The Annihilation Score Read Online Free PDF

tends to bounce back, bless him, almost as if he’s too dim to see the horrors clearly. (I used to think he’s one of life’s innocents, although there have been times recently, especially since the business in Brookwood Cemetery a year ago, when I’ve been pretty sure
he’s
hiding nightmares from
me
. Certainly Gerry and Angleton have begun to take a keen interest in his professional development, and he’s started running high-level errands for External Assets. This latest business with the PHANGs—Photogolic Hemophagic Anagathic Neurotropic Guys, that’s bureaucratese for “vampire” to me or thee—has certainly demonstrated a growing talent for shit-stirring on his part. Almost as if he’s finally showing signs of growing up.) I keep my eyes closed, and systematically dismiss the worries, counting them off my list one by one and consigning them to my mental rubbish bin. It’s a little ritual I use from time to time when things are piling up and threatening to overwhelm me: usually it works brilliantly.
    The car slows, turns, slows further, and comes to a halt. I open my eyes to see a familiar street in the predawn gloom. “Miss?” It’s the driver. “Would you mind signing here, here, and here?”
    A clipboard is thrust under my nose. The London Met are probably the most expensive taxi firm in the city; they’re definitely the most rule-bound and paperwork-ridden. I sign off on the ride, then find the door handle doesn’t work. “Let me out, please?” I ask.
    â€œCertainly, miss.” There’s a click as the door springs open. “Have a good day!”
    â€œYou, too,” I say, then park my violin and suitcase on the front doorstep while I fumble with my keys.
    Bob and I live in an inter-war London semi which, frankly, we couldn’t afford to rent or buy—but it’s owned by the Crown Estates,and we qualify as essential personnel and get it for a peppercorn rent in return for providing periodic out-of-hours cover. Because it’s an official safe house, it’s also kitted out with various security systems and occult wards—protective circuits configured to repel most magical manifestations. I’m exhausted from a sleepless night, the alarms and wards are all showing green for safety, the Code Red has been cancelled, and I’m not expecting trouble. That’s the only excuse I can offer for what happens next.
    The key turns in the lock, and I pick up my violin case with my left hand as I push the door open with my right. The door swings ajar, opening onto the darkness of our front hall. The living room door opens to my right, which is likewise open and dark. “Hi, honey, I’m home!” I call as I pull the key out of the lock, hold the door open with my left foot, and swing my suitcase over the threshold with my right hand.
    I set my right foot forward as Bob calls from upstairs: “Hi? I’m up here.”
    Then something pale moves in the living room doorway.
    I drop my suitcase and keys and raise my right hand. My left index finger clenches on a protruding button on the inside of the handle of my violin case—a motion I’ve practiced until it’s pure autonomic reflex. I do not normally open Lecter’s case using the quick-release button, because it’s held in place with powerful springs and reassembling it after I push the button is a fiddly nuisance: but if I need it, I need it
badly
. When I squeeze the button, the front and back of the case eject, leaving me holding a handle at one end of a frame that grips the violin by the c-ribs. The frame is hinged, and the other end holds the bow by a clip. With my right hand, I grasp the scroll and raise the violin to my shoulder, then I let go of the handle, reach around, and take the fiddle. The violin is ready and eager, and I feel a thrill of power rush through my fingertips as I bring the instrument to bear on the