surprised?”
    Dad, having witnessed the transformation, said, “What the—”
    Cashman pulled out a gun, aimed it my dad’s head, and pulled the trigger.
    Both my mom and sister screamed at the same moment, their shrill cries almost drowning out the gunshot.
    As Dad fell to the ground, blood gushing everywhere, Cashman said to me, “That was for fucking up my truck.”
    He shifted his arm so the gun was now aimed at my mom, pulled the trigger again.
    “And that was just for fun.”
    The phone was still in my hand, now doing its monotonic beeping. It was on a cord but it was a long cord and I threw it right at Cashman’s head, shouting, “Emma, run!”
    The cord wasn’t long enough and Cashman should have known but he still flinched, moving the gun and firing but the aim was wide, taking out a cabinet door, and Emma managed to sprint past him.
    A vase of roses was on the kitchen table, something that hadn’t been there earlier this morning and which I was certain my dad had purchased out of guilt. I picked it up, chucked it at Cashman, just as he fired at me.
    In the confusion I don’t know if I felt the familiar pinprick or if the ring was now glowing; I just ran forward, right into him, knocking him down. Out into the hallway where Emma was trying to unlock the door but