Vampire Moon Read Online Free Page B

         “Okay. So how did the plane crash?”
     
               “All signs point to sabotage.”
     
               “Sabotage how?”
     
               He was debating how much to tell me. I could almost see the wheels working behind his flirtatious eyes. No doubt he was computing the amount of information he could still give me and still not give up any real government secrets, and yet leave me satisfied enough to sleep with him tonight. A complex formula for sure.
     
               Men are better at math than they realize.
     
               He said, “Someone planted a small explosive in the rudder gears. The pilot heard the explosion, reported it immediately, and then reported that he had lost all control of the plane. Ten minutes later the plane crashed into the side of the San Bernardino Mountains.”
     
               “And everyone on board was killed?”
     
               “Yes. Instantly.”
     
               “Is there any reason to believe that these key witnesses were killed to keep them from testifying?”
     
               “There is every reason to believe that. It’s the only motive we have.” He drank the rest of his Jack and Coke. “Except there’s one problem: our number one suspect was in jail at the time of the crash.”
     
               The waiter came by and dropped off another drink for Greg. Perhaps the waiters here at El Torito Bar and Grill were psychic. Greg picked up his drink and sipped it.
     
               “It would take a lot of pull to sabotage a military plane,” I said.
     
               “Not as much as you might think,” said Greg. “This was a DC-12, and the contract the government has with them stipulates that the makers of the planes get to use their own mechanics.”
     
               “So the mechanic was a civilian.”
     
               “Yes.”
     
               “Have you found the mechanic?”
     
               “Yeah,” he said. “Dead in his apartment in L.A.”
     
               “How did he die?”
     
               “Gunshot in the mouth.”
     
               “Suicide?”
     
               “We’re working on it.”
     
               I followed up with this some more, but Greg seemed to have reached the limit of what he was willing to tell me.
     
               Greg motioned to my half-finished drink. “You going to finish that?”
     
               “Probably not.”
     
               “You want to head over to my place and, you know, talk some more about what it’s like giving yourself raises?”
     
               I said, “When you say ‘talk’ don’t you really mean boff my brains out?”
     
               He grinned and reddened. I reached over and patted his superheated face.
     
               “You’ll just have to give yourself a raise tonight,” I said, and left him my card. “Call me if you hear anything new.”
     
               “But I live right around the cor —”
     
               “Sorry,” I said. “But your calculations were off.”
     
               I smiled sweetly and left.
     
              
     
              
     
              
     
               Chapter Six
     

     
              
     
              
     
               We were at the beach, sitting on the wooden deck of a lifeguard tower. The sign on the lifeguard tower said no sitting on the wooden deck.
     
               “We’re breaking the law,” I said.
     
               Kingsley Fulcrum turned his massive head toward the sign above us. As he did so, some of the moonlight caught his cheek bones and strong nose and got lost somewhere in the shaggy curls that hung on his beefy shoulders.
     
               “We are risking much to be here,” he said. “If we get caught, our super secret identities may be