Fractured Read Online Free PDF Page B

swallowed by the extra weight on his face.
    Will shouldn't have been surprised by the question, or even the way it was phrased. The last time Paul Campano had talked to him this way, Will was ten years old and they were both living in the Atlanta Children's Home. A lot had changed since then. Will had gotten taller and his hair had gotten darker. The only thing that changed about Paul was he seemed to have gotten heavier and meaner.
    Leo supplied, "Mr. Campano, this is Agent Trent with the GBI."
    Will tried to talk Paul down a little, to make him feel like he could help. "Do you know if your daughter had any enemies, Mr. Campano?"
    "Emma?" he asked, glaring at Will. "Of course not. She was only seventeen years old."
    "How about you?"
    "No," he snapped. "No one who would do…" He shook his head, unable to complete the sentence. He looked back at the dead killer. "Who is this bastard? What did Emma ever do to him?"
    "Anything you can give us will help. Maybe you and your wife could-"
    "She's up there, isn't she?" Paul interrupted, looking up. "My baby's upstairs."
    No one answered him, but Leo took a couple of steps toward the stairs to block the way.
    Paul said, "I want to see her."
    "No," Abigail warned, her voice shaking. "You don't want to see her like that, Paul. You don't want to know."
    "I need to see her."
    "Listen to your wife, sir," Faith coaxed. "You'll get to see her soon. You just need to let us take care of her right now."
    Paul barked at Leo, "Get the fuck out of my way."
    "Sir, I don't think-"
    Leo took the brunt of his anger. Paul slammed him into the wall as he bolted up the stairs. Will ran up after the man, almost knocking into him as Paul stopped cold at the top of the landing.
    He stood frozen, staring at his daughter's lifeless form at the end of the hallway. The girl was at least fifteen feet away, but her presence filled the space as if she were right there beside them. All the fight seemed to drain out of Paul. Like most bullies, he could never sustain any one emotion.
    "Your wife was right," Will told him. "You don't want to see her like this."
    Paul went quiet, his labored breathing the only audible noise. His hand was to his chest, palm flat as if he was saying the pledge of allegiance. Tears brimmed in his eyes.
    He swallowed hard. "There was this glass bowl on the table." His voice had gone flat, lifeless. "We got it in Paris."
    "That's nice," Will said, thinking that never in a million years could he imagine Paul in Paris.
    "It's a mess up here."
    "There are people who can clean it up for you."
    He went silent again, and Will followed his gaze, taking in the scene. Leo was right about downstairs being worse than up, but there was something even more sinister and unsettling in the air up here. The same bloody shoe prints were here, crisscrossing the white carpeting up and down the long hall. Streaks of blood slashed across the white walls where either the knife or a fist had arced over the body, repeatedly punching or plunging into the flesh. For some reason, the most troubling part to Will was the single red handprint on the wall directly over the victim's head where her attacker had obviously rested his weight as he raped her.
    "Trashcan, right?"
    Paul Campano wasn't looking for the garbage. He had called Will "Trashcan" when they were children. The memory put a lump in Will's throat. He had to swallow before he could answer. "Yeah."
    "Tell me what happened to my daughter."
    Will debated, but only for a moment. He had to turn sideways to get past Paul and go into the hallway. Careful not to disturb anything, he stepped into the crime scene. Emma's body was parallel to the walls, her head facing away from the stairs. As he walked toward her, Will's eyes kept going back to the handprint, the perfect formation of the palm and fingers. His gut roiled as he thought about what the guy had been doing when he left the impression.
    Will stopped a few feet from the girl. "She was probably killed here," he