The couple stood by until his chest was no longer moving. At last the man, who was twenty-five, blond, and well built, checked Christopher’s pulse again. “Okay.”
“Okay,” the woman said. At thirty-six she was still in stunning shape, had short, stylish light red hair, distinctive green eyes, and a steely, unwavering gaze.
The man stood. “Do you ever wonder what’s going through their minds when they do it?”
“I don’t think that’s something you would really want to find out.”
“No. You’re right. I … I just … I wonder sometimes.”
She turned from the corpse. “Check the medicine cabinet. I’ll look in the kitchen and the bedroom.”
“Right.”
After they’d retrieved what they’d come here for, the man asked his partner, “So, what now? Up to Boston?”
“No. We won’t be visiting the importer until next Friday. First, we need to get back to Chennai—pay a little visit to the people at the production factory.”
“Back to India? I thought we were going to go to—”
“The time frame has changed.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Now you do.”
Without another word, she led him outside to the car, and they left for the airport while Christopher’s still-warm corpse lay on the living room floor soaked in blood, less than an hour after he’d awakened expecting to head to work for another ordinary day at the office after his shower and customary cup of strong, black, morning coffee.
Table of Contents
The Alley
1
2
3
4
5
6
The Train Yard
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
48
The Landfill
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
The Hospital Room
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
The Coffeehouse
100
Epilogue
The King