Leopard Dreaming Read Online Free

otherwise perceive.
    Yesterday’s silence seemed all the more surreal as the future wakened slowly around her. The alley appeared empty and lifeless, while an alarm buzzed noisily in an apartment above her. Probably rang yesterday too, but she could only see the past, not hear it.
    Static buzzed too, and a male voice swore at his radio. No reception, apparently.
    Pans clanked against the other side of the wall, making her jump.
    ‘Chef’s apprentice,’ Lockman said. A familiar click reminded Mira that he could see through most walls using sound waves and thermal sensors akin to radar imaging. ‘He’s preparing to bake. That should keep him busy for a while.’
    Mira stayed on edge anyway. Since she’d left Serenity, most loud bangs had been accompanied by bullets flying in her direction.
    ‘Are you okay?’ he asked. ‘You’ve gone a bit pale.’
    She nodded, but felt an urge to simply clamp her eyes shut and run through to the estuary so she could pick up the kidnapper’s trail from out there on the water.
    Mira cleared her throat, hoping she didn’t sound too worried. ‘Was it all clear around the next bend?’
    ‘Would you be this far in if it wasn’t? Or I can check again, if it makes you feel better?’
    ‘I didn’t mean today, I meant … you know. Any leftover evidence from other times?’
    ‘It’s all clear,’ he assured her. ‘Aside from the quick recon today, on stakeout yesterday I saw a media circus pass through, leaving nothing more than empty water bottles, some chip packets and a few old lens caps.’
    ‘What about bloodstains?’
    ‘For paparazzi, they didn’t look that cut-throat.’
    ‘I didn’t mean their blood.’
    ‘I know what you meant.’ His tone stiffened, and she heard something in his voice that suggested he’d been thinking about past events too. His sergeant had been murdered in this alley, and the killer had tried to frame him for it; had beaten Lockman too, right there near the industrial bin.
    ‘It’s history,’ Lockman assured her. ‘Nothing can hurt you now, so long as we’re careful.’
    ‘Yeah, right.’ She wished she could believe it, but as she rounded the first bend, she saw the full length of the industrial bin by the rear door to the kitchen, and guilt slugged her in the stomach. If she hadn’t “witnessed” his sergeant’s murder just as the killer returned to the scene of the crime, then more people would still be alive, starting with the female bodyguard who’d sacrificed herself to ensure Mira’s escape. One of Lockman’s team. Her blood had painted the alley too; history repeating itself, the same but different. Same killer, different motives. Same scene, different bodies.
    ‘I just want to find them before anyone else gets hurt.’ Third time lucky, according to an old Braille quote — one that her mother had embossed into her favourite tree on the last day she’d climbed to the top.
    ‘That’s the plan.’
    Mira paused and turned around, scanning up five storeys and examining all the balconies to see who else had been awake at dawn the previous day.
    ‘How can you stand coming here so easily?’ she whispered.
    ‘What makes you think it’s easy?’
    ‘You sound calm; your voice, your stride.’
    ‘You can’t see my hands shaking.’
    She couldn’t imagine it either. ‘Seriously, is it justice or revenge that’s driving you?’ On the one hand, he had a chance to nail Sergeant Hawthorn’s killer, and on the other, he could gain revenge for the torture session he’d been put through at the hands of hissuperior officer who’d tried to pull a confession out of Lockman, since the killer and Colonel Kitching were one and the same.
    ‘Keep your voice down,’ Lockman whispered.
    ‘I thought you said it was clear?’
    ‘It is, but —’
    ‘How am I supposed to trust you better if I don’t understand why you’re here? You’re not working for General Garland any more, allegedly.’
    ‘Allegedly?’ He sounded hurt.