Nevermore Read Online Free PDF Page A

different sizes and shapes, with the pinnacle of the Empire State Building rising above all of it. It was a complex mélange of constructed life, a monument to human achievement over nature.
    The scholar in him wanted desperately to explore the inner workings of that monument, whether to play tourist and see the sights, like he and Jess had done in San Francisco, or to check out the underside of the place, see if the thousands of legends that had grown up around the city were true: the alligators in the city sewer system, the phantom subway conductor, the missile silos in eastside apartment buildings.
    He sat back in the passenger seat with a sense of melancholy. Their lives didn’t allow for that sort of thing. They came in, they did the job, they left.
    Hell, now Dean was on the feds’ radar, and, while Sam couldn’t find any specific warrant out for his own arrest (and didn’t Dean love giving him crap about that? ), he was pretty sure he wouldn’t be ignored if they got the attention of law enforcement, either. They had to keep their heads down—which meant no self-indulgence. Seeing the Statue of Lib-erty, going to the top of the Empire State Building, Never
    33
    more
    exploring Central Park, even going underground to check to see about the alligators and the ghosts and the missiles, none of that could afford to be on the agenda. Them doing the job saved lives, which meant time spent not doing the job meant people might die.
    That’s the job. And it needs doing. One of the items on his eight-mile-long list of regrets was that it took Dad dying for him to realize that.
    The exit for the Henry Hudson was right after the bridge ended, and to Dean’s loudly expressed relief, most of the traffic that took the exit was going southbound, which would take them into Manhattan. Almost nobody else was going north.
    However, Dean’s desire to speed was tempered by the parkway itself, which was hilly, twisty, and turny, and Sam found himself once again holding the dashboard in a death grip.
    Feeling the need to distract himself from the fact that Dean was using the lane markers as a guide-line more than a rule, Sam said, “So I checked out this guy’s band on the web. I’m starting to see why Ellen thought of us—they’re a cover band, and they do seventies rock.”
    For the first time since the cars started moving slowly on I-80, Dean’s face brightened. “Really?”
    “Yeah, they named themselves after a DJ who died a couple years ago named Scott Muni.” 34 SUPERNATURAL
    “Dude,” Dean said in a familiar tone. It meant that Sam didn’t know some arcane and pointless piece of musical lore that Dean thought was es-sential to being alive. Sam steeled himself for the tirade even as Dean said, “It’s pronounced ‘myoo-nee,’ not ‘money.’ They called him ‘the Professor,’
    he was one of the greatest rock DJs of the sixties and seventies. You know Van Morrison’s ‘Cara-van’? The ‘Scottso’ he’s talking about is Muni.” Sam just nodded, despite not knowing the song or DJ in question, and not caring all that much.
    He’d gotten enough of a tongue-lashing on the subject of Robert Johnson’s music during that Hellhound job.
    “Well, Ash’s friend,” Sam said once he was sure Dean was done chastising him, “Manfred Afi ri, is the lead singer, and he plays guitar. There’s four other guys, a keyboard player named Robbie Mal-donado, another guitar player named Aldo Em-manuelli, a bass player named Eddie Grabowski, and a drummer named Tom Daley. They play weekends at a place in Larchmont called the Park in Rear.”
    Dean shot a sidelong glance at Sam. “Seriously?” Sam shrugged. “That’s what the website says.” The road finally straightened, just in time for a sign indicating another toll.
    “Oh, you have got to be freakin’ kiddin’ me!
    Never
    35
    more
    Bad enough we had to pay six bucks to get into this town, now we gotta pay more?” Raising his eyebrow at the use of we in that