Read The Hell You Say for Free Online

that, if you’re single, it is absolutely the loneliest time of year.
    It would have been a lot lonelier if I hadn’t had Lisa and a handful of good friends. And this year I had Jake. Sort of.
    Naturally I wanted to spend Christmas with Jake, but I realized that was unlikely. He would spend it with his family, who after forty years apparently had no clue that James Patrick Riordan had a yen for men. Despite the fact that he spent a couple of nights a week under my roof and in my bed, there was no way that Jake was going to set them straight (as it were).
    Nor was he likely to spend Christmas on my turf. He wasn’t thrilled about the fact that my mother and Chan, his partner on the force, knew we had a relationship. Add four more strangers to the mix, and I’d probably never see him again.
    Jake had vacation time coming -- he always had vacation time coming, because he was a workaholic -- and for a while I had toyed with the idea of trying to persuade him to take a trip for the holidays. I thought that on neutral ground, someplace where no one knew either of us, he might relax again, and we might regain the closeness we had shared the previous spring. But I had never got around to asking him -- mostly because I was fairly sure he’d say no.

    24 Josh Lanyon
    There were a few forlorn Christmas lights as I drove down Colorado Boulevard. The lamppost holly wreaths had a windblown, ghost-town look. I turned off onto the quiet side street, driving past mostly dark shops and closed businesses.
    I lived over the bookstore. The building had originally been a small hotel built back in the ’30s. I’d bought the place not long after I’d inherited a chunk of change from my paternal grandmother. I’d graduated from Stanford with a degree in literature and a vague idea that running a bookstore would be a good day job for a writer. A decade later it turned out that writing wasn’t a bad hobby for a guy who ran a bookstore.
    Old Town was a happening place at night, but not in my neighborhood. Around here it emptied out about eight o’clock. Generally I liked the privacy. Tonight it felt lonely.
    I wondered if Jake might have left a message on the answering machine, but I knew that was unlikely. I wouldn’t see him tonight, not two nights in a row. The CD started over. I listened to the sweet sorrowful chords of “Rain,” reached over to turn off the player.
    Turning into the alley behind the store, my headlights slid across the brick wall of the back of the building. I caught a gleam, like eyes shining in the gloom. I had a confused glimpse of something uncomfortably like heels disappearing out of the spotlight of my headlights. I jammed on the brakes.
    Had I imagined it?
    I waited, engine idling, exhaust red in the Forester’s taillights, windshield wipers squeaking against the glass.
    No movement in the shadows.
    A cat, I thought.
    A really tall cat.
    A really tall cat wearing sneakers.
    I took my foot off the brake, rolled quietly into my parking space. After a moment’s hesitation, I turned off the ignition.
    A gust of wind sent a milk carton skittering along the asphalt. It was the only sound in the alley, the only movement.
    I got out of the SUV and went inside.

    * * * * *
Things looked brighter in the morning, but that was due to sunshine slicing through the leaden cloud cover, not any emotional epiphany on my part.
    I had requested that the temp agency open another can of sales associates. They sent me Mrs. Tum. Mrs. T was a diminutive and elderly lady with practically no English, which provided insight into how the agency perceived my business.

    The Hell You Say

    25
    Mrs. Tum also appeared to be rather excitable in nature, as I discovered when she tried to explain to me about the graffiti on the front step.
    Finally, when I was still no comprende-ing, Mrs. T grabbed my arm with her doll-sized hands and hauled me outside, where I had an up close and personal view of what appeared to be a pentagram drawn in blood on