The Art of Fear by Pamela Crane

The Art of Fear by Pamela Crane

Author:Pamela Crane [Crane, Pamela]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Psychological, Thrillers, Suspense
ISBN: 9781940662091
Publisher: Tabella House
Published: 2018-02-01T00:00:00+00:00


Chapter 21 Ari

Seven days until dead

I don’t know where exactly Cloud 9 is, but I had set up camp and planned to stay a spell. After yesterday’s kiss, I didn’t know what to do with myself after I arrived home—alone. Feeling fidgety, I needed something to focus on, other than replaying the kiss for the next several hours.

I ended up whiling away the time by looking through Josef Alvarez’s case file. Upon finding nothing, I pulled out the address book that I swiped from his house. He was probably the one guy left in a million who still used a tangible address book. There were barely a handful of names in it—Rosalita Alvarez, George Battan, Pedro Luis—until one in particular caught my eye: Killian Alvarez, complete with address and phone number. Luckily the info wasn’t as outdated as the address book.

Calling him during my lunch break at work, my floor supervisor Florence and the kids’ department associate Gloria caught wind of the masculine voice on the other end and teased me mercilessly—and with way too much innuendo, which felt ickier given that they were both in their early seventies:

“It’s about time you found a man to release all that pent-up horniness with.”

Ew.

“When’s the last time you did the horizontal tango?”

Double ew.

“You’re overdue for some hard salami in your diet!”

They screeched with laughter while I shushed them in the background, praying Killian hadn’t overheard as I explained who I was and made plans to meet after work. After hanging up I yelled an exaggerated “eeew!” and scolded them, explaining how he was a sixteen-year-old boy who was the brother of a friend. Of course that’s when the crude cradle robber comments had started, forcing me to hide out for a while in a changing room.

The oversexed old bags were still ragging me when I clocked out of work five minutes early, thanks to my short lunch break, and headed to the Waffle House on Hillsborough Road, nervous about what I would say to Killian … and wondering how much Tina would kill me for doing so. Most likely she’d be dismemberment mad.

The Waffle House’s yellow sign looked cheery and inviting against the gray concrete block exterior. The red awning shaded me from the sun scorching my winter-white arms. If I had any chance of surviving the fast-approaching summer, I’d need to get started on my base tan, as it was only April and we were already hitting the mid-seventies.

Inhaling a deep, calming breath, I opened the glass front door and an icy blast of air conditioning tousled my hair and clothes. Damn, they kept the place cold.

Inside, only a smattering of people sat in booths, making it easy to find Killian—the only Latino adolescent in the place amid the mostly elderly patrons. Like his sister, his features boasted perfect symmetry and shine. In the way he nodded his head at me in greeting, I instantly saw a ladies’ man.

“You Killian?” I asked.

“Yep. And you’re Ari, right?”

“Hey.” I nodded and sat across from him.



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