Fletcher Read Online Free PDF

these is limited, but here goes:
    “They had a good marriage, and have both been happy for at least a few months. The double-tap to her chest is very executioner style. Close to the heart, you see? Despite his rage, or whatever, he wanted her to go quickly.”
    “But why not shoot her in the head?”
    “Because you don’t shoot something you love in the face.”
    “So he definitely loved her?”
    “That’s how I read it. He was also scared, or shocked, or some level of emotionally compromised at the time. Weak wrists gave rise to the interesting shot to his own head—upwards trajectory, entering his temple and erupting out the top left side of his head. Anger stiffens up the body, which would level the shot. Not here.”
    She handed back the photographs, a puzzled look distorting her features.
    “Why did he turn away?”
    “I was hoping you would tell me.”
    The expression persisted.
    “This certainly isn’t your standard murder-suicide. Nice catch. Any background information on the victims?”
    I had done a small amount of searching at the start of this case. Born and raised in Germany, in the years before 2012 the husband had worked at a foreign distributing branch representing a small German munitions company. When Berlin burned and the entire country went belly up, it did very little to take the wind out of his sails. Three months after Germany was abandoned by the rest of the world, the distributing branch had been repurposed under a far larger munitions company—RailTech. This name had instantly set off alarm bells for me. RailTech was dubious in its dealings at best. Aside from their incredibly vicious marketing cycles and technology releases, which rendered previous RailTech technology obsolete at a rate of knots, they had ascended to the position as largest munitions supplier through multiple ruthless takeovers, sabotage, extortion and a surprisingly long string of well-concealed corporate assassinations.
    Naturally, they were one of my more common clients. No fewer than three members of the Department of Defence have met their end because RailTech tapped me on the shoulder and pointed, and as many opposing factories have suffered tragic—and spectacular—equipment malfunctions by my hand.
    The wife, on the other hand, took a far more simple life working as a consultant dietician for schools and sporting institutions. Very little in her history raised any alarm—born in France, 1982; met her husband at a marathon in 2005; married four years later. Stone dead in 2014, shot to death by the same man who beat her by one place in 2005.
    Valerie took all this in with a half-smile, while she tended to a comatose female in the gurney beside me. When I was done, she was quiet for a few minutes, and only once she had finished extracting shards of glass from her patient’s eardrum did she speak again.
    “Three theories so far; none particularly good. First, some German-French vendetta. The frogs were the first to drop the krauts in 2012; could be that John Rourke here was pressured into offing his wife by a group of pissed-off survivors.
    “Secondly, RailTech could have had a hand in this. From what you tell me, if a tree falls in a forest, chances are RailTech was responsible and has already stolen its shares. Maybe John knew something. Maybe he was planning something. Either way, the big plotters get wind of it, deal with the wife and set the husband up. Husband chooses acute lead poisoning over jail.
    “Finally, what if she cheated on him? Works as a dietician, spends her time around good-looking sportsmen. Sure, not so much anymore, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t. Husband finds out, flies into a rage, double-taps her and then realizes what he’s done. Great love works both ways, unfortunately.”
    I sighed. “None of those address the silencer. Or the fact that he turned around.”
    “The silencer is circumstantial, K. This is 2014. Gunshots are hardly uncommon. The likelihood of someone