The Monster Within Read Online Free PDF

parking lot, feeling the heat coming up and down on me like I’m inside some hellish oven. It feels like the sun is watching us with immense amounts of disapproval. I don’t like the way that any of this is feeling. I can’t help but wonder if the box Owens carries once belonged to Pandora.
    There’s a bottle of Stevenon sitting on top of the roof of my Shelby. Owens waits for me to unlock the door for him. He sets it in the passenger seat and stands back, looking at the car, taking it in with a long, surveying glance. “This is one hell of a ride, King,” Owens shakes his head. I love it when people compliment my car. It makes me feel powerful. It makes me feel like a man. It’s the same feeling I’m sure people who work out at the gym must feel when girls eye them. There’s something phallic about muscle cars. I’m certain that there’s more women attracted to cars than there are women attracted to muscles. At least, my experience says that.
    “Thanks,” I say, trying to not make my delight known. “It was my father’s.”
    “Did you restore it?” Owens furrows his brow.
    “Hell no,” I chuckle, tossing my burger into the passenger seat next to the box of files. “My dad loved this car more than he loved anything else in the world. On his list of priorities, this was the top. He wanted to be buried in the thing, but I didn’t think zoning permits would allow a seventy year old man to be buried in a car at the cemetery.” Owens chuckles, but that’s the truth. There’s very little that my father cared about in life outside of cars. His Shelby, Charger, Stingray, and Prowler all came above my mother or the rest of us. It wasn’t funny, living that way.
    “King, just look over the files,” Owens says as I twirl the keys on my middle finger, waiting to get out of here. I’m hungry, and traffic is going to be a nightmare. I’ll make my way through this entire bottle tonight if I waste time reading through all of these files. “The pattern will stick out to you, I guarantee it. Everything about this feels wrong,” he adds.
    “I’m sure it does,” I answer with my own doubts. There were a lot of detectives in that box that were going to hate me if I ripped up the flooring and started looking for the monsters lurking inside the darkness beneath. No one wants that. “Take it easy, Owens.” I drop into my seat and put the keys in the ignition. “Call me if you get any more suspicious suicides.”
    “Absolutely,” Owens says.
    I take as many back roads as I can, making the long way back to my house, letting the city quiet my thoughts. I pull out my guacamole burger and bite into it, tasting the flavors and smells of Mexico dancing with hickory smoked bacon and ground beef that makes my mouth water just smelling it. It’s a damn good burger and I kick myself for not asking Owens where he got it. I had no idea how hungry I was, but with each bite, I feel my stomach more and more satisfied. There’s nothing more appealing than a good burger on a hot night, driving down the busy streets in a muscle car. At the streetlights, my Shelby rumbles, growling at all the inferior cars around me like a wild cat making its territory well known. It’s something beautiful that only car people will understand.
    I’ve always had a weakness for cars, I guess it’s hereditary. When I was married, it was more than just a weakness, it was a fault. It wasn’t my only fault. I know that I spent more time on the job than I should have, obsessing about scum when I should have been present with my wife and daughter, but they’re long gone. They don’t give a shit about me, but I find myself thinking about them on these long drives, focusing on what I could have done—what I definitely shouldn’t have done. I take in a deep breath, remembering my greatest sin, my greatest fault, my hungriest demon.
    The long way through my neighborhood takes me past St. Judas’ Catholic School where the high school and middle