Read Helix: Plague of Ghouls for Free Online

snorted.
    “Pay-per-view, too.”
    “I can’t expense that.”
    “The Marigold Hotel it is then, God help you, or the Lancaster Motel.”
    “Nothing else?”
    “Holiday Inn burned down, and the Ambassador went bankrupt. Don’t go to The Purple Horn.”
    “Still a BDSM club?”
    “Swinger’s club on Thursdays,” Buckle said, with a nod. “I hear they’ve got the best wings in town. Floor show’s nothing to write home about though.”
    Two-Trees smiled. “Give me ten minutes to make my calls, and I’ll be right back to take another look at what CSI’s grabbed so far.”
    “You need this?” Buckle offered the flashlight.
    Under the gurgle of flooded ditches and the rush of wind through the weeds, Two-Trees swore he heard the soft padding of feet. Buckle swung his flashlight in the direction Two-Trees had turned. The light shone on a swaying bush of staghorn sumac. None of the other trees moved.
    “Yeah, gimme that,” Two-Trees said. “Last thing I want to kick in the dark is somebody’s head.”
    “Aw, but that would make my job easier. Hurry back, would you?”
    Two-Trees made his way through the slippery grass, across the damp wooden planks, and down the gravel shoulder to his truck. Once there, he collapsed his umbrella, got in the truck, and considered speeding away. He picked up his cell without disconnecting it from the charger and placed his first call.
    “Maple, calling in, ID is HTT1963,” he said. “Yeah, that’s me. Yeah, they’ve granted me access to the site, no problem.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “No, of course not yet. It’s too early for any kind of DNA testing. Hell, the medical examiner hasn’t even arrived yet.” Rainwater warped the scene outside. Another OPP cruiser drove up from town and parked at the head of the line. “Yeah, it won’t be long before the press arrives. Halo County may have grown in the six years since I was here last, but it’s still the small town I knew thirty years ago. We’re not going to be able to keep something like this a secret, press or no press.”
    He rubbed his forehead.
    “But if you ask me to go on instinct? Then yes, we do have a big problem on our hands. I’m going to need backup, preferably a well-trained canine unit.” He wiped his face. “You’ve gotta send me Bridget on this one. No—I . . . No, listen to me. Hey! Listen! I know what she did, and I don’t agree with it either, but I know why she did it, and we’ve got a hell of a lot more on our hands than what did or didn’t happen at Wyndham Farms. It’s Bridget or nobody, not even me. I’m not equipped to deal with . . . Yes, I realize that, but—but I . . .” He sighed and nodded, though the nod was useless on a voice call. “I understand. See what you can do for me, all right? And we’re going to need some help on the inside, because guaranteed, they’re going to run tests, and that’s going to give us a whole new level of grief.”
    Could be in Venice right now, standing on the Bridge of Sighs. Sailing around Corfu. Checking out the nudist beaches on the Côte D’Azur.
    “Either way, we need the experts on this one,” Two-Trees said.
    Can’t believe we’re back to this. We were supposed to be finished with this three years ago.
    “No, I don’t mean Gil. Leave him where he is.”
    Can’t believe I’m saying this.
    “We need Daniel Grey. He started this. He ends it.” He saw figures moving past the escaping light of the evidence tent. “No, because it isn’t just one. Listen to me. There are parts of a very large corpse that have gone missing, and either they were sliced off and taken away in bags, or they were sliced off and taken away in stomachs—either way, there would have been more than one stomach could handle, even one of theirs. This kid was huge.” The insides of his windshield and windows were fogging up, and humidity clung to him, amplifying the smell of exposed intestines and muddy, clotting blood. “I don’t