The Haunting of James Hastings Read Online Free PDF

dates.’
     
    I swallowed half my beer.
     
    ‘Do you have plans?’ she said.
     
    ‘Like what?’
     
    ‘Someone to spend the weekend with. I guess if it were me I would want to get out of the house, go do something good for myself.’
     
    ‘No, I’m not seeing anyone.’
     
    She sighed. I guessed I was being an asshole.
     
    ‘Tell me about you. How’s life on the beat?’
     
    Lucy filled me in on a couple of her recent arrests, including the apprehension of a handsome Korean masher who proved so charming she found herself jotting her number on her notepad and slipping it into his pocket before the cruiser arrived to take him in for booking. She regretted this after further inspection of his record (the previous mashees were young ), and eventually had to change her phone number. She received a small promotion for hitting her five-year mark with a clean record. I congratulated her and the conversation veered back to actual relationships, as it tends to between single people who have been knocked out of the major leagues but haven’t given up hope of receiving one more call from the front office.
     
    ‘There’s a guy,’ she said. ‘He’s fine, but I knew by the second date it wasn’t going anywhere.’
     
    ‘He’s no good in bed?’
     
    ‘There’s more to it than sex, James.’ But she was blushing.
     
    ‘Uh-huh.’
     
    ‘I’m a cop. Why does every guy think this is a green light to break out the handcuffs?’
     
    ‘We’re always looking for the new play.’
     
    She laughed. Okay, there was still a little something there and neither of us flinched. Despite mucking up everything I touched, there still existed in this woman some goodwill toward me. With feeble effort I could parlay it into something comforting, maybe even something real. On any other morning, but not this one.
     
    ‘You look good, Lucy,’ I said. ‘Happy.’
     
    She tilted her head. ‘Thank you.’
     
    A moment stretched between us.
     
    I said, ‘Now you’re supposed to say how good I look.’
     
    She cupped a hand over her grin. ‘Oh, James. You look like shit.’
     
    ‘See, that wasn’t so hard.’
     
    ‘What’s going on with your hair? And the beard’s getting a little unruly.’
     
    ‘I’m going for a kind of nineties grunge thing.’
     
    Neither of us could tell if I was joking.
     
    ‘So, are you looking?’ she asked. ‘For the new play?’
     
    ‘I’m a fucking mess. It never ends.’
     
    ‘Do you want it to end? Because I think that’s part of it. Wanting to move on.’
     
    I finished my beer. ‘What else do you know about him?’
     
    ‘Who?’
     
    ‘Mr Ennis.’
     
    ‘Oh.’ She looked disappointed I had returned to the subject of our deceased neighbor. ‘Not much. I remember him mentioning a son in Barstow or Reno, I think.’
     
    ‘You talked to him?’
     
    ‘A few times. I invited him to that pot-luck Thanksgiving I threw two years ago. He was polite but declined. I didn’t press him.’
     
    ‘Could you confirm the cause of death?’
     
    Lucy frowned. ‘He had a heart attack. Didn’t Troy tell you?’
     
    ‘Troy?’
     
    Lucy spun her finger in a circle. ‘The officer who spoke to you before I led you home.’
     
    ‘Oh, right. Did he seem, you know, at peace?’
     
    ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
     
    Did he look terrified out of his fucking mind? I wanted to scream at her, but of course did not. ‘Can they tell if he went quickly or if he suffered?’
     
    ‘Like more than a heart attack suffered?’
     
    ‘Never mind - oh, shit, wait.’ I sat forward. ‘The flowers. Did they find a vase full of flowers in the kitchen?’
     
    ‘Flowers?’
     
    ‘Yes, purple ones, with the heads cut off.’
     
    ‘I have no idea.’
     
    ‘Will you check?’
     
    Lucy’s patience was nearing its end. ‘If it’s important. Are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me? Because if you saw something—’
     
    ‘No, no. I’m just . . . I had a bad dream,