Shadow Of The Wolf. Rebecca Flanders

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СКАЧАТЬ through Ky’s veins. His heart pounded in his throat, his breath was quick and strong. Every sense was more acute than it had ever been. He recognized the man immediately for what he was. And he had never seen him before in his life.

      He was a big man, powerfully built, with a thick mane of silver hair that fell below his shoulders. He wore a patchwork fur vest, which was distinctly out of place for New Orleans, and carried an elaborately carved wooden walking stick. His face was stern and imperious, his eyes crystal blue.

      Ky knew he was in the presence of greatness. His knees were abruptly rubbery and he wanted to sit down, but he dared not show any weakness. He thought, This can’t be.

      And yet it was.

      He squared his shoulders, closing his fists. He demanded, “How did you get in here?”

      The other man smiled, and gestured toward the door. “Locks pose no problem for us, do they?”

      Ky’s heartbeat jumped again. It was hard to swallow. “Who are you? What do you want?”

      The intruder moved away from the window a few paces closer to Ky. Ky stood his ground, but all the man did was lift a medium-size canvas satchel from the coffee table. The satchel was not Ky’s, so he presumed the man had brought it with him.

      “My name,” he said, “is Sebastian St. Clare, and I have a business proposition for you.”

      Ky said nothing.

      “You don’t have a business address,” St. Clare went on. “I presume I was right in coming here.”

      Ky said, “How did you find me?” His voice was a little hoarse. He tried to swallow.

      “You are a private investigator, are you not?” inquired St. Clare mildly. “How do clients usually find you?”

      That was not what Ky had meant and the other man knew it. The rules had been established, and they were simple: St. Clare would ask the questions.

      The door behind him was still open. Ky considered turning and leaving. He wondered how far he would get.

      Instead, he crossed the room to the kitchen area, opened the refrigerator and took out a beer. He turned, twisting off the cap. “I do divorce cases, insurance fraud and process serving. Which are you?”

      “Homicide,” Sebastian St. Clare replied.

      A fraction of a second’s pause in the movement of his hand, but no more. Ky lifted the bottle to his lips and drank. He did not take his eyes off the other man.

      “I think we should talk.”

      “Yes, I think so, too,” Ky replied.

      “But first…” St. Clare’s eyes moved past Ky, toward the open door. “Will you allow that pathetic creature to come inside? Please assure him that I won’t bite.” He said it with a perfectly straight face.

      Voodoo poked his head around the corner of the door frame, ears flat, eyes wary. When Ky snapped his fingers, the dog crept inside, his tail low and his manner anxious, and went quickly to Ky’s side. He, too, never took his eyes off the stranger, and he made a wide circle around the carpet upon which St. Clare had trod.

      “Might we sit down?”

      Ky nodded. St. Clare took the lumpy plaid sofa, and Ky, with Voodoo clinging like a shadow to his side, sat cautiously in the reading chair across the room. Every sense, tangible and innate, was working overtime, assessing and observing, accumulating information and processing impressions, trying to make sense of what could not possibly be sitting on his sofa, lifting the satchel to his knee, opening it, showing the contents to Ky.

      The satchel was filled with money. The cash was neatly stacked and wrapped with teller’s bands: tens, twenties and fifties. Ky’s eyes scanned the bundles quickly as he tried to keep his expression neutral. There must have been over…

      “Fifty thousand dollars,” St. Clare said. “It represents half the amount we are willing to pay for your services. This is yours now, the remainder due when your assignment is completed.”

      Ky took another sip of his beer. The dryness in his throat was only partially relieved. “And who was it,” he inquired carefully, “that you wanted me to kill?”

      St. Clare closed the satchel and placed it on the table. He said, “You are aware of the man they call the Werewolf Killer.”

      It was not a question, so Ky offered no reply. His thoughts were spinning, and there was no way he could predict what the old man was going to say next. None. How could he defend himself if he didn’t know the battlefield…or even if this was a battle?

      “I represent a consortium that would like to see this reign of terror brought to an end,” St. Clare stated simply. “You have been chosen for the task.”

      Ky could not quite prevent a lift of his eyebrow. “I’m flattered. But we have a very fine police department that specializes in this kind of thing. Maybe you should give them a call.”

      “Yes,” murmured St. Clare, holding Ky in that steady blue gaze. “Your police department. The world has seen how effective they have been in dealing with this menace. Not that they are to be held at fault. They are incapable of stopping this killer, we both know that.”

      I don’t know anything! Ky wanted to shout at him. This whole thing was insane. None of it could be happening, it all had to be some kind of colossal joke, none of it made sense.

      He didn’t say any of that, of course. He didn’t raise his voice or tighten in muscles or even breathe hard; he did not in any way betray his agitation, but he wasn’t fooling himself, either—St. Clare knew what he was feeling. The old man could smell it.

      Ky asked the only remaining relevant question. “Why me?”

      St. Clare smiled. “Who else,” he demanded simply, “is there?”

      “You,” returned Ky sharply. “If you want this killer brought to justice and you insist upon taking the law in your own hands, you go after him. Don’t come to me with your bag of money and expect me to risk my life for people I don’t even know.”

      “But isn’t that what you did every day when you were a police officer? And for far less money than this.” He nodded toward the satchel.

      Ky brought the bottle to his lips again. “Yeah, well, I’m not in that line of work any longer.”

      “A story in itself, I’m sure,” replied St. Clare politely. “And to answer your question…I’m an old man, as you can see. I would be foolish to take on such a dangerous task at my age.”

      Ky restrained a snort of disbelief. He suspected the old man could have taken on a dozen men half his age without even becoming winded.

      “As for the others,” St. Clare went on, “I could send a squad of trained specialists down here, I suppose, but I’d rather not attract the attention, or to be frank, risk losing any of my top men. None of them know the city like you do, its people, its legal customs, its resources. None of them has as great a chance of going undetected by the killer as you do. Besides—” he glanced toward the window “—there is a great deal of water surrounding СКАЧАТЬ