The Path of Silence Read Online Free Page A

murmured. He had often argued with Joe about people who lived for years with imbedded projectiles inside their body.
    “He could have been a walking ghost.” Joe tilted his head, holding the drumstick. “That’s what it had to be. He had to walk with that shit in him for some time.”
    I wondered whether I should spoil his midnight snack and tell him that the victim had been missing for four years. I looked at Ken. He blinked. I understood.
    “Have you read any good medical research journals lately, Joe?” Ken asked. Keeping abreast of the latest bizarre medical inventions was another one of Joe’s hobbies.
    Joe tossed the drumstick behind him. It landed on a gurney. “Whatever that shit was, it didn’t come from Johns Hopkins, not legally that’s for sure. I’m going to biop the tissues and send the blood samples over but I don’t think there’s anything there to find anymore. You go and work on his employment, hobbies, friends, family—a name might be nice to have too.”
    “Jonathan Anderson Brick, age thirty-five,” Ken said. “His wallet was in his jeans. The car ownership, registration and insurance were in his car.”
    “There you go,” Joe exclaimed happily. “You’ve got more than enough to start pounding the pavement, looking for the nasty person who executed him.”
    “Executed?” we echoed.
    Joe smirked. “What he had implanted into his chest wouldn’t be cheap. It shouldn’t malfunction. Hell, our military would be rattled to know that someone can do that sort of thing—you know, long-distance and on command. He probably knew it was stuck in there but didn’t know how to get rid of it. Even a crooked veterinarian would be tempted to report that kind of strange device to the police. He must have known and couldn’t tell anyone.” He looked down at Brick’s sharp profile, eyes now closed.
    “Kidnapped, tortured—and executed,” I murmured.
    “Four years between kidnap and execution,” Ken whispered back. Joe heard him.
    “What do you mean four years?” His head reared and his features stiffened.
    I nodded at the body. “Mr. Jonathan Anderson Brick is a cold case in the truest sense of the word. Four years ago, he went out for popcorn and pop to a 7-Eleven and never returned to his fiancé, waiting for him on a couch in front of a TV.”
    We went outside to hail a taxi.
    “Do you think Joe will ever go into a 7-Eleven again?” Ken asked, grinning.
    “Probably not,” I chuckled, remembering the pathologist’s shocked stare. “I should have said Nando’s Chicken. It would have saved us a lot of money.”

Chapter 3
    T he morning clocked in with all the appropriate stress of having guests. Jazz didn’t want to set a good example and take down the tent. I stopped Mrs. Tavalho from doing it
    “Clean up or you’re grounded for the rest of the month,” I said inhospitably. The girls shrank away. I had four hours of sleep and equal amount of fury burning inside me.
    “I don’t hear any voice. Do you?” Jazz ignored me. She turned to her friends for support.
    “Jasmine, take down the tent and clean up the living room or there will be no breakfast for you—or your guests.”
    “I’m an orphan and orphans make their own breakfast,” she declared and moved for the kitchen.
    I was about to lose it. Mrs. Tavalho saw it and touched my arm. She offered compromise. She would help with the tent removal and the breakfast, while I should go check my messages. She heard my cell phone buzzing in my purse.
    She was a wise woman. She knew why Jazz was so difficult lately.
    It wasn’t just the father issue but roots—mine. I was well aware that the grade four had a new course, genealogical studies but it didn’t diminish my resistance to give out information on this dangerous topic. I told Jazz that she should consider herself lucky to have a caring, devoted parent—her mother. These last few weeks, there hadn’t been a moment of truce between us.
    I returned Ken’s message. I