Valentino Pier (Rapid Reads) Read Online Free PDF

him in the left shoulder blade. Too close to the heart.”
    Patrick stroked his cheek with his right hand. “I wonder what the kid saw that made it worth trying to kill him a second time.”
    “Sure bet it involves a lot of money,” Gulliver offered. “You don’t take the kinds of risks this guy took just for the hell of it. He’s good for three counts of attempted murder. Two on the kid and one on a cop. That’s a lot of years in prison right there.”
    Patrick said what they were both thinking. “Drugs. It’s gotta be drugs.”
    Gulliver nodded in agreement. He thought of telling Patrick he’d found out where the kid had set up house. About talking to Mary Shea. About talking to all the people along Ferris Street. But he decided against it. Detective Patrick had warned him to stay out of this. Gulliver couldn’t risk the cops stopping his investigation. Not yet. Besides, there really wasn’t much for him to tell the detective. Only an old lady’s story about a loud truck and screaming banshees. He could only imagine what Patrick would say to that.
    “What were you doing here in the first place?” the detective asked.
    “I was out for a ride. Then when I saw the exit for the hospital…I decided to stop.
    It wasn’t planned.”
    “Well, good thing for the kid you stopped by or he’d be dead.”
    “You going to put more men on the door?” Gulliver asked.
    “Better than that. We’re moving tn. He kept pre

CHAPTER NINE
    H e had trouble sleeping that night. At one po]nedhat happenedint he just gave up. He put the leash on Ugly and went for a walk. The days might have been feeling like spring, but the nights still bit hard like winter. The chill of the early morning rattled Gulliver to his bones. And without any fur, even Ugly was shivering a little.
    This was Red Hook at its scariest. When no one was on the street. When the buzzing of cars along the expressway was the only sound you heard. That and the beating of your own heart. When random noises shook you. When a helicopter passing overhead sounded like the end of everything. When menace hid behind each shadow.
    It was strange how strong the smell of salt was in the air. Then he realized where they were.
    Gulliver hadn’t planned on walking the dog to Ferris Street. But that’s where they found themselves. He stood in the middle of the road. First looking to his left, toward Valentino Pier. Then to his right, toward King Street.
    He stared at Mary Shea’s house. He stared at the warehouse where the kid had lived. It was easy at this time of night to see how the old woman could have imagined banshees in such a place. Not much scared Gulliver Dowd. He had proved that earlier. He hadn’t flinched when he dealt with the guy trying to kill the kid. The big man was a good two feet taller than he was. More than a hundred pounds of muscle heavier. Gulliver hadn’t cared.
    He didn’t believe in evil. People did bad things. Evil acts. Some people seemed to have nothing but hate inside them. But evil as a thing unto itself wasn’t real. Yet… as he stood there on the empty street, he was uneasy. Something was going on here that he didn’t understand. And Gulliver didn’t think it was as simple as drugs.
    A car turned onto Ferris Street. At any other time of day, Gulliver would not have even noticed it. But this wasn’t any other time. Maybe the driver had taken a wrong turn. It was easy enough to get lost in Red Hook. All it took was one left where you should have made a right. It had happened to him when Keisha first moved to the area. The streets were winding. They sometimes didn’t seem to connect.
    The car rolled to a stop. Okay, that made sense. The driver was just trying to figure out where he was. Where he had made the wrong turn. Where he should go next.
    “Come on, Ugly,” he said to the dog. “This guy’s lost. Let’s help him get out of this maze.”
    He took a few steps toward the car, then froze. The front license plate was missing.