Out Cold Read Online Free Page B

Out Cold
Book: Out Cold Read Online Free
Author: William G. Tapply
Tags: Mystery
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dead. They often end up dead, actually. Some of them just stay missing. Some of them show up after a while, surprised that anybody was worried about them, and nobody bothers to report that. And I’m not talking only about Massachusetts. We get missing-persons reports from all over the Northeast. They are so out-of-date and incomplete it’s a joke. If somebody turns up alive, or if their body is found, in, say Vermont, we might never hear about it.”
    â€œIt sounds hopeless,” I said.
    â€œYeah, well, we do what we can, we really do,” she said. “I want to know about this girl as much as you do. I’m just trying to be straight with you.”
    â€œSo what can you do, then?”
    â€œWe’ll circulate her picture among the precincts, see if anybody recognizes her or can match her up with a photo or a description. We’ll check the FBI databases. If she ran away, or however she disappeared, if it was fairly recently, say a week or two, chances are pretty good that we’ll identify her. The longer she’s been gone, the worse the odds get.”
    I looked out my office window. A foggy kind of gray darkness had settled over the city. There were orange haloes around the lamps that lit the plaza. They reflected in the slushy puddles and glowed on the piles of dirty old snow.
    When I turned back, I saw that Lt. Mendoza was frowning at me. “You’re really upset about this, aren’t you?” she said.
    I nodded. “I am. It feels personal. My dog found her. I carried her into my living room. I couldn’t tell whether she was alive or dead. I can’t think of her as some statistic. The place where I found her in the snow, there was a bloodstain. I should have noticed it, figured it out.”
    â€œYou did all right, Mr. Coyne. Don’t blame yourself.”
    I shrugged.
    â€œSo have you thought about why she picked your backyard to…”
    â€œTo die in, you mean?”
    She nodded.
    â€œI’ve thought about it,” I said. “I don’t know. I assume it was just that my gate was open so she wandered in.”
    â€œRandom, you think.”
    I nodded. “I guess so.”
    She reached down for her attaché case, set it on her lap, and opened it. She took out a plastic evidence bag and put it on the coffee table in front of me.
    I bent to look at it. It contained a small sheet of square notepaper. Printed in childlike block letters on it in dim but readable pencil were the words: “77 Mt. Vernon St.”
    I looked up at Mendoza. “Why didn’t you show this to me before?”
    â€œI wanted to hear what you had to say first.”
    â€œYou suspect me of something?”
    â€œI suspect everybody of everything.”
    I frowned at her.
    She smiled quickly. “Relax.”
    I touched the plastic bag with the scrap of paper in it. “Where’d you get this?”
    â€œIt was in the girl’s pocket.”
    â€œIt’s my address.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œSo she didn’t just end up in my backyard randomly,” I said. “It was her actual destination.”
    â€œSo it would appear. It would appear that she was looking for you. She went to Mt. Vernon, climbed up your hill, found your place, number seventy-seven, walked around to your back alley, opened the gate, went into your backyard—”
    â€œAnd died,” I said.
    Mendoza nodded. “And died. Yes.”
    â€œShe didn’t knock on my door or anything,” I said. “I might not have heard her, but my dog would’ve. He would’ve barked at the door. I’d’ve heard him bark.”
    Mendoza gave me a soft smile. “Sure,” she said.
    â€œI don’t know why she had my address,” I said. “I’m positive I don’t know her.”
    â€œSuppose you met her, say, four or five years ago.”
    â€œYou’re thinking, she was a child then, a young woman now, and she’d

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