Read Dying to Know for Free Online Page A

tellin’ you this for your own good. Some-
    body askin’ questions and making it sound like you and the wife,
    you know, gotta thing.”
    “Who’s spreading that?”
    40
    Mr. Sumo shrugged.
    “Find out.” Bear tapped his watch. “Time’s ticking. Get me the
    name or I come for your boss. Capice ?”
    “Sure, sure. But I’m tellin’ ya’, he’s not playin’ in this one. Back off.”
    Bear reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of bil s. He
    tossed several at Mr. Sumo. “You find out who’s talking about
    Angela and me, Tommy. Find out fast. And you better start prov-
    ing your boss is clean, too, or he’s going down. The easy way or
    the hard way.”
    Bear turned and headed for his golf cart.
    “Yeah, yeah. And hey …”
    Bear stopped and turned around.
    “Watch your ass, Bear. If you get it next, who’s gonna keep my
    parole clean?”
    41
    eig ht
    When Bear left Tommy on the fairway, he seemed angry and
    frustrated. He mumbled he was late for a “thing,” abandoned his
    golf cart in the parking lot, and drove off. He took his frustration out on the gravel driveway.
    Whatever his “thing” was, I didn’t want to be part of it.
    I decided to let him cool down and headed for home on foot.
    I strol ed along trying to conjure up the magic words to launch
    me onto the spook-highway and materialize in my den, but noth-
    ing was working. Unable to find the formula, I settled on a five-
    mile fall hike to contemplate what my life—or lack of it—would
    now be.
    I never made it a mile.
    “ Oliver—go to Angel. Go now. ”
    Oliver? Who said that?
    Fear gripped me. It squeezed my thoughts in a fist and
    twisted. It was confusing, disorienting—I wasn’t afraid … Angel
    42
    was. She appeared in front of me as her terror reached out and
    seized me. She was bracing herself against an unseen attack. Her
    thoughts were flustered and whirled in circles searching for pro-
    tection, somewhere to hide and find safety. Her voice echoed in
    my head, calling me, begging me to help her.
    “ Dammit, Oliver, go to her. Fol ow her. ”
    The voice burned into my head. It was loud and commanding
    but it wasn’t from anyone near. It came from inside. Then I heard
    Angel again, begging me to reach her. Fol ow her … Yes. Like a distant light in the darkness, I followed her voice and it led me to her.
    
    She was pressed against a highboy dresser, fighting to slide it
    across the floor against the bedroom door. She was crying but
    her teeth were clinched in determination. Something was terrify-
    ing her and she was barricading herself in.
    “Angel, what is it? What’s happening?”
    I recognized the room from the photographs on the wall.
    They were all Civil War monuments from throughout Virginia.
    This was one of Ernie Stuart’s guest rooms. The Monument
    Room, as Angel called it, where she slept last night.
    “Angel, I’m here. What’s wrong?”
    For a second, she stopped and looked around as though
    searching for my voice. Then she attacked the dresser again. The
    highboy stuck on the heavy corded rug. She grunted, tried to lift
    it free, but failed. She ran to the window and looked out. What-
    43
    ever she saw—or didn’t see—calmed her, and she went to the
    door and pressed herself against it to listen.
    “Angel?”
    Her face paled and she returned to the highboy. This time,
    she succeeded in inching the dresser across the rug and against
    the bedroom door. For a second, she leaned against the wall,
    head cocked, straining to hear what I was sure she would not.
    I was wrong.
    Footsteps in the downstairs hall tromped to the foot of the
    stairs and stopped. Then they moved away, lighter this time. Sec-
    onds later, something crashed and rolled across the floorboards.
    Then one glass—then two—shattered on the floor. The footsteps
    retreated further and went silent.
    “No, no, no.” Angel’s eyes flooded and she pressed all her
    weight against the highboy, leveraging it tighter against the