Little Girls Lost Read Online Free PDF

get business over with and find something just for us, brother. A celebration.”
    The door closed and Rose heard the locks slide into place. He gave Truman ten minutes before he pulled the drive from the floorboards. He wanted to see the new girl again.
    The girl was rigid with fear as Rose climbed the storm-shelter rungs with her over his shoulder. “I like you a lot, Jacy,” he said, lifting her outsidethe hatch, clutching her hand as he followed. The night was cloudless and steamy, the stars smudged with haze. “I’m going to teach you to dance. You like to dance?”
    “My name’s not Jacy,” the girl said, quivering, eyes wet with tears. “It’s LaShelle. Why did you take me from my house? Why am I in that place down there?”
    “You’re very pretty, LaShelle. You have nice eyes.”
    “Please, mister. I want my mama. I want to go home. Please don’t hurt me.”
    “I’ve got music inside.” Rose swiveled his hips, snapped his fingers and smiled. “I’ll teach you to dance. It’s good exercise.”
    “Please, mister. I don’t want to learn no dancing.” Tears ran down her cheeks.
    Rose guided LaShelle Shearing into the house. He shut the door and slid the deadbolts.
    It was ten p.m. when Ryder stopped at the morgue. He knew Clair Peltier would be working late, trying to make a dent in her paperwork. The guard buzzed him through the building’s main entrance, gilt writing on the door proclaiming Dr Clair Peltier as Chief Medical Examiner, Alabama Bureau of Forensics, Mobile Branch. He waved to the guard and stepped lightly down the hall to Dr Peltier’s office, hoping to catch her by surprise.
    She was at her desk, eyes down, reading glasses poised on her delicate nose as she penned notes ona stack of forms. Her shoulder-length hair was as black as wet coal. Ryder studied the ubiquitous vase on the desk, overflowing with bright flowers from her garden. The floral scents turned the air into a sweet oasis amidst the astringent morgue smells.
    “Don’t be thinking you’re sly, Ryder,” Peltier said without looking up. “I heard your footsteps all the way down the hall, tiptoe or not.”
    “You’re a difficult woman to sneak up on, Doctor,” Ryder said. “But then, you’re a difficult woman, period.”
    Clair Peltier looked up from her writing. “I’m not sure I should be alone with you, Ryder. Is anyone near?”
    Ryder leaned out the door and looked up and down the hall: empty. “The closest person is the guard. He’s half-napping in the foyer.”
    When Ryder turned back, Clair Peltier was in front of him. Their lips met, brief and chaste and, for a shadow of a moment, something more. Over the years their relationship started acidic, sweetened into a year as lovers, finally reaching today’s point, an understanding each would always be there for the other, occasionally physically, always emotionally.
    Ryder stepped back and looked into the blue eyes that struck lightning into his soul.
    “You’re really leaving, Clair?”
    “I have to go. You know that.”
    “Doesn’t mean I have to believe it.”
    Peltier brushed an errant lock of dark hair fromRyder’s forehead. “Come with me then, Carson. You’ll believe it when we’re sitting on the lanai and watching the waves. I know you could use the vacation. Come on, accompany a girl to a symposium in Hawaii.”
    “I can’t leave. My cases will fall down the same rat hole as everything else.”
    “Departmental politics are still that ugly?”
    “It’s like Squill dropped the MPD into a blender. Everything’s torn apart, mixed up.”
    Peltier shook her head. “It seemed to happen overnight.”
    “The king changed and his pawns own the board. Squill’s in control, I’m at his mercy.”
    Clair Peltier stepped back and leaned against her desk, arms crossed. “I know you hate to talk about the situation, Carson, so I try not to ask too much. But can you give me a few more details about how Squill got back in charge after three