Read Online Under Cover of Darkness by Julie E. Czerneda - Free Book Online Page A

heavy footsteps outside my office. Oh, no, they had finally found me!
    Moving fast, I silently opened the top drawer to my desk and pulled out a Glock .357 Magnum. The checkered grip filled my palm like the handshake of an old friend, firm and reassuring. Dropping the clip, I quickly checked the load inside. Lead dumdum, silver bullets, and US Army armor-piercing rounds. Not much, but it was the best I had. But then, in spite of what the movies show, private investigators rarely use a gun. Especially ones that specialize in corporate espionage. No damn dirty divorce work for me. Love betrayed, weeping and screaming, widows and orphans . . . no way. I was trying to keep my soul clean, ever since I took possession of the Key.
    Easing the clip back into the grip, I gently worked the slide to chamber a round and leaned back in my chair. This didn’t have to be demons from hell. Might be pure coincidence that a visitor came exactly at midnight and fog blanketed the city. Hey, anything was possible. I tightened my grip on the Glock, disengaging the safety. Then again . . .
    The footsteps thumping along the hallway stopped right outside my door. There was a short pause, and then somebody politely knocked twice.
    â€œExcuse me, I saw the light under your door,” a soft feminine voice said. “May I use your bathroom?” She sounded sweet and southern. Pure corn pone and hom iny grits. A delicate flower of the South. “The one in the lobby is broken, and I really have to pee something fierce. Please?”
    â€œJust a sec,” I answered cheerfully, aiming at chest level where the heart would be on a human being. Yeah, she was from the South, all right. Straight down south. Near the core of the planet.
    Two thousand years ago, King Solomon himself had built a temple to keep the Key safe from the wrong hands. Inhuman hands. The Crusades in the Middle Ages—just a cover story for the Knights Templar to get it back after being stolen by a traitor in our ranks. William Shakespeare wore it around his neck in a leather pouch for safekeeping, which is why all of his hair fell out so young. Mozart died from touching it with a bare finger, and Beethoven went stone deaf from doing the exact same thing, trying to prove it wasn’t really dangerous. George Washington wanted to use it to help his troops in the American Revolution, but Ben Franklin gave it to Paul Revere to hide somewhere safe until the fighting was over. The key he tied to that famous kite was merely a decoy to throw pursuers off the trail.
    Finally, Jules Verne devised a way to keep it safe—wrap it in soft lead foil—and Oscar Wilde pretended to be a homosexual and went to jail rather than divulge that secret. Nikola Tesla tried to destroy the Key and was driven insane. Jack Benny was badly scared just from looking at it in the moonlight, while Louie Arm-strong and Colonel Sanders flatly refused to believe it could possibly exist. John Glenn wanted to cast it into space, but Wally Schirra talked him out of it. Presidents, congressman, and generals kept it hidden in Fort Knox for decades, but when that location became known to the others, the Key was given to me.
    For over two millennia, my brother Freemasons had fought, lied, cheated, stolen, and died, to keep the Key from the unholy hands of our enemies. Some of them even took the blame for crimes they had not committed and been sent to jail for life, or executed, just to keep any official investigations from going further and discovering the possible existence of the Key. And, more importantly, what it unlocked.
    Now, I have the bedamned thing sown into my leather belt, and somehow, They had found me, were knocking on my office door, coming to get me, kill me , and take away the Key of Solomon to unlock That Which Should Never Be Opened.
    â€œCome in,” I said smoothly, taking the Glock in a two-handed grip and holding my breath. Steady now, easy does it, don’t want to shoot a