The Rag and Bone Shop Read Online Free PDF

hesitation on Braxton’s part. “Yes. The scenario’s in place. We know about your work with Fallow and Blake.”
    Trent frowned at the mention of Blake. Blake had been an aberration with a predisposition to confessing.
    “Arrangements?”
    “Senator Gibbons will provide transportation. He’ll have a driver at your disposal. Pick you up anywhere at any time.”
    “How much time will I have with the suspect?”
    “Three hours. Maybe four.”
    “Parents?”
    “Father’s away on a business trip. We anticipate that the mother will accept the scenario.”
    Trent’s mind still echoed from the Ping-Pong–like questioning session with Califer and his too-smooth, too-confident voice and the effort it had taken to break him down. He had a sudden urge to reject this new assignment.
But do I want to be a small-town cop all my life?
How could he turn his back on a case that would leave a powerful senator in his debt?
    “Fax me the details,” Trent said, giving Braxton the number. “Everything. Spell it out. I don’t want to have to read between the lines. And I don’t like surprises later.”
    “Right,” Braxton said.
    “And have your driver pick me up in Highgate at six sharp in the morning.”
    “Right,” said Braxton again.
    Trent hung up the phone, despising himself for allowing a politician to influence his decision. But then Trent had despised himself for quite a long time, anyway.

    J ason was surprised when he entered police headquarters to find a normal place that could have been any business office in Monument. He’d expected telephones to be ringing wildly, a bank of monitors showing all kinds of activity, police officers coming and going, and cigar-smoking detectives in plain clothes hunched over their desks, like on television or in the movies.
    Instead, Jason found himself in a small cubicle occupied by a gray-haired man in a crisp white shirt and blue tie sitting at a desk behind a plate-glass window. The place was so quiet that Jason could hear the humming of the air conditioner.
    The officer, whose name was Henry Kendall and who had accompanied Jason to police headquarters, nodded at the man at the desk. The man apparently pushed a hidden button that buzzed a door open to their left. Officer Kendall led Jason to another office that was as bare and barren as the principal’s outer office at school. No pictures on the walls, no desks or chairs, no curtains on the windows.
    “The others will be here in a minute or two,” Officer Kendall said, voice soft and gentle. “You’re going to be a big help to the investigation, Jason. You’ll do just fine.”
    After he’d left, Jason shivered slightly in the coolness of the room. He walked to the window and looked out at Main Street. Traffic moved slowly as if the heat had affected even the cars and trucks. People walked languidly as if in slow motion. Jason thought of his mother and wondered if coming here was a mistake. Then wondered why he should be having that thought.
    He had been surprised earlier that morning when he glanced outside his bedroom window and saw a police cruiser pulling into the driveway. Another visit from the police? His breath quickened and his heart accelerated. An emergency of some kind? But the blue and white lights on the roof of the cruiser weren’t flashing and the big red-faced officer who got out of it strolled leisurely up the driveway toward the front door.
    Hearing the chime of the doorbell, Jason stood still, urging his heart to calm down if that was possible. The sight of the policeman brought back the image of Alicia Bartlett as he had last seen her at her house.
Last seen her.
Poor Alicia.
    “Jason.”
    His mother’s voice reached him as if from far away.
    A moment later, Jason stood in the foyer with his mother and the police officer.
    “This is Officer Kendall,” his mother explained to Jason. “He’s asking for your help in the investigation.”
    “Actually, we’re asking several people for their