Presumption of Guilt Read Online Free PDF Page B

not where it applied to Dan. For reasons no doubt entirely genetic, she had never once shaded him with any hint of creepiness. He was a researcher, an archaeologist, the Boswell of Brattleboro’s human heart.
    Okay—a slight overstatement. He broke into rich people’s homes and studied their habits, collecting facts as others might scoop up the silver, and entered what he learned into a filing system the NSA might envy—if on an entirely local level. And—truth be told—he had left those sticky notes on the homeowners’ night tables while they were sleeping.
    But somehow, through Sally’s skewed view of it, Dan had managed to make his outings at once beguiling and scientific. Her self-acknowledged delusion was encouraged by her realization that the police knew of his activities. Her father had actually stumbled upon proof of a crime, and helped the police—or at least Willy Kunkle—bring it to a successful conclusion. He had also sworn off the high-visibility Tag Man role—officially—and had sunk from judicial sight.
    Less officially, he had merely stopped leaving the Post-it notes. Whatever boastful impishness had prompted him to plant them in the first place had apparently been placated. Either that, or he had taken his daughter’s nascent interest in his covert life as reason enough to dial back the showmanship while he ramped up his role as a mentor.
    Either way, she was grateful. An original thinker herself, hitched to this single parent and his withdrawn, nomadic personality since her birth, she’d been wondering what to do after high school, while finding no joy in the conventional choices before her, which partially explained why she was taking a “gap year” before college.
    â€œWhat do you think?” she whispered, studying the house across the lawn.
    He’d been here earlier, prepping the field. She knew that. Her apprenticeship wasn’t to be rushed. He’d already sprung the locks and made sure the house was empty, to minimize the risks. Later, he would train her in security breaching, and expose her to the thrill of drifting through a house where the inhabitants were present, if asleep—or not.
    But for the moment, she would shadow his moves, get used to the feel of the work, and discover if she was willing and able to inherit the mantle. There would be plenty of time, and her training would be thorough and carefully administered. She knew herself to be in tutelage to a master, though of what, she still wasn’t sure.

 
    CHAPTER FOUR
    â€œMy God, David. That’s eerie.”
    Joe held the off-white death mask in his hands gingerly, as if cradling an ailing child. Its pale, sightless eyes stared past his shoulder, seemingly transfixed by something behind him. Joe almost turned to double-check.
    Instead, he returned it to David Hawke, the state crime lab’s director. “I had no idea the mold would turn out so well.”
    Hawke placed the mask on his desk. “Me, neither. Lucky break. For what it’s worth, we also managed to get this.” He shoved over a plastic hand with two perfect fingers and three crude extremities, making it look like an abandoned sculpture project. Next to it was a fingerprint card with two readable impressions in black ink.
    â€œNot bad,” Joe complimented him. “And speedy, too. I didn’t expect this so fast.”
    It was early in the day, the morning after Joe’s visit to the morgue. He’d spent the night with Beverly, who lived just south of Burlington, and had been surprised to get a call from David on the drive back to Brattleboro—convenient, given the lab’s location along the way, in Waterbury.
    â€œYou caught us at a good time,” Hawke told him. “Plus, who could resist jumping on this one? Way too cool. Unfortunately, I ran the prints through the system and got nothing, but you can’t have everything. What did you learn from