Last Call - A Thriller (Jacqueline "Jack" Daniels Mysteries Book 10) Read Online Free Page B

signature.”
    “People actually follow you?”
    “Hell yeahpants.”
    “Okay then, Harrypants—”
    “Blog is anonymous. No one knows it’s me.”
    “Okay then, assholepants—”
    “That’s pretty meanpants, Phin.”
    “Can you just make your point about Lucy, without saying pants again?”
    “I can’t make that promisepants. As for Lucy, she’s one for the true crime books. Ran away from home when she was a kid, started hitchhiking and killing anyone who picked her up. Same MO as the video; she would drag them behind the car on a chain, pulling them down the street until their clothes scraped off, stopping every few hundred meters to spritz their skinned bodies with lemon juice. So she meets up with Donaldson—he’s yet another psycho from Jack’s past . He likes to pick up hitchhikers and torture them to death. Donaldson and Lucy hurt each other real bad. We’re talking major league freak show disfigurement here . And somehow they bond from the experience,” Harry said. “Pants.”
    Lemon juice. That must have been what was in the spritz bottle on the video. When she squirted that poor bastard, he thrashed around like he was being electrocuted.
    “So you think that’s Luther in the video?”
    “Tough to say. He’s got that hood on. He’s all scarred up. But I think it is. The clincher is the knife. For someone who has killed as many people as Luther Kite is supposed to have killed, there isn’t a lot of information on him. But all sources agree that he favors a Spyderco Harpy.”
    Phin was familiar with the Spyderco brand. He paused the video, then used his browser to enlarge the picture. The silver knife being used to carve trenches into the screaming man’s back had a curved blade, like the beak of a hawk.
    “So what’s the planpants?” Harry asked.
    Phin didn’t have to think about it for more than a few seconds before he made his decision. If that really was Luther, and Lucy, Phin wasn’t going to wait around for them to eventually come calling. Jack and Sam shouldn’t be forced to live in constant paranoia. Better to nip it in the bud.
    If that really was Luther and Lucy, Phin would fix it so they’d never bother his family, or anyone else, ever again.
    “I’m going to check it out. Don’t tell Jack where I went.”
    “How can I? I don’t even know where the hell you’re going.”
    “Just stay quiet, McGlade.”
    “Want me to go with you? We could make a road trip out of it. Hey! I could invite Sinnamon! You’d have to pitch in for her hourly rate, though. It’s okay; getting a handy isn’t like cheating. It’s more like a rigorous, joyful greeting. Think of it as saying hello, in the nicest way possible. Jack lets you greet people, right? Or if that doesn’t work for you, I can bring my inflatable doll. We’d probably need some wet wipes or something if we take turns.”
    Phin hung up on him before he could say
pants
again.
    Then he watched the YouTube video once more and tried to prepare himself for what he needed to do.



KATIE
    S creaming filled her radio earpiece.
    The video. That would be Phin’s sixth viewing.
    Katie wanted to ask him about it. Wanted to get his opinion. She had her suspicions about its origin, but her skillset didn’t include detective work. When she’d met with that idiot, McGlade, she’d gone there to hire him and Jack to help her track Luther down. But McGlade didn’t actually inspire confidence. All he really inspired was a desire to bathe.
    Jack Daniels, however, was another story. If anyone could find Luther, it was Jack.
    Which was why Katie watched Phin drive away, a duffle bag in hand, and didn’t follow him.
    Maybe Phin would find Luther. Maybe he wouldn’t.
    But once Jack knew Phin was gone, she’d go looking for him. And Jack would lead Katie to Luther Kite.
    Katie made her way deeper in the woods, past the property lines, into some undeveloped land alongside a creek. Trees, bushes, years of fallen leaves, and an occasional