R.S. Guthrie - Detective Bobby Mac 02 - L O S T Read Online Free Page B

to him.
    Who? Spence asked the voice.
    You know who.
    He did know.
    But I want to make a difference , Spence said. He didn’t want to be a monster; he wanted to rid the world of the bad people.
    Not his own family .
    You cannot rid the world of monsters, Spence. The world will always have them. But you can send good people away from here—far, far away. To a better, monster-less place!
    It made sense. The world was no better than a ring of Hell. How many times had he questioned the decision of bringing two young girls into the cesspool of what now passed as “humanity”? He’d never considered such an act of finality in his deliberations, of course. But what a few months before would have been impossible to even imagine, now appeared preordained and positively resplendent.
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
    As Spence tucked his two angels away beneath the patchwork covers that night he could hardly contain his excitement for them. His hands were shaking he was so impatient to send them on their journey. What greater thing could a father do than remove his children from a life sentence in Hell?
    And his wife. It made him warm inside to think of her going first. She would be waiting for the little ones, and then, finally, for him—when the four of them could transport themselves a billion light years away from all the mess the world had become; they would leave this toilet of a civilization and disappear into cosmic bliss in the wink of an eye.
    The act of sharpening the knife was more than symbolic. Great patience was the key. He moved the edge along the rough whetstone, careful not to nick the blade. Over and over he lovingly pulled the blade, honing, perfecting.
    He’d purchased the knife a few days earlier, though he’d been looking for the perfect weapon for a long time—nosing in and out of cutlery shops, attending gun shows, frequenting flea markets.
    So many wonderful knives; so many choices.
    The voice inside assured him he would know the right talisman when he found it. The one. The blade that would draw his family closer to God; closer to Paradise.
    And he did know it. He found it in a smallish, private shop on a trip across the border to Missoula on business. An old Nez Perce woman ran the store, which exhibited twenty to thirty blades attached to meticulously carved handles made from alabaster, elk horn, and obsidian.
    Spence knew the moment he saw the magnificent black handle, the curved deboning blade glinting even in the dull light of the little shack. When he saw it he forgot why he ever drove to Missoula in the first place. Did he not come for this?
    Of course you did , the voice assured him.
    “How much,” he asked the wrinkled old woman.
    “Two hundred,” she said. “Handmade. Very strong.”
    No price seemed too high for the tool he needed. He paid the woman.
    The voice was speaking to him again, saying he’d better make sure there were no loose ends. It was, after all, a small shop. And the voice seemed to have a problem with the broken down Indian woman.
      She is shaman, Spence. A child of the coyote. Seer. Look into her eyes. She already knows. One phone call to the locals and your plan is over—your children struggle through decades of living Hell.
    Spence did look into the old, wrinkled face. Into those cloudy, ancient orbs, devoid of compassion. The voice was right. It was clear she knew.
    A shaman .
    Just his luck. But then again, he thought, where else to find a knife to do God’s work? Not Wal-Mart.
    Spence had been palming the knife, admiring it, when the voice told him about the Indian medicine woman. He kept his eyes locked on hers as he reached across the counter, grabbed a fistful of her long, gray-streaked hair, and pulled her toward him. She drew a deep breath, as if to cry out, and Spence deftly plunged the knife into her esophagus, silencing any scream that may have been building.
    He remembered his practice. He kept his own eyes locked on the Indian woman’s. He watched as the fight