Read Online Whirlwind by Charles Grant - Free Book Online Page A

it was just after four. “I suppose it’s too late to catch Dr. Rios. What about…Patty? Patty Deven. Is she well enough to talk to us?”
    Garson stabbed a thumb at her as Mulder rejoined them. “She always like this?”
    â€œWe have three people murdered, Red. The altitude didn’t kill them.”
    The man nodded, accepting the point and the rebuke without taking offense. “The Devens live about a mile down the road. They’re fixing to head back to Chicago as soon as this is cleared up.I’ll take you over, but I’m telling you now that you won’t be welcome.”
    Â 
    He was right.
    Scully caught the instant hostility as soon as Kurt Deven opened the trailer door and saw who it was. When Garson introduced his companions, the man scowled and told them to wait. Then he closed the door. Hard.
    Mulder nodded toward the riverline of cottonwood sixty or seventy yards away. “Down there?”
    â€œYep. The bank slopes sharp right about where you’re looking. It happened a little ways to the right.”
    Scully shaded her eyes against the low-hanging sun and tried to see it at night, with little but moon and stars for illumination. The trailer wouldn’t help; it was too far away, and except for the skeleton of an unfinished house beside it, there were no other homes in the immediate area, even though she saw flagged wooden stakes in the ground, marking other lots soon to be developed. The nearest trailer was a good sixty yards away.
    The door opened.
    The two men stepped aside as a woman stepped down onto the cinder-block steps. She was short and slight, with straight blonde hair that needed a brushing, and a lost, empty look inher eyes. When she spoke, rage and grief made her hoarse:
    â€œShe doesn’t want to talk to you again, Mr. Garson.”
    Red told her softly he understood, and apologized for the intrusion. “But I have these folks here, Mrs. Deven. All the way from Washington.” He cleared his throat, glanced at the open doorway. “They’re experts in this kind of crime. If anyone can catch the—”
    â€œNobody has,” she snapped. “It’s been two weeks, and nobody has.”
    Scully lifted a hand to draw her attention. “Mrs. Deven?”
    The woman took her time: “What?”
    Scully kept her voice gentle. “Mrs. Deven, I won’t lie to you. I won’t pretend to know how you feel for your loss, or how your daughter feels. But Agent Mulder and I have done this more times than I ever want to tell you. And if nothing else, I can promise you that we don’t quit. We’re not perfect, but we do not quit.”
    Mary Deven’s hands pressed lightly to her stomach, eyes narrowed. “Are you promising me you’ll catch him?”
    â€œNo,” Mulder answered, just as gently, just as firmly. “We’re only promising you that we won’t quit. And if you don’t want us to bother you, or your family, you won’t have to worry.”
    Mrs. Deven stared at the trees, blinking rapidly,then not at all. “Just don’t take her down there,” she said, barely above a whisper. “You take her down there, I’ll lose her.”
    Scully agreed readily, and said nothing when Mulder asked Garson to show him the scene. After all this time, there wouldn’t be anything left of real value—Garson and his men and the local police would have raked it over thoroughly. Mulder, however, had a knack for finding things in barren places, a knack she didn’t pretend to understand as well as she wanted to.
    â€œAgent Scully?”
    Wan, painfully thin, Patty Deven was the mirror image of her mother, right down to the haunted look. A fading bruise spread across her right cheek and temple. Her eyes were too large behind her glasses.
    They sat on two lawn chairs. There was no shade, and no offer of a drink.
    After a long silence, with the girl staring at the knot of