Torn Read Online Free

prophet. The Profit. Crucial difference.
    Once the big, bald cop is safely inside the school, Roland emerges from the van. He opens the creaky rear door. His tools are inside, neatly laid out. First to be removed is the small janitorial cart, rattling as it hits the pavement. Inside the cart he places a ragged string mop, intended for show—look, I’m a janitor cart!—and then, very gingerly, a zippered gym bag. The bag is heavy, more than fifty pounds heavy.
    Careful, careful, don’t want that little sucker activated before the time comes.
    Then, clipped to the inside of the cart rim, just out of sight, a canvas holster, quick release, containing a Glock 17, modified with a reduced-power spring kit for the lightest possible trigger pull. Perfectly legal and not, as the kit warned, for self-defense. Point and shoot without even having to squeeze, that’s how soft the pull—the gun will practically shoot itself.
    Before setting off with the cart, Roland places the white earbuds in his ears and activates the iPod. The Voice has instructed him in the use of the iPod, a device that does not respond well to his clumsy, insensitive fingers. Roland prefers buttons, switches, triggers, not wimpy touch screens. Still, he learned, he practiced until he got it right, and it’s not as if he has to scroll through the selections. The only playlist is a comp of Black Sabbath, specifically selected by The Voice. Even in the heaviest throes of his metal phase, Roland was never a Black Sabbath fan. Waytoo old. Geezers in wigs. Pathetic. His taste tended more toward classic Megadeth tracks, or if he was really twisted, anything by Municipal Waste. Thrash? Don’t mind if I do. The fact is he hasn’t listened seriously to metal since he began to evolve—nearly a year now—but The Voice specified Black Sabbath, and once he has the Ozzified itch of “Killing Yourself to Live” buzzing in his ears it’s okay, strictly as a kind of soundtrack to the sequence of events that have been so painstakingly rehearsed and memorized.
    Roland can see the task list in his mind’s eye, clear as day. Start from the top, follow the numbers, execute each task.
    1. Gain Access
    A wheel spins out of kilter as he pushes the cart across the parking lot, approaching a side door marked Exit Only. Although it is not marked as such, this is where the school takes deliveries. Roland knows this because he worked, ever so briefly, for custodial services. Ring the delivery buzzer and they will come. The buzzer sounds in the coffee room—little more than a closet—and the duty custodian will grudgingly put down his cup, amble out to the door, maybe cadge a smoke from the truck driver making the delivery.
    Roland presses the button, waits. Counts to ten, pushes it again. Lazy bastards.
    It seems to take forever. His heart pounds like a boxer’s padded glove hitting the canvas bag, but in less than a minute the fitted metal door yawns open.
    “Hey, hey,” says Bub Yeaton, his usual salutation.
    Roland figured old Bub would be on duty. Not that his presence is crucial to the plan. Any warm body will do, so long as the door opens. But seeing Bub start to squint, asrecognition dawns—his watery eyes tracking from the cart to Roland, looking comically quizzical—having Bub in his sights is pretty sweet, all things considered.
    “Roland? Hey. Um, what are you doing here?”
    “They give me my job back,” says Roland, reaching into the cart.
    “I don’t think so,” says Bub warily. “Nobody told me.”
    “Check with him,” Roland says, pointing at the empty corridor.
    Bub turns to look. Pure instinct—if someone points, you turn to look. And as the elderly custodian turns his head, Roland withdraws an eighteen-inch length of lead-filled iron pipe from the cart and smacks old Bub on the back of the skull, midway up. Exactly as he has rehearsed, practicing on ripe watermelons.
    The only sound the custodian makes is a flabby wet thump as he hits the hard