Shattered Shell (Lewis Cole Book 3) by Brendan DuBois

Author:Brendan DuBois [DuBois, Brendan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severn River Publishing
Published: 2023-06-26T16:00:00+00:00

We were parked in the same store lot again, watching the plows do their night work, scraping and moving tons of snow into piles that were beginning to dwarf the surrounding buildings. I had the heater on and we had cups of coffee, taken from a drive-up window at a Dunkin' Donuts. The coffee tasted fine, but I was in a foul mood.

"Well, we learned a lot tonight," Felix said, and I grunted in reply. He went on. "See the little scam I pulled with him, just before we left, when I shook his hand?"

"Sure. What were you trying to do, see if he belonged to the same lodge?"

"Hardly. The man says he has a job at the docks in Boston, working under the table. Those guys work hard in all weather, and even if you wear gloves, it does a number to your hands. The guy's hands are soft, soft as a virgin's butt. There's no way he does outside work. And did you notice the other thing about him?"

Amber lights flashed from the growling plows. "No, what was that?"

"Jesus, Lewis," Felix said. "The guy was coked up to the gills. Sniffling like that, his hands shaky, eyes watery. I bet you that's where his business interest lies, not with the docks. Our Doug was seriously strung out. Couldn't you see that?"

I turned and looked over at him. He was being polite, but he could tell he was chiding me, and I said in return, "No, but I saw something else."

"Oh? Like what? Like Doug doesn't do laundry?"

I raised up my coffee cup. "No. Our Doug was lying. He's been to Kara's place."

Felix shifted in his seat to get a better look at me. "Say again?"

"Doug's been there, and probably recently. When you and I were at Kara's, do you remember her living room? What was there, besides furniture and books?"

He thought for a moment. "Tapestry hanging from one wall. Coffee table and such. Closed-off fireplace, some junk on the mantelpiece."

"That junk was three ceramic sculptures, showing a fantasy world. Knights and trolls and horses. Two of the sculptures were a matched set. The other showed a knight, kneeling in fear, waiting to be attacked. But there was nothing attacking him. Nothing."

"You saw it at Doug's place," he said, no more chiding in his voice.

"That I did. A sculpture of a dragon, waiting to move down to kill something, and a perfect match to the knight sculpture. It belongs at Kara's place, but it's at her brother's dump. He says he doesn't know where she lives, and he says he's never talked to her. Felix, the man's lying about the first and I'm sure he's lying about the second."

Felix's voice sounded bleak. "Are you saying he raped his sister?"

The coffee seemed to back up my throat. "I don't know. I do know he's been to her place. Look, we've tracked this one down pretty far. We talked to Kara, cops, neighbors, parents, employers, and the landlord, who later gets his throat slit.

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