The Dark Detective: Venator Read Online Free PDF

how Max had been recruited to the Demon Division of Scotland Yard. His colleagues were simply told that he was on ‘special assignment’. Max had trained under Kennet and had learned much from the old man in the past fourteen months.
    Today Max had come close to getting killed. Even though he had eliminated one nest of Brood already, experience told him that it was unlikely to carry on being that easy. There was bound to be another nest somewhere in the city – the terminated Brood demons had told him as much – and it would be hard work to get rid of the rest of them. For the umpteenth time he wished that Kennet was still there to help him.
    Max knew that the first lot of Brood had been careless and that he had been very lucky. The way this day was going, he felt pretty sure that he couldn’t count on his luck lasting.
    He sighed, remembering Sophie. He was genuinely sorry that he’d had to terminate her. But that was the trouble with demons – you just couldn’t trust them. They didn’t have a sense of what was right and wrong. Spawn today just weren’t what they used to be.

Home Comforts
    Max finished his coffee and left a handful of change on the table. The waitress smiled and waved as he left. Next time, she told herself.
    He walked back to his office, deep in thought. He turned on his computer but there were no new emails or text messages and his voicemail informed him, “You have no new messages”.
    The smart detective would let his fingers do the walking, Max decided. He looked up the Brood on his demon database. There really hadn’t been any major Brood infestations for several hundred years. In fact the last time they’d been in London had been 1666. Their involvement in the Great Plague and the Fire of London had been hushed up. That happened a lot – in fact, if Max thought about it, that was pretty much his job: to hush things up.
    It was interesting but it didn’t explain why the Brood were back in town now. And had they been telling the truth when they’d said that more were on their way?
    Word of Sophie’s termination had spread rapidly. It would be a while before any Level Twos risked contacting Max again.
    He wondered if it was worth calling Walter J. Caspar, his counterpart in Langley. But it seemed a bit over the top for what was, in all probability, purely a local matter.
    He sighed. This day just wasn’t getting any better.
    “I’m going to have to do things the old fashioned way,” he said.
    He wandered down to the canteen. It was almost empty, just a tired looking pair of Community Service Officers talking in quiet voices over a plate of bacon sandwiches. They ignored Max as he collected a week’s worth of dusty newspapers and carried them back to his office.
    He scrutinised the papers for any unexplained disappearances or mysterious occurrences. Nothing out of the ordinary. Max sighed heavily.
    It was the same on the internet: the demon message boards were quiet and nothing of note had been reported in the forums. Max was at a loss.
    Without any leads to follow up and none of the demon population willing to talk to him, Max was out of answers – well, just about. There was one place he could go and know that he’d be welcome.
    * * * *
    The house was small and neat, located in a quiet street at the end of a long terrace. Old-fashioned net curtains hung at the window. Max watched them twitch as he knocked at the door.
    “Better safe than sorry,” he muttered to himself.
    The door opened and a little old lady with thin, white hair opened the door.
    “Max, dear! What a lovely surprise,” she said. “Come in, come in!”
    “Thanks, Gran,” said Max wearily.
    She fussed around him, tutting over the state of his overcoat and pressing a mug of hot tea into his hands.
    “Dear me!” she said. “That overcoat of yours has seen better days. I don’t think I can repair it anymore. Well, I was saving this until your birthday.”
    She pulled a large carrier bag out from under the