Touching Evil Read Online Free PDF

it.
    "No, and I don't want you to." He sighed, shook his head. "But
you're supposed to. It's part of his game, and if he's leaving you
clues..."
    "Okay. Okay." Greg stumbled toward the pyramid, the copper tubing
soldered with silver. "Might as well just dive in. You take notes; I'll
talk as long as I can."
    "Wait. Wait, let me get you something. Orange juice. Something."
Artie caught up, caught Greg's arm. The man was just gonna fall over.
    "God, that feels good." Greg squeezed his fingers, gave a near
hysterical laugh. "Details, details, detective. Take notes. It'll be
fast."
    Then, sure as shit, Greg reached into the pyramid and picked the
little brown paper package up. All he could do now was listen and try
to record every fucking detail. They'd been here before.
    Artie hated every minute of it.
    "Underground. Red lights. Swinging red lights. Scalpels. The knife
is to scare them. The rest is worse. Worse. The rest is work. Katy.
Karen. Kaitlin. K. Her name has a K and her granny gave her a necklace
when she was twelve. She screamed and screamed and he made her stop.
Dripping. The blood is dripping. She's put in the box. A box with the
others. There's water. His boots never get wet. Never."
    The notebook and pen felt like it weighed about eighty pounds, but
Artie got it all, writing in his own sort of shorthand. All the while
he listened for outside noises and watched Greg's face as it got paler
and paler.
    Greg didn't open the package, just held it, rocking it as if
comforting someone. "Kathy or Karen or Kari, and she was a street kid,
young enough to be scared. A throwaway person. A hole. She stopped
being frightened at the end. She went home to the mountains and he
screamed and tore at her and she didn't care and her eyes were green
but they're not anymore and there's part of her in here, in this box
and I can't open it but she's in here, too and..." The words trailed
off, murmured lost nonsense. Greg was wandering, eyes rolling.
    Artie dropped the pen and paper and caught Greg with one hand,
taking the box away with the other. Part of her in there. Jesus. He set
the box aside on the table, trying to touch as little of its surface as
possible. "Come on, man. Let's go up now. Let's get some juice in you
and sit down and all."
    "Orange juice makes you itch and you're allergic to blueberries."
    Leading Greg back upstairs, Artie nodded, talking in a low voice.
"And I like raspberries and chocolate, but my favorite is banana
splits. They always make me think of when I was a kid and I still
thought cops were heroes who always got their man." One more step, then
another. "And you like orange juice and cream puffs, but not together,
because that's like orange juice and toothpaste. Icky."
    "Yes." Greg followed him, shuffling like a hypnotized man. "Yes, and
your grandfather wore a badge and it was shiny and you watched it. His
eyes were the same gray as yours."
    His breath caught in his chest. Yeah. Yeah, his grandfather had been
his damned hero. He'd never even told his dad that. "Come on. Come and
sit." There. Down on the couch, and he left Greg hugging himself as he
went to the kitchen and got juice, finally digging his cell out.
    "Hey. Hey, honey. Look, yeah, I know it's late. It's—Yeah.
Another box. Can you come? And we want someone good. Maybe Dave or
Laura. Okay. Yeah. Bye."
    Bless Leah's heart. She was a trooper.
    "Here, man, drink up." Greg had shifted to the gray chair—his
chair—was curled in it, wrapped in the quilt, looking lost.
Goddamn. Artie plopped down on the ottoman thingee. "Come on, Greg. You
gotta drink or you'll pass out. And that'll suck. Then you'll dream."
    "No dreams." Greg drank the juice down, long throat working. "No dreams."
    "No. No dreams." Mind racing, he sat and waited for Leah, rubbing
Greg's leg with one hand. The doorknob, the street outside, the pyramid
... yeah. God, Greg looked like crap. "Have some more. Do you want a
sandwich?"
    "No. She'll be here soon. I'll wait here for you to be