Fabulous Creature Read Online Free PDF

“More like a bloody castle. They have this room they call the trophy room that’s bigger than most people’s houses. That’s where they keep most of the dead animals.” Suddenly Fiona’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “You have some particular interest in…” She paused, grinning. “Oh, so that’s it, is it? Diane strikes your fancy?”
    James started to say something about a casual meeting on the beach, but Fiona interrupted. “You’d better watch your step with that one, laddie. Wind up hanging over the mantle with the zebras, you will.”
    He left the snack bar soon afterward, discovered he’d left his groceries under the table, went back for them and left even more quickly with Fiona’s bitter chuckle following him out the door. At the crossroads he bravely took Gettysburg Avenue, but although he walked very slowly past number seventeen, a palatial cabin completely surrounded by multilevel decks, no one was in sight. Defeated, at least temporarily, he took the footpath to Anzio and headed toward the west gate.
    He was almost through the grove of old trees when he heard the sound of a high-pitched voice. He stopped and stood still, listening. The voice came again. “Grif. Griffin. Where are you?” A moment later a little girl, perhaps six or seven years old, bounded into view, saw James and stopped with a startled gasp.
    She was small and dark, and her hair hung in jagged wisps around her narrow face. There was something about the aristocratic sweep of her long delicate nose that reminded James of a beautiful Afghan hound he had once been acquainted with. Like the Afghan, the little girl seemed to be suspicious of strangers. Backing away among the trees, she was staring at James with large, startled eyes.
    “Hello,” he said, smiling in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. “Did you lose—something?” “Grif” sounded like a pet, probably a dog.
    Still backing, the girl continued to regard him warily. A moment more and she would probably have disappeared, but just at that moment the paper bag tore. A milk carton bounced off his foot, and as he grabbed for it, a loaf of bread shot out the top of the bag. While he was busy juggling groceries, he thought he heard a giggle, and when he was finished, with everything arranged more or less at random on the ground in front of him, except for one long strip of bag paper, which he still clutched in his left hand, he found that she had returned. Apparently the impromptu clown act had convinced her that he wasn’t dangerous after all. Squatting in front of him, she gathered up fallen groceries and asked questions.
    “Who are you? Do you live here, in The Camp? Have you seen a girl—a big girl in a shiny dress?”
    James grinned. “My name is James. No, I don’t live here, I just come here to shop at the Commissary. No, I haven’t seen anyone around here. Except you, that is. What’s your name?”
    “Laurel. I’m Laurel Jarrett.”
    “Jarrett?” James’ interest multiplied geometrically. “Is the girl you’re looking for Diane?”
    In the midst of helping James stack his arms with loose groceries, Laurel Jarrett paused. Looking up she puckered her small mobile mouth as if she’d tasted something sour. “No. Not Diane. Diane is my cousin. Grif is—Griffin Donahue.”
    On the little girl’s thin dark face vivid dramatic expressions came and went like colors in a kaleidoscope, and there was something about the way she said Griffin Donahue that was almost reverent. “Don’t you know Griffin?”
    “No, I’m afraid not.”
    “Shhh!” she said suddenly, her finger to her lips. For a few seconds she parodied listening and then disappointment. Concern, anxiety and deep, dark foreboding followed each other across her face in a way that would have done justice to a heroine in a silent movie. “I’ve got to find her,” she said, making it sound as if it were at least a matter of life or death. “She said she’d be here.”
    Running on tiptoe she