Seconds to Live (Scarlet Falls) Read Online Free Page A

Assumptions? How did they not understand? They just didn’t get it. No one appreciated the irony. His sigh was long, deep, and full of disappointment.
    He’d left Missy at a baseball field with a hypodermic needle at her side, a junkie in the middle of America’s symbol of wholesomeness. He’d thought the contrast was interesting, even artistic. He’d positioned her carefully. Hell, he’d even wrapped a fucking bow around her neck. But apparently he’d been too subtle. Maybe if he’d left an apple pie in her lap, the police would have gotten the message.
    He opened his folder. Eight-by-ten color glossies of Missy lying on the bench, arms folded across her midsection Sleeping Beauty-style, hypodermic needle tucked beneath her overlapping fingers. He’d positioned her late Saturday night. Since then, an entire day of severe storms had raged through the area. Maybe the weather or time had affected the precise positioning of Missy’s body.
    Next time he’d be more careful. He’d make sure his message was delivered on time.
    On the TV, behind the reporters, two men in coveralls rolled a gurney toward a white and red van. Missy had been zipped into a black body bag.
    Too bad.
    The public should see what happened to the fallen. She’d deserved what she’d gotten. He’d performed a public service: judgment, punishment, and execution of the depraved.
    Missy had claimed to be redeemed, but none of them were. She’d been dirty. Weak. Pathetic. And now she was gone, plucked from society like a dandelion ripped from a lush, green lawn. The grass would fill in, healthier, stronger without her tainted roots.
    The news segued to a traffic report. He stopped recording.
    How could he make his message clear? Some people were unworthy of life. There were consequences for bad decisions. People should be punished for their sins. What would it take for the world to understand?
    He replayed the news clip. When Detective Dane entered the frame, he paused the recording. She was in charge. Therefore, she was the one he needed to convince.

Chapter Four
    Monday, June 20, near Tabatinga, Brazil
    The booming growl of a howler monkey echoed across the forest. Mac froze. He lowered his binoculars, his survival instincts quivering as the rain forest around him went on alert. Something was wrong.
    June was past the official rainy season, but this part of the jungle didn’t really have a dry one. The Amazon River flowed fat and fast past him, sunlight glimmering on its rippled surface. Twenty yards away, a male giant river otter poked its head above the water and stared downstream. Mac followed the weasel’s focus, looking for the snout of the black caiman that had been hanging around the day before.
    A pair of scarlet macaws burst from the forest and winged out over the river. Mac shifted his binoculars from the water to the canopy. A hundred feet above, the reddish brown body of a howler monkey poised on a thick branch. The air smelled like rain was coming, but torrential downpours were daily events and wouldn’t bother the monkeys. The big male sounded another throaty warning. Something—or someone—was invading the primate’s territory.
    Mac lowered his binoculars. His three-member team had been camped near a small village ten miles from Tabatinga, Brazil, for weeks. The monkeys had become accustomed to their presence. Another group of primates could be encroaching on the home turf of the resident troop. Or it could be something else entirely, maybe a jaguar. The monkeys scattered, the canopy shifting, branches and foliage swaying, as the creatures took flight. If another group of primates were muscling in on their territory, the howlers would have stood their ground, at least for a time. There would have been a vocal protest, posturing, possibly even a physical altercation. The animals’ quick abandonment of their domain meant one thing: predator.
    He scanned the river. The young otters had stopped playing and had scurried into the