The Hell Yo - lanyon Josh (бесплатные версии книг .txt) 📗

glanced down to see a large white rabbit hopping beneath the table.

Selena returned carrying a tray with an earthenware teapot and mugs. She sat across

from me. “Sugar? Cream?”

“Black.”

She nodded. Poured the tea, passed me the cup with a smile. “How can I help you,

Adrien?”

I don’t know if it was that smile, which was warm and reassuring and genuinely

interested, or the worn beauty of her face, but for the first time in a long time I felt myself

relaxing.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I don’t think there’s much you can tell me about this that I

don’t already know.” I offered the well-handled photos of the inverted pentagram. “I have a

feeling this is not your line.”

She took the photos, going through them slowly, without expression. Then she set

them aside. “No, they’re not my line. Tell me what you know about them.”

I can’t explain why – maybe it was the profound peace of that isolated cabin or the

grave serenity of the woman herself – but I found myself pouring out all my troubles.

I told her about the Scythe of Gremory and the three blades. I told her about Angus. I

told her about Guy. I even told her about Jake. I probably would have blabbed all night if she

hadn’t finally said, into one of my rare pauses for breath, “What do you think is behind these

murders?”

“What or whom?”

“What.”

“You mean the motive?”

She smiled a little. “If you want to call it that.”

I stared at her bleakly. “I think Kinsey was killed because they wanted to frame

Angus.”

“But to kill one of their own?” She spoke gently.

She was right. I hadn’t given much thought to motive – partly because Jake always said

that if means and opportunity were there, motive would turn up. And partly because I had

spent all my energy chasing demons, but the real demon of this case was named MacGuffin.

“She did something to turn the others against her,” I said slowly. What had Angus’s sin

been? By attempting to leave the club, he had threatened disclosure, exposure, revelation.

What he had threatened, Kinsey had unwittingly accomplished. “She came to the bookstore

that day and tried to intimidate me. Until then, I didn’t know who any of them were. After

that I had names, faces.”

Selene nodded, sipping her tea. “And so did the police – through your friend Jake. That

was a serious miscalculation on her part. Whatever her previous ranking, and I imagine it

was quite high for her to persuade the other girl to follow, she would have lost favor

following her visit to you. Remember, in these groups there’s a good deal of rivalry and

competition.”

“So someone aspiring to her position as…Adept…might have been willing to silence

her?”

Her expression was grave. “It wouldn’t be the first time, would it? That’s what

frightened your young assistant. Murder.”

I nodded. Drank more tea. It had an odd aftertaste, but it was good. I felt less weary,

less depressed.

“The other two murders…” I had been thinking aloud. Selene was silent. “One kid

disappeared in October. One kid disappeared in May. Those correspond with witches’

Sabbats, right?”

“Samhain and Beltane both fall in those months.”

“How many Sabbats are there?”

“Eight.”

“How many of the Sabbats require human sacrifice?”

She opened her mouth to object, I said, “I realize that Wicca doesn’t follow these old

traditions, but you share the same Sabbats with the Satanists.”

“The four major Sabbats are Imbolc, Beltane, Lammas, and Samhain.”

“So there could be more deaths.”

She nodded.

“There might be more bodies out there.”

“It is possible.”

I reached for the photos. “Was this meant to scare me, or was this an actual death

threat?”

“I think it was intended to frighten you. I can’t be sure. In any case, you’re more of a

danger now than you were then.”

I considered this from a tired distance. It occurred to me that if I didn’t hit the road

soon, I’d be asking for a place on her sofa.

I stood. “Thank you for your time. This was helpful.”

Selene rose also. The three-legged dog, still watching us from the doorway, made a

determined hopping effort to get to its feet.

She walked outside with me, her bare feet seemingly impervious to the frost on the

ground.

As I opened the car door, she touched my arm. “Adrien, you’re very tired. Be careful

driving back.”

I looked at her in surprise. Took the hand she offered.

“Can I ask you a question? Do you make a living at this?” I gestured to the cabin,

outlined in silver moonlight.

“You mean do I have a day job? Yes, I’m a criminal psychologist.”

She chuckled at my expression. I climbed into the Forester.

I caught a final glimpse of her standing in the cabin doorway, the dog beside her. The

firelight seemed to form an aureole around her.

The next bend in the road took the cabin from sight. It was dark out here, deathly

quiet. The headlights picked out the sign leading back to the main road.

High overhead, a wicked crescent moon shone like a crooked smile over the waves and

waves of black pine trees. I clicked my high beams on.

After the earlier workday traffic, Angeles Crest Highway was startlingly empty. Miles

ahead, I spotted a single pair of headlights winding their way toward me.

As I drove, the winding highway seemed to pick up a kind hypnotic rhythm.

Accelerate in, decelerate out, the road looped and rolled around the mountains, narrowing to

a pass between hills that looked more like rockslides and then widening deceptively.

I passed the car I had seen miles below me, dimming my high beams briefly as we

flashed past each other. Then nothing more but a long empty stretch of invisible road.

Selene Wolfe was right. I was tired. I had been sleeping badly. It was harder to avoid

demons in dreams – especially when they were your own.

Shortly before he died at age eighty-one, Joseph Hansen started a blog called

Lastwords. I’d found it once, surfing the ’Net. Three posts filled with the loneliness of having

outlived pretty much everyone and everything that mattered. Three posts and about as many