Skin : the X-files Read Online Free PDF Page B

nothing more than a pair of kind blue eyes, a demolished hospital room, and a mark on a wooden door. But to Fox Mulder, it was like cocaine in his veins. These unexplainable details carried the scent of an X-File.
    He quickly moved to the small desk in the other corner of the hotel room and reached for the phone. He dialed the number for the New York FBI office from memory, and spoke quietly to the operator, detailing the request he wanted forwarded to the NYPD homicide division in charge of the Stanton investigation. Then he replaced the receiver and made sure his fax machine was in the autoreceiving mode.
    He crossed back to the closet door, pausing along the way to retrieve the soggy towel he had dropped on the floor by the bed. He wrapped the towel around his open right hand and stood facing the unmarked wood.
    He shut his eyes, drew back—and slammed his right hand into the center of the door. There was a sharp crack, and Mulder grimaced, the muscles in his fore-34

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    arm contracting. He pulled back and saw fractures in the surface of the wood, expanding outward from the point of impact. The cracks were noticeable—but nothing like the deep indentations he had seen in the CNN
    report. And even with the towel, his entire arm ached from the collision with the wood. He tried to imagine each finger in his right hand hitting with enough force to leave a dent.
    A sudden knock interrupted his thoughts, followed by a muffled female voice. “Mulder? Is everything okay?”
    Mulder quickly crossed to the hotel-room door and undid the latch. Dana Scully was standing in the narrow hallway, her rust-colored hair dripping wet. She was wearing a dark suit jacket open over an untucked white button-down shirt, and it was obvious she had dressed quickly. Her usually precise and formal appearance seemed momentarily frayed—from the drops of water that glistened against the porcelain skin above her collarbone, to the concerned look in her blue eyes. Although her hands were empty, Mulder could see the bulge of her holstered Smith & Wesson service revolver under the left side of her jacket; no doubt, had he delayed answering the door, she would have entered the room barrel first.
    “What’s going on in here? It sounded like someone was brawling with the furniture.”
    Mulder smiled. “Not the furniture. Just the closet door. Sorry if I interrupted your shower.” Scully stepped past him into the room. She smelled 35

    THE X-FILES
    vaguely of honeysuckle, and there were still flecks of shampoo caught in the lilting arcs of her hair. She stopped in front of the closet door and took in the cracked dent in the center of the wood. Then she glanced at the wet towel still wrapped around Mulder’s right hand. “That’s an interesting way to ice a swollen jaw.” Mulder had almost forgotten about his injury. The swelling and the pain no longer seemed to matter.
    “Scully, how often do patients try to kill their doctors?” Scully raised her eyebrows. Her body had relaxed, and she was working on the top two buttons of her white shirt. She stopped in front of the television set, the glow reflecting off her high cheekbones. “Mulder, we need to get packed and on the road if we’re going to make it back to Washington tonight.”
    Mulder shrugged, then returned to his line of thought.
    “A patient wakes up from an operation, vulnerable, drugged up, exhausted—and the first thing he does is erupt in a violent rage. How often, Scully? Rarely?
    Almost never?”
    Scully was looking at him intently. She recognized the familiar gleam in his eyes. But Mulder could tell—
    she didn’t know where it was coming from, or why it had to happen here, in the middle of nowhere. It was late, she was tired, and perhaps a little frustrated from the long days they had spent on a case that had turned out as mundanely as she had expected. Certainly, she was ready to get back home to her apartment and what little life she had beyond the enveloping reach of