Read Body Of Truth for Free Online Page A

other’s backs. They would never tell anyone. But they’d do their damnedest to get out of that neighborhood, to make something of themselves like Father wanted.
    They’d succeeded beyond what they could have conceived of at the time. Father would have been proud, if he’d lived to see them now. That’s what counted most to him. He, they, had risen above what meager prospects the neighborhood had offered. They had made it.
    Damn Mouse! For twenty-five years they’d kept their pact and their silence—and for the most part, their distance, as well. But thanks to Mouse, they were in it all over again. Mouse had come to him begging his understanding and his help. He hadn’t meant to kill the nosy bitch, but she wouldn’t leave it alone. He’d seen his carefully built life ruined because of her and panicked.
    That was the trouble with lies and secrets: No matter how carefully you kept them, they sought the light, they sought discovery. He’d lived the last twenty-five years waiting, knowing time would eventually reveal what they’d done. But why now, when he’d finally allowed himself to breathe, to hope, to want, did his world threaten to dissolve around him?
    More than discovery, he feared what else Mouse would do to keep the secret besides what he’d done already. But this time there would be no pact, no promises. They weren’t children anymore; they were grown men. He couldn’t be a party to it anymore. He put the picture back in his wallet, hiding it behind another. This time, if there was hell to pay, he’d pay it and let the chips fall where they may.

Three
    If not Jonathan’s least favorite place, the m.e.’s office on Crosby Avenue had to run a close second. Not that the sight of blood or gore fazed him. He’d been a cop long enough to have gotten over any innate squeamishness he might have possessed. But folks who made a career out of poking around in dead people’s insides had to be one step up from crazy.
    Jonathan parked in the small lot at the back of the building and got out of the car. Heat rushed up at him from the pavement. This day threatened to be as much of a scorcher as the day before. Mari came up beside him as he retrieved his jacket from the back seat and put it on.
    â€œReady to meet the relative?”
    Jonathan snorted. Seymour Banks, Amanda Pierce’s only living relative, had been met at LaGuardia airport by a black-and-white unit, supposedly as a courtesy to the bereaved. In truth, Jonathan wanted to get a bead on the man when he viewed his sister’s body. Distance preventing him from seeing first-hand Banks’s reaction to the news Pierce had been killed, as he would have liked. Without intending to, people gave away a lot about themselves by the way they reacted to the news, sometimes their own culpability.
    According to the detective that had spoken to the brother, Banks had responded with neither surprise nor much emotion. There could be any number of explanations for that. After Jonathan had spoken to Mari last night, he’d spent a few hours researching Amanda Pierce on the Internet. No one but her publisher seemed to have a kind word for the woman.
    Reviews attacked her literary prowess. The subjects of her tell-all books threatened lawsuits, though as far as he could determine none had actually gone to trial. The general public seemed to hate her most of all. The “Let’s Start by Killing Amanda Pierce” message board, which appeared to be frequented mostly by fans of the celebrities she’d skewered, featured innovative ways to put Pierce out of everyone else’s misery.
    The uni pulled into the parking lot and took the spot beside them. The officer on the passenger’s side got out and opened the back door. Banks stepped out. A man of medium height, with a slender build and lanky brown hair, he wore a pair of gray slacks and a summer weight sweater that appeared casual but