A Wild and Lonely Place Read Online Free Page A

life. I did know that earlier, in the seventies,
     he’d accepted finder’s fees for steering important people who wished to remove themselves and their assets from the war-torn
     Asian countries to an air-charter service run out of Bangkok by Dan Kessell. Hy—who had been discharged from the marines after
     a flare-up of his childhood asthma—had been one of Kessell’s pilots; guilt stemming from his actions and experiences during
     those turbulent, terrible years had consumed him for nearly two decades. Not so with Kessell, though; on him they had left
     no mark. He was, according to my lover, the same resilient and apparently conscienceless man of the early days in Thailand.
    Renshaw and I rounded the corner onto Jackson. A police barricade blocked access and farther down I spotted squad cars, a
     fire truck, the bomb squad van, and an ambulance. Word about this latest bombing had already reached the media; reporters
     and camerapeople clamored to be allowed onto the scene, and the uniformed officers were having trouble controlling them. Renshaw
     and I pushed through the crush.
    As Gage held up his I.D., a Channel Seven cameraman swung around and began filming us. I stepped back so Renshaw’s body blocked
     view of me; already I had too high a public profile, and having my presence there broadcast could hamper my ability to investigate.
     The officer moved the barricade to let us pass, then shoved the persistent cameraman back when he tried to follow. Immediately
     he began yowling about the public’s right to know. I shot him a disgusted look and trotted after Renshaw.
    In front of the consulate, the excitement was dying down. The fire crew prepared to leave, the bomb squad van pulled away,
     and a pair of cops leaned against a black-and-white, talking in low voices. Neighbors from the surrounding houses and apartment
     buildings began to wander home, their hushed conversations in counterpoint to the harsh sounds from the emergency-vehicle
     radios. I recognized an unmarked blue Buick that belonged to the task force.
    The big creamy-white house was set farther back from the sidewalk than its neighbors, surrounded by a low ornamental fence
     and fronted by a formal garden. To the left of the brick walk leading to its front door lay the ruins of a fountain; jagged
     chunks of concrete were scattered around its tiled base, and water had gushed from its piping, soaking and puddling the ground.
     The pipe, capped off now, leaned at a forty-five-degree angle.
    I caught my breath, my skin prickling. The destruction here was nothing like what I’d seen after the bombing on the Mendocino
     coast, but nevertheless it unnerved me. I swung my gaze to the right of the walk and saw a pair of paramedics standing over
     a young woman on a stretcher. Her face was cut and abraded; water plastered her short blond hair to her skull.
    Renshaw was talking with one of the paramedics. I went over and squatted down beside the RKI operative. “How’re you doing?”
    “I feel like dog meat.” Her eyes were glazed by pain, but she sounded lucid.
    Renshaw squatted down on the other side of her. “Holman,” he said, “how the hell did this happen?”
    Her fingers spasmed against her thighs, but otherwise she didn’t react to his abruptness. As calmly as if she were being debriefed
     at the office she said, “I was on grounds patrol when I saw what looked like a UPS man handing over a package at the door.
     I checked for a truck. Wasn’t any. So I yelled at him, and he took off.”
    “You allowed him to get away.”
    Again Holman’s fingers tightened. “Yes. Mrs. Hamid’s granddaughter, Habiba, was the one who accepted the package. Today’s
     her ninth birthday, and I guess she thought it was a present for her. She had already started to open it, so I grabbed it
     and chucked it into the fountain.”
    “Thus triggering the detonating device.”
    Holman closed her eyes. Like all RKI’s people, she was a tough pro, but either the