Invitation to Murder (1991) Anthology by Ed Gorman; Martin H Greenberg

Author:Ed Gorman; Martin H Greenberg [Greenberg, Ed Gorman; Martin H]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

MERLIN AND THE HITMAN

Teri White

Farrow knew that he was losing his mind.

He could not quite remember when the knowledge of that fact first came to him, but over the last six months or so, it had become clearer every day.

He was going crazy.

There was no way of knowing why this was happening to him. Maybe it was something physiological. Like a brain tumor or cancer. Or perhaps this was a purely emotional thing, although Farrow didn’t like to think that; he was a man who had always prided himself on his ability to keep his emotions under strict control. Had to, in his line of work, or else you’d. . .freak out.

His best guess was that it was all in the genes. Hereditary. Now that he actually stopped to think about it, his mother—who died when he was fifteen—must have been a little schizo, not just the looney drunk he always assumed. And who the hell knew what he’d inherited from the father he’d never known?

When you came right down to it, why he was losing his mind wasn’t the important thing anyway. What mattered most was what he could do about it. No doctors, that was for damned sure, and no shrinks either. There were too many secrets in his life that couldn’t be spilled under anesthesia or therapy. He’d even come to the conclusion that insanity wasn’t the worst way things could end for him.

And over the last few weeks, he had even managed to come up with a solution to his problem. Once upon a time, he’d spent a vacation on a small and unpopular island in the Caribbean. Empty beaches and lots of water, along with a population of pleasant, non-curious inhabitants. It seemed like a nice enough place for a man to go crazy.

Of course, as always, money was a sticky detail. In order to live the way he wanted to, he would need quite a lot of cash. Enough to last him until. . .well, until whatever.

In light of that, Farrow decided to take on one more job. It was something he’d never done before, but now the risk seemed acceptable.

Farrow was going to kill a cop.

“I must be going crazy,” Spaceman Kowalski muttered. “What the hell business do I have getting married again? At my age?”

His partner, Blue Maguire, had been listening to that or similar remarks for most of the past week, as the day for the planned nuptials drew even closer. By now, he was mostly just ignoring the complaints. He could afford to be nonchalant, because all he had to do was show up on time and remember to bring the ring. A best man had all of the fun and none of the pressures.

Blue was only sorry that the wedding wasn’t going to be formal, because he hadn’t worn his tux since transferring out of the department’s public relations office. It would have been nice to dress up again. But Spaceman had drawn the line at that, so Blue had to settle for getting a new blazer.

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