The Skull Ring Read Online Free PDF

okay, too. She no longer had to sleep with a police scanner, hoping for someone’s personal tragedy to supply her day’s work.
    She made it to the office just in time for her 3:00 writers' meeting. Her assignments for the week included a flower show at the mall, a disease outbreak at the animal shelter, some famous literary writer she'd never heard of speaking at the library, the dedication of a new soccer field, and a crafts festival coming up in three weeks. The crafts festival included a lot of the paper's advertisers, so the editor wanted to give it a big push. Julia could handle it, although glorifying glued beads and poorly-woven baskets was a challenge to her writing skills.
    Covering the local school boards and arts committees was also a challenge. She'd learned that the most valuable journalistic skill was making people’s quotes sound smarter than they actually were. She was bothered when readers referred to the weekly paper as "The Snooze," but she was thankful for the low-stress job. Pulitzers could wait. She was in Elkwood to get her head together.
    As she left the conference room, her co-worker Rick O'Dell caught up with her. "Hey, Julia, what's up?"
    "Same old," she said.
    Rick smiled, eyes bright behind his 1950's science-teacher glasses. He had a Clark Kent-style curl in the middle of his forehead, the studly tress glistening with mousse . His zoot-inspired suit was tailored, a luxury at his salary. His retro style was tarnished by the gold chain around his neck, as if he were Palm Beach by way of Cleveland. "Did you read the opening of my series?"
    "I don't get the paper," she deadpanned.
    Rick laughed too enthusiastically. He was a hot reporter, on the way up, two North Carolina Press Associations Awards under his belt already. But he wanted other things under his belt, such as every young woman who crossed his blotter. "It's a killer story," he said. "Literally."
    "Do tell," she said, continuing to her desk, knowing Rick wouldn't need a nudge. Persistence was important for a good reporter, and Rick’s cockiness meant he didn’t give up easily.
    "Remember in the 1980s, when there was all this buzz about Satanism, the huge underground network, how all these children were disappearing that ended up as human sacrifices?"
    Julia's head lifted at the word "Satanism." She stopped walking and turned to Rick. "Yeah. Didn't everyone pretty much agree that the whole business was overblown?"
    "Sure. I mean, how do you account for some of those claims that as many as 50,000 people were murdered as human sacrifices? You just can't hide that many bodies without somebody finding a bone here or there."
    "Bone?" Last night's dream stirred in its slumbering grave.
    "Yeah," Rick said. His angular sideburns lifted as he smiled. "Well, maybe it's coming back. Did you hear about the body they found in the Amadahee?"
    "No." Julia avoided the television news, the radio, even the paper when she could. She hadn’t been kidding about not subscribing to the newspaper. If ignorance was bliss, she wanted to be as blissful as a meditating Buddha.
    "Caucasian male, in his twenties. Nude, hands bound, his abdominal cavity ripped open. Pretty ritualistic."
    "Wow," Julia said, her interest piqued. Elkwood didn't have as many murders as Memphis, but was as suspect to that particular sin as any other American community. Still, this one sounded different from the run-of-the-mill Saturday night armed disagreement. Julia hadn't shaken the habits of the crime beat as easily as she had thought. "But what's the link to Satanism? If you've done your research, and I bet you have—"
    Rick grinned, showing perfect white teeth that could afford smugness, and nodded at her to continue.
    "Then you know that ritualism is usually more to fill a psychological need than a spiritual need. At least when it comes to murder."
    "Sure. Serial killers do what they do to fulfill a sexual need. Everybody knows that. They don't make necklaces of women's body parts