The Hush of Dark Wings by Charles L. Grant

Author:Charles L. Grant [Grant, Charles L.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780451457332
Publisher: ROC
Published: 1999-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

TWELVE

Leb sat on the stable floor, knees drawn to his chest. The double doors were open an inch or two, and a narrow slant of dim light passed his left shoulder and barely reached the facing stall. Absently he scraped his teeth over the nail of his right thumb, while the other hand rubbed the side of his face from temple to jaw. Over and over. Pausing now and then to scratch at his beard or pass hard under his nose to keep from sneezing.

He needed silence.

He needed to think.

The first decision had been laughably easy: no way on God’s earth was he going out there tonight. Let Bliss and Wayman and the others make damn fools of themselves, thinking they were going to find Otis out there. They knew they weren’t; they had seen the damn horse. And if by some damnable miracle they did, there wouldn’t be enough left to bring home in a midget’s knapsack.

His hand drifted down to the bottle at his side, gripped the neck, lifted, and waited until he was sure he needed another courage—ounce before bringing it to his lips.

A gulp, a cough, and he put the bottle down.

Ken Stark was lucky. He had gone looking for his dumb wife on his own. Lucky because he’d found her, and his mind had gone south and he barely remembered his own name anymore.

But at least he was still alive. A hell of a lot better than Otis probably was.

He lowered his head as if in prayer, and listened to the old nameless mare stir in her stall. He’d done what he could for the poor old gal, rubbing her down, drying her off, a little water, a little hay, a fresh warm blanket to stop the shivering that made her legs weak. But he had a feeling from the way she’d looked at him while he worked that she wasn’t long for this world anymore.

Not after what she’d probably seen.

Damnit, Otis, you dumb shit, what the hell were you doing out there tonight? Still think it’s the good old days, you stupid old fool?

He sighed wearily and leaned his head back against the wall, fingers brushing the bottle, caressing it, holding on.

Everything inside him, every ounce of sense he had left, screamed at him to get up off his butt, run like hell home, get into the damn truck and ride the hell away. It didn’t make a damn difference what direction it was, as long as it was away. He didn’t need any more money; he had enough to take care of himself for the rest of his miserable life. The others wouldn’t care. More for them, that’s all.

If he stayed, he was going to die.

He knew it; he just knew it.

Just like he knew that that son of a bitch Proctor was going to figure it all out no matter what Wayman claimed, and Leb didn’t want to be around when the fire came down.

He looked to the gap between the doors,

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.