A Perfect Grave Read Online Free

someone was speaking her name.
    “Grace. Grace,” Perelli nudged her, holding out his cell phone, “It’s Stan, he says your phone’s dead.”
    “Garner.”
    “It’s Boulder. We got a fresh one and you’re the primary.”
    “Cripes, Stan, we got our hands full with the Forrest case. Can’t Marty and Stallworth take it?”
    “It’s yours. Take down the address, it’s near Yesler Terrace.”
    Grace pursed her lips as she jotted down the information.
    “Who’s the vic?”
    “Anne Braxton. This will get profile. Big time.”
    “Why?”
    “She’s a nun, murdered in her residence.”

Chapter Four
    J ason Wade grabbed a portable scanner and took the stairs to the parking lot, hating his situation.
    He couldn’t miss a story and he couldn’t turn his back on his father. His old man was fresh at war with a ghost that had been stalking him for years, but he’d refused to talk about it.
    Ever.
    Even as it destroyed the things he loved, he would not open up to anyone. Even when it threatened to drag Jason down with him. Like tonight, man, he had to be careful. Whenever his father was seized by his demon, he reached out to Jason to rescue him.
    Jason was all he had.
    The cry of a gull and lonely horn of a distant boat echoed from the bay as he approached his 1969 Ford Falcon. He’d finally gotten around to getting it painted metallic red and it reflected the city lights as he wheeled through the streets. A few blocks east, the Space Needle ascended into the night, while south, the city’s tallest buildings, Union Square, Washington Mutual, and the Columbia Center dominated the skyline. Pike Place Market was near and a little farther, Pioneer Square.
    Welcome to Seattle, baby.
    Jet City. The Emerald City. Gatesville. Amazonia. Java Town.
    The place where Jimi Hendrix learned to play guitar.
    Rolling south near the stadiums he cast a glance in the direction of First Hill and Yesler Terrace and considered a detour. To where, though? He had no specific address to check out. He wasn’t even certain anything was happening out there.
    Cover yourself, man.
    He called the East Precinct again. Voice mail again. He left a message. Then he alerted the editorial assistant at the paper to call him if he heard anything. He set his phone on vibrate, then slid Layla into his CD player. He was a disciple of classic rock and loved how Clapton’s genius blended with the scanner’s dispatches in an eerie mix against the night. He gathered speed as the song played and returned to his old man’s situation.
    Henry Wade was a private investigator, an exbrewery worker, and an ex-Seattle cop. And for as long as Jason could remember, his father would not, or could not, ever bring himself to talk about the incident that had forced him off the Seattle PD and into a job at the brewery, where each day the thermos in his lunch bucket had been spiked with bourbon.
    Whatever it was that he was trying to drown had ultimately cost him his marriage. Jason’s mother had worked beside his father on the bottling line but eventually she walked out on both of them. She just couldn’t take it any longer, she said in her note. The night before she left, she’d hugged Jason and her eyes looked as if she were dreading something on the horizon. In the days after, Jason rode his bicycle all over the neighborhood searching for her until his old man told him she was gone.
    “But don’t you worry, Jay, she’ll come back, you’ll see.”
    The scanner crackled with a warehouse alarm.
    Nothing to it. He adjusted the channels, then looked toward the bay as he guided his Falcon south until the brewery loomed. Man, he hated that place with its dark cluster of brick buildings, its stacks capped with red strobe lights spearing the night, the stench of hops permeating his car, reminding him of the worst days of his life.
    His mother never returned and his old man’s drinking never stopped.
    Over time, it had pushed everything to the breaking point. It came just