The Avenger Read Online Free PDF Page B

Finally, a fourth death, mimicking the first – the woman buried alive in the salt flats of Utah. No evidence, no note, no toxicology yet. Were they connected? Was this a copycat? Or was Jack's old nemesis starting again?
    Jack pushed back from the desk, saved his data, and closed his laptop. He sucked in a deep breath as he felt another rush of adrenalin enhancing his body's chemical changes. He turned his hands, palms upward. Piano fingers, he'd once considered them – long ago when he entertained such youthful fantasies. The slender fingers that used to play with such fluidity were now fleshy pads, calloused and swollen.
    He glanced at his wristwatch. He had a moment to peruse the Gant woman's dossier. PhD in Ancient Students, Greek and Roman history and culture. Linguist extraordinaire, according to Myron Higgins, the Judge's assistant who had approached Gant two months ago. She refused in June and again in July, cited school bylaws prohibiting outside consultations by their professors. She was supposedly some kind of whiz kid in her field, on sabbatical from the University of California at Berkley to teach at Our Lady of Fatima University, a private Catholic college in southeast Bigler County.
    Jack looked over her teaching schedule. He still had a two-hour drive to Sacramento and thought he could catch her on break. He'd drop in without an appointment. Although he had no leverage to use on the Gant woman, he knew everyone had skeletons in the closet. If he couldn't persuade her with his charm, he thought wryly, he'd find another way to get her assistance.
    He always did.

 
     
     
    Chapter Six
     
    Dr. Gant's office at the university was the second door down a well-lighted hallway in St. Joseph's Administration Building. Jack lingered at the entrance and examined the small, crowded office.
    The woman bent over a file drawer, her light gray sweater riding up from the waist of a black skirt to expose a strip of smooth flesh. From an ancient boom box resting on a corner file cabinet, James Brown crooned about not wanting to be alone tonight. The view and the music jarred some ancient, buried memory that Jack briskly put aside as he rapped on the open door.
    He recognized her the second she turned to face him. A giant fist squeezed his heart, his throat spasmed and choked off air, and the soul he'd been sure he no longer had shriveled with momentary shock. He saw at once the gangly girl inside the self-possessed woman who turned to greet him, and another long-suppressed image slammed him with gale force. The young girl who'd whispered his name in the night. Bundled in layers of clothing that she removed one item at a time, all sad innocence and sure purpose. The soft pleading in her voice when she begged him to ...
    Shit.
    For an endless moment, his feet riveted to the spot. A sickening fear smacked him in the gut. Fear that every dirty misstep of his life dangled in plain view – hung out like so much soiled laundry – and barred any hope of salvation.
    Not that he'd believed in heaven or redemption for a long time. But still ...
    "Oh my God," Olivia said, her pretty face a mask of stunned confusion.
    Not pretty, he thought, but striking, interesting. High cheekbones and clearly defined brows. Green eyes set far apart, wide and large in a smooth face. Dark hair now wound tightly in a knot at the back of her head, but which he remembered tangling riotously around slender shoulders. A small woman, with fragile bones covering a steely determination.
    Time resumed as Olivia sank into the worn office chair behind a utilitarian desk and regarded him with a wide-eyed expression. "Jackie Holt."
    Astonishment, bewilderment, and another indefinable emotion crossed her face until she shut it down. Shut it down hard, he could see by the set of her jaw and the flash of those brilliant eyes sharp as cut glass. Impossible that the full, soft lips he remembered now thinned to taut rubber bands, stretched so tight they threatened to