Read Online Rust On the Razor by Mark Richard Zubro - Free Book Online

eerie: clear visibility at ground level, and then these wisps of fog, and then above them a dark sky to the west but faint grays and the first blues off to the east.
    I ambled to the car. The lights in the parking lot flicked off as I approached our rental. I saw a dark figure in the backseat of the car. “Now what?” I muttered.
    As I approached, the bulk didn’t move. A few seconds later I was close enough to recognize, despite the deep shadows, the grinning face of Peter Woodall, the sheriff. I unlocked the front door and flipped the lock for all the doors. An unpleasant odor mixed with the new-car smell. I guessed it had something to do with the nearby forests, swamps, and farms. Odd I hadn’t noticed it when I walked
out of the hospital. Maybe the wind had changed.
    By the time I wrenched open the back door, I’d completely lost my temper. “I don’t know what the fuck you think you’re doing, you son of a bitch. I’ve never done anything to you. I just want to be left alone. As soon as Scott’s father is better, we’re leaving. I wouldn’t want to stay in your goddamn county anyway.”
    Woodall just kept staring forward and grinning.
    â€œLook, asshole,” I continued, “maybe you’ve got some score to settle with Scott. Maybe you should fight a duel or do whatever it is macho guys do in the South, but why don’t you leave us the hell alone until that can be arranged?”
    He grinned some more.
    I leaned further in. Most of his body was shrouded in darkness. The odd smell was almost overwhelming. “Look, shit-for-brains, maybe you can hide in the backseat of people’s cars in this part of the country, but—”
    The grinning face slowly leaned toward me and then continued past my startled expression and slumped all the way over.
    I grabbed the body before it could fall out of the car. It was cold. The front of Woodall’s shirt felt damp and sticky. “Shit.”
    I shifted his bulk so he was sitting up. The light was dim, and I could still barely see. I looked at my hand. The sticky dampness I’d felt was blood.
    I lifted Woodall’s head up to feel for the carotid artery, although I figured it was quite useless. I’d held dead bodies in the jungles of Vietnam, and this one felt just like those. Checking the carotid was indeed pointless. Moving his head gave me the cause of his death. His throat had been slit.

4
    I’m afraid that the vision that flashed across my mind was that of my father. One Saturday afternoon he was showing my brothers and me how to fix something on his car. He’d just toggled some switch or other and started the car when a puff of smoke and a tongue of flame rose from inside the engine. My father stood there for a minute. We boys backed away a few steps, wondering if the car or my father would explode. He just stood there with his hands at his side, staring into the engine. All he said was, “This is a revoltin’ development.”
    My sentiments exactly.
    I looked at the body. I held out my blood-covered hands. With nothing to wipe them on I tried using the floor of the car as the nearest dry surface. I got most of it off, but stray smears and small patches of stickiness remained. Touching the body had also gotten blood on the front of my shirt and pants.
    I looked around to see if there was anyone in the vicinity to call to for help.
    Nobody. I didn’t need to be involved in a murder investigation in the South. Who knew what lunacy might be perpetrated?
    I hesitated to go for help. The only other person who
had been here was the murderer. The crime scene could hardly be more pure or better preserved. With the light at hand I did some examining. Woodall’s shirt was bloody, but the car itself had very little blood on it. With that kind of wound more than his shirt would have gotten soaked; the area around the body would be saturated. The pavement surrounding the car had no