The Killing House Read Online Free PDF Page A

that something was wrong. The fringe of her short blonde hair was matted across her damp forehead. Her face was pale, her bloodshot eyes wide with terror. She had dark rings of sweat underneath the arms and collar of her long-sleeved grey T-shirt. I've got that rotten stomach flu that's going around , she'd told him.
    A logical explanation, and one he might have believed if she hadn't told him the reason why she and her husband had decided to forgo Ali Karim's investigative services at the last minute: Finances. We simply couldn't afford Mr Karim's fee .
    Karim, Fletcher knew, hadn't charged the Herrera family for his services. He didn't charge anyone.
    Karim, a former CIA operative, had left the Agency at a relatively young age. Instead of entering the lucrativeprivate sector, he established his own security company in Midtown Manhattan. Having recently divorced, and with his ex-wife taking their only child, their son, Jason, back to live in her family home in London, Karim put his time and energy into his business.
    In less than a decade, he had opened additional offices in several major US cities. Then, with the explosive growth of the Internet during the nineties, Karim's careful and well-timed investments had allowed him to expand his business and purchase several private forensic companies in the United States and abroad. By the dawn of the twenty-first century, Ali Karim was the owner of a global security empire - and one of the nation's richest men. Karim devoted his considerable wealth, talents and resources to providing pro bono investigative services for the victims of crime.
    When Theresa Herrera said she couldn't afford Karim's fee, Fletcher thought the woman was trying to warn him - about what, he had no idea. He had drawn his weapon, wanting to be prepared, and he saw her relief before she looked sideways and held her gaze where the shooter was hiding, watching and listening. He was about to grab Theresa Herrera and take her to the safety of his car when the woman in the fur coat fired.
    Still, he wondered if there was something he could have done to change the outcome. If he had acted immediately, instead of using the time to remove his sidearm, it was possible that ... Useless, childish thinking. Theresa Herrera was dead.
    Fletcher unbuttoned his shirt. The adrenalin had abated, leaving in its wake a growing pain in his chest and abdomen. He slipped a hand inside his shirt and undid the vest's straps to relieve the pressure.
    He gently pressed on his breastbone. Daggers of pain erupted from the left side of his chest; he had cracked at least two ribs.
    While breathing was painful, he didn't feel short of breath, dizzy, lethargic - all promising signs that he hadn't suffered a flail chest, a life-threatening medical condition that occurred when part of the rib cage detached from the chest wall.
    The next part would be difficult, but he had to do it.
    Fletcher took in a slow, deep breath. Sparks of pain exploded through his brain and burned a bright white across his vision, but he fought his way through it. Having suffered such injuries in the past, he knew the importance of taking in the deepest breath possible in order to prevent pneumonia or a partial collapse of lung tissue known as atelectasis.
    He took another deep breath and then repeated it again. Again. When he finished, he was flushed, drenched in sweat.
    Fletcher took out his smartphone and dialled Karim's private number. A small pause followed as the encryption software scrambled the call, and then Karim's deep and smoky voice erupted on the other end of the line.
    'Well, that was bloody quick. I take it you found something good.'
    Fletcher managed to speak clearly over the pain.'Theresa Herrera's dead,' he said, and walked Karim step by step through everything that had happened.
    A long silence followed. In his mind's eye Fletcher pictured Karim, a short, round man of Pakistani descent, seated behind the immense glass desk in his private office,