02 The Shaktra by Christopher Pike

Author:Christopher Pike [Pike, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Rose worked for Sheri Smith, taking care of Nira.

Patricia used to work for Sheri Smith, taking care of Nira.

Hector used to date Patricia.

Hector used to see Nira.

Hector used to date Lucy.

Lucy and Sheri Smith had been in the plant together when it blew. According to Rose, but not according to Hector.

Hector’s two girlfriends had died in Toule.

Freddy Degear had died in Toule, but only Rose knew him.

Freddy Degear was the reason they had gotten to know Nira.

Yeah, Steve thought, it was all interesting, but how did it add up?

“We’ll get to that in a second,” Cindy said, unaware of how annoyed Hector was getting. “But we need to ask you a couple of questions about Lucy, and what happened to her the year before the electrical plant blew. We understand she was in a car accident, and that she got badly burned?”

“Who told you that?” Hector demanded.

Cindy lowered her voice. “Ms. Treacher.”

Hector shook his head, he had reached his limit. “It’s your turn to talk. You tell me what you know about Patricia’s death and I’ll decide what to tell you about Lucy.”

They had reached an impasse. Steve decided it was time for a little honesty.

“We went to your local library,” Steve said. “We were there this morning, but we went back again after we had lunch with Rose and Nira. A lot of stuff was bothering us about Rose, that we’ll get into in a minute, and we wanted to check it out. But from talking to people around town, we knew about your connection to Patricia and Lucy and Nira. That inspired us to look up all the old articles on Patricia’s death, and we saw that she had been hit with a black SUV.” Steve added, “Some witnesses said it was a Ford Expedition.”

“So?” Hector said.

“We were there when Freddy Degear got run over yesterday,” Steve said. “He was hit by a black Ford Expedition.”

Hector sat up, interested. “Have you told the police this?”

“Not yet,” Steve said.

“Why not?”

“Because we’re still confused about Rose, Nira’s nanny,” Cindy said. “It’s one of the reasons we came to see you. We thought you could tell us more about her.”

“I’ve never even met the woman,” Hector said.

Steve saw their problem. They kept swinging from Rose to Patricia to Lucy. He apologized and asked Hector if they could focus on Rose for a second. Hector nodded, reluctantly. He was beginning to look like he wished he had never invited them inside.

“At first we liked Rose,” Steve explained. “It seemed like she really loved Nira, and took good care of her. But when we went for lunch this afternoon, she wouldn’t let Nira join us. She kept her in her room the whole time. And this room was like a jail cell. It has no toys in it, no TV, nothing on the walls. Rose wouldn’t even let us take Nira out for ice cream.”

“All this sounds like the mother’s fault,” Hector interrupted.

“Maybe,” Steve said. “But as we left the house, Cindy and I felt uneasy about Rose, and we started thinking about something Ms.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.