Alex Barclay - Blood Runs Cold

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Bob.

‘I know,’ said Ren. ‘Anyway, the team will be in touch with you any minute now. They’ll be the ones to go to Barger’s house too. So all you need to do is sit tight. And prepare to tell Casey Bonaventure some nice lies.’ She stood up.

‘Thanks, Ren.’

‘My pleasure.’

Ren got into the Jeep and clung to the steering wheel, her head bowed. Get your shit together . She pulled out of the parking lot, did a tour of the roundabout and drove to Frisco under a dusky sky.

Gary had once said to her, ‘I swear Domenica Val Pando has an island somewhere where she breeds those fucked-up goons.’

Ren disagreed. She just breaks into your nightmares and takes out the very worst parts — right at the black peak that wakes you up screaming — and she crosses them with an animal that, for a fraction of a second, can convince you he’s a man .

Ren walked the polished steps and shiny hallways up to the third floor of the beige brick building. Denis Lasco was on a call when she arrived in to his office. He put down the phone.

‘Hello, Ren.’ He was shaking his head, checking his watch. ‘You know, you think you are going to have a nice easy evening and now I hear that two bodies have been found in a house in Breckenridge.’

‘Ridge Street?’ said Ren. ‘Older male, younger female, GSW?’

Lasco frowned. ‘Yes. Did you flee the scene?’ He smiled.

‘I guess you could say that. But that’s not why I’m here.’

He rolled his chair back and turned it toward her. ‘Sit down. I’m surprised to see you here after everything.’

She sat on the edge of his desk. ‘Well, I have a favor to ask of you. A couple of favors, actually.’

‘Sure, go ahead.’

‘You know what you said about those greedy people who show up and take stuff when their relatives die? I was wondering if … if I told you a little story, you might like to help me out.’

Ren tied the little white headphones around her rear-view mirror and let the shiny pink iPod shuffle swing in the sunlight; two hundred and fifty songs, a personality preserved in music. She thought of Salem Swade and his eighteen-year-old smile and his perfect uniform and his shaved head and his heavy boots and his blown-apart hopes and his lost friends and his thirteen meds and his free breakfasts and his pale eyes and his skinny shoulders and his big, tortured heart.

She pulled out on to the highway. She was going the wrong way for Glenwood. She pushed her foot down on the accelerator, passing all the cars that wanted to slow her down.

Vincent. Paul. Billy … a complex tangle of emotions. Throughout her life, tiny threads had come together, wrapped around each other, twisted, frayed and unraveled. She glanced at herself in the mirror and saw eyes trying to harden. What is wrong with you?

Then she felt something at her neck — a warm, gentle comfort. She smiled, reaching her hand back, rubbing the soft, black, furry jaw.

Misty, take it easy. No barking. I’m not dead yet .