Predator and Prey Prowlers 3 Read Online Free PDF

Couldn’t smell the smoke at all, and usually the acrid odor of cigarettes made him nauseous.
    “ Hey,” said the smoking man. “Hey. What’s your name?”
    Kenny opened his mouth. Wasn’t sure if anything would come out. He glanced around him and saw that the people, the buildings, South Street Seaport itself . . . everything looked as though he were watching it on an old black-and-white TV with bad reception. Everything except the river, and the guy with the cigarette and the goatee. Those were real.
    “ I’m Kenny,” he said. “Kenny Boone.” And the introduction reminded him of Jasmine and her sharp teeth. Jasmine who had . . .
    “ Call me Rafe,” the guy said. “Don’t worry, Kenny. You’re off balance right now, but you’ll be feeling better soon. Get your bearings and stuff, y’know?”
    “ I’m dead,” Kenny told Rafe.
    Rafe smiled and nodded kindly. “Sí, amigo. You got it in one. Better than most.”
    Kenny wanted to cry, wanted to scream, but all he felt was a kind of numb resignation. He turned around and there, on the ghost-gray pavement, he saw a pair of expensive Italian leather shoes sticking out from between the two EMTs who crouched there. Me, he thought. But how could it be? I’m here.
    Forlorn, he turned to look at Rafe again, thinking this was just the perfect end to the perfect day. Smoke from Rafe’s cig curled in the air but Kenny still couldn’t smell it.
    But he smelled something. Something . . . what was that smell? Like skunk and burning rubber.
    Rafe’s eyes went wide. “Oh, no!”
    “ What?” Kenny demanded. “What is it?”
    “ Run, man! Just run!”
    With that, Rafe took off, running flat out across the gray cobblestones as though he were in the final stretch of a marathon. As Rafe ran, the shadows of the living seemed to swirl and undulate around him like thick fog. Kenny knew that wasn’t possible, that in the flesh and blood world it was still a hot August night where something awful had happened, but that everyone would go home to their lives. Not Rafe, though. Not Kenny. Not anyone over here, ’cause this wasn’t the flesh-and-blood world.
    There were only ghosts here.
    Slowly, hesitant in his confusion, Kenny started to run after Rafe. It didn’t feel like running, though. More like falling. Simple as that, really. He tried to follow Rafe through the smog-shapes of the living, of the flesh world, but the man was gone.
    Somewhere far off he heard shouts of alarm and knew somehow that they were cries of the dead, the shouts of ghosts, not voices from the flesh world.
    “ Rafe?” Kenny called.
    No, no, he thought. Not going to be alone again. Not here.
    He ran faster, the shadows of life all around him, obfuscating his vision for a moment so he had to wave his hands in front of his face to brush them away, push the life away.
    Please, no, Kenny thought.
    Then he slowed. Frowned. There was that smell again.
    He paused, began to turn. “What is that?” he whispered into the land of the dead. There are only ghosts here, he thought again.
    But he was wrong.
    As he turned, it lunged from the flesh-shadows with a roar that washed away the gray all around him, silenced the voices in the distance for just an instant until, somewhere, ghosts began to scream. Soul-sucking eyes big as half-dollars burned with hunger as it stared at him. A thick, green, leathery tongue slid out over a mouthful of teeth like razor blades, viscous drool dripping from its snout.
    “ Only ghosts,” Kenny whispered. He began to back up, hands raised. “Not fair. It isn’t fair. What . . . what happens now? After this?”
    Its claws lashed out, tore Kenny open, then hauled him up and began to eat.
    “ Not fair,” Kenny moaned again.
    Then he was no more.
    C H A P T E R 1

    Like a ghost, the framed photo of Jack Dwyer’s mother seemed to stare at him from atop his bureau. He caught a glimpse of it out of the corner of his eye and grinned, feeling foolish. On his bed lay several