Read The 9th Hour (The Detective Temeke Crime Series Book 1) for Free Online Page B

are.”
    “ Heaven , Kizzy,” Darryl corrected. “Where there’s no more crying or pain.”
    “But Dad, there are bluebells there. I’ve seen them.”
    Kizzy was determined there were carpets of them in the mountains spreading beneath the giant pines. Only bluebells thrived in English woodlands, not the sandy loam of New Mexico. Still, they went camping to look for them, the summer she died.
    Kizzy was like him, big eyes and a big nose. Darryl began to laugh at that for the first time in thirty-four torturous days. Deep in his throat the sound came like rain beating on the roof tiles and he almost lurched forward in his chair.
    His mind was suddenly a blur of memories, fishing, hiking, horse-riding as he looked out of that window at the old wooden swing set he had bought for Kizzy’s birthday. The seat was powdered with snow now and there were large flakes in the air like the molt of a cottonwood tree.
    Best not think about what that man did to her. Best not think of her last moments.
    A small part of him always did – especially the last moments. He wished he could have been there if not to save her then to hold her while she died. During his darkest times, he would hesitate in his thoughts, pausing to wonder. Why her?
    Did that man have a swing when he was a child?
    The thought took him by surprise. What did he care? The man was a monster. He was never a little boy with rosy cheeks and a swing to sit on. Was he?
    He’s someone’s son. He’s someone’s brother. He’s. Some. One.
    Darryl batted the air with his hand. He felt no pity. Not an ounce of it. Not when a homicide detective showed him Kizzy’s little green blazer all covered in blood. She was proud of that blazer and the gold embroidered bird on the pocket. It had the words Clemency Christian School, Home of the Doves written beneath it.
    The doorbell sputtered and then gave a peevish ring, breaking the longest silence he had ever heard. He left his gun on the bed and staggered toward the front of the house, dreading what he might find. Through the spyhole he could just make out a man darker than tar. Temeke, he thought. With the notebook.
    He had an Hispanic woman with him this time, petite, pretty, probably in her early thirties. Why did warning buzzers whisper in his ear each time he saw an attractive woman?
    “How have you been?” Temeke said, eyes shining like two wet pebbles.
    “So, so, Detective,” Darryl whispered as he sat down on a wooden chair. He waved them over to the couch and noticed a whiff of cigarette smoke.
    “Temeke. Call me Temeke .” He introduced his partner as Malin.
    “That’s a type of fish isn’t it?” Darryl said, noting the slight shake of the head, the tiny smile.
    “It’s not spelled the same,” she said.
    Her face was freckled, unusual for an Hispanic woman, and she looked just as uncomfortable as he was.
    The detective stared long and hard. “Had a few phone calls from concerned neighbors. Haven’t been using that tree for target practice, have you?”
    “A few times,” Darryl said, nodding.
    “How many times?”
    “There’s four slugs in the bark.”
    “This is a caution. Next time you use that gun in this neighborhood, it’s mine. Understand?”
    The detective’s words hung in the air and Darryl merely nodded again. He could have confiscated the weapon there and then. But he didn’t.
    “I’m right in thinking you’re a widower?”
    “Yes,” Darryl said, watching the detective’s eyes as they wandered around the room, pausing at a ball of knitting in a wicker basket. “My sister lives here. She looks after the girls.”
    Temeke nodded and placed a scuffed red notebook on the coffee table. “We thought you might want to look at this. I’m sure she would have wanted you to have it.”
    They all looked at it like it was a strange archaeological relic until Darryl broke the silence with a choked thank you . He opened it and saw a dried flower pressed to one page, a desert primrose if he could