Operator - 01 Read Online Free PDF

teenager, but one that proved invaluable years later. I always thought of hunting as a basic skill, like carpentry or tuning a car, so Mel’s visceral reaction to guns surprised me. “They’re awful, evil things,” she said, “and nothing good comes from them.” I got angry and told her that just because her family could afford to eat without hunting didn’t make them better than everyone else. That softened her and she apologized, but she never really changed her opinion.
    “Yeah, a lot of people have been talking about it, saying that it seems wrong,” Jamie adds. “It’s totally not like her. I mean if I were going to go, it would be a handful of Vicodin,” she continues and looks around puzzled when she realizes everyone is staring at her. “What? I’m just saying…”
    * * *
    My cellphone wakes me from a sound sleep. I’m sweating, which means that it caught me in the middle of a nightmare, but the details evaporate from my brain before I can catch them. I’m instantly awake like the lamp on the nightstand I flick on as I sit up. It’s Veronica on the other end of the line.
    “I’m so sorry to bother you, did I wake you?”
    “No, I was reading,” I lie instinctively and glance at my watch – it’s just after midnight. I’m unaccountably relieved that years in the field have taken the sleep out of my voice.
    “This is going to sound stupid, but I think George is stalking me. I’m with a friend who was also at the funeral. We met for dinner in New Paltz and as we were leaving the restaurant I could have sworn I saw George across the street. Now we’re sitting in this bar down the block. We were heading home, but I looked out the window and he’s there in a car right outside. I know I sound totally paranoid, but I’m a little freaked out. I’m so sorry to bother you, but you’re the only – well, guy I know around here.” I can barely hear her over the background noise. “And if I ask some stranger in the bar to help me I might just be trading one problem for another.”
    “Just stay put and tell me where you are,” I reply, reaching for my pants.
    A half hour later, I pull my black 2004 Pontiac GTO into a parking spot a block short of the bar. I look in the rearview mirror as I pull a sage baseball cap with “Blackhawk” written on the front in modest letters low over my eyes. I step out of the GTO and amble forward, slouching deliberately with my hands thrust into jeans pockets and my eyes cast down. It’s almost as good as invisibility for a man with a medium build.
    I spot George immediately. New Paltz is not Conestoga – it attracts a good crop of wealthy city folk in the summertime and during ski season, but fewer at this time of year. Sitting behind the wheel of his new, cherry-red BMW coupe, George stands out like a strawberry on a pumpkin pie. I brush past the car on the sidewalk and confirm that he’s not holding anything but the steering wheel. I walk two cars further down the block, then cross the street and turn back to Rascal’s Lounge. A bouncer blocks the door – a wide Samoan who looks like an offensive tackle for an NFL team. The man eyes me and glances at my D.C. driver’s license with a professional eye before waving me through.
    Rascal’s is a big place, considerably larger inside than it appears from the street. It has a Boston-pub-meets-Swiss-chalet feel to it. A long oak bar attended by three attractive women in buttoned vests exposing a healthy amount of cleavage runs the length of the main room. The twenty-something crowd is mostly standing in the space next to the bar, but a line of booths hunker against the wall under hunting trophies and old ski paraphernalia. The sour smell of beer competes with Old Spice and a pulsing song from the Cure for my attention. I take off my cap and run my fingers through my hair, which is approximately the color of squid ink and is starting to feel a little shaggy. This earns me a stare from a brunette in a halter-top