Dark Moon Walking Read Online Free PDF Page B

gently stroked its back.
    He watched her, drawn by the tenderness he saw in the action. She was a big woman, perhaps six feet tall, with rough, calloused hands and feet that were perpetually stuffed into caulk logger’s boots. He had never seen her in anything but a torn flannel shirt and stained work pants held up by red suspenders. Now she was wrapped in a threadbare robe, the hem of a flannel nightgown brushing the toes of a pair of worn fleece slippers. The long iron-gray hair she usually wore in a braid hung in wisps over her shoulders, giving her a look of vulnerability he had never noticed before.
    â€œWhy the hell would anyone put a hole in it?” she continued, staring at him as she tried to make sense of his words and obviously failing. It was a rhetorical question, and they sat in silence as they both considered the implications.
    â€œSo where’s the girl?” she asked finally. “She get blown ashore or what?”
    He shook his head, still staring out into the darkness. “No. I don’t know what happened, but the boat was sunk deliberately. I think maybe Claire got away in the kayak. It’s not there.”
    Silence fell again. There was nothing to say.
    It was Walker who woke first. The warmth of the cabin had wrapped around him, relaxing tired muscles and bringing a deep and dreamless sleep, but the first pale hint of daylight brought him instantly alert. He was alone. Annie had covered him with a blanket before returning to her bed. He could hear her steady snoring coming from the forward cabin.
    He pushed himself upright and looked around. He had only been inside Annie’s boat a couple of times before, and he remembered his amazement the first time he saw it. It was certainly not what he had expected. The outside matched the woman who owned it: large and rough. The inside was an entirely different matter. Simple padded benches surrounded a wooden table, a cast-iron stove gleamed against the bulkhead, and a heavy black kettle issued a welcoming wisp of steam. China cups swung from hooks below the cupboards. Colorful prints filled the open spaces on the walls, most of them scenes of thatched cottages and gardens, and the oiled wood floor was covered with a scattering of faded rugs. It wasn’t opulent, but it was neat and clean.
    Even more surprising were a small refrigerator he found humming softly in the galley and the speakers that were almost hidden behind shelves of books in the salon. As his eyes took it all in he came to the understanding that this was a home, warm and comfortable and well cared for. By the time he had reached the bridge and seen the gleaming array of instruments sitting on the wide ledge in front of the windshield, his face had taken on the bemused expression of a child at a magic show. Annie had laughed at his look of amazement.
    â€œBit more than you expected?” she had cackled loudly as she proudly showed him the generator that kept the batteries charged.
    Now he stood up and moved forward to the wheelhouse. The dial on the radio glowed green and the power light blinked reassuringly. He picked up the microphone, feeling awkward and uncomfortable with it in his hand. It was a reminder of another life, an alien technology he had thought he would never need again. He didn’t want to use it. It was the one link he had to the man he had once hated. The man who had put him in jail. The man who had helped give him his life back. The man who might be able to help him find the girl.
    He pressed the switch. “ Dreamspeaker. Dreamspeaker. Dreamspeaker. Walker calling.”

FIVE
    The black ship floated gently at anchor at the head of a small inlet, her name, Snow Queen , inscribed in pale charcoal-gray script across her stern. Someone, Harry couldn’t remember who, had come up with it as a joke, but Harry had liked it.
    On deck, Javier Fernandez sat quietly, his lean frame draped easily over an upholstered teak chaise. It was not the kind