A Deafening Silence In Heaven Read Free Page B

that she wasn’t alone. Marlowe lay on the floor nearby, the black Labrador’s brown, soulful eyes locked upon his master’s still body.
    Reality had remained in one piece after all.
    Linda dared to look at Remy as she cradled him in her arms. There was blood on the front of his dress shirt, the expanding stain reminding her of the violence that had erupted in her lover’s home.
    She saw the fight in staccato images burned into her memory: Remy—her wonderful, handsome Remy—fighting a pale, horrible thing that seemed to have appeared out of nothingness. The memories were as clear as if the events were unfolding before her at that very moment.
    But it was really just one particular sight that caused her to doubt her sanity.
    Made her doubt her reality.
    Maybe it had already fallen, insanity growing like some malignant vine, twisting the normal into something beyond comprehension.
    Remy had had wings—powerful, golden wings. She had seen them as clear as day in the theatre of her mind’s eye but still doubted their actuality.
    Marlowe whined again and shoved his black snout beneath Remy’s still hand, attempting to flip it so that Remy would pet him. But the hand just flopped back to the floor.
    The Lab’s sadness was palpable, and whether Linda believed in what she had just witnessed, Remy was injured, and she needed to help him.
    She let his body slide gently to the wood floor, placing her hands on his face, struggling to remain in control of her emotions. His skin was cold and turning an unhealthy shade of gray. She could feel Marlowe’s eyes watching her as she searched for signs of life.
    “He’s going to be all right,” she told the dog as she jammed her fingers beneath the collar of Remy’s shirt, desperate to find a pulse. “Don’t do this to me,” she said aloud, panic creeping in as she felt none. “Don’t you dare!”
    She’d had to take CPR classes when working as a waitress at Piazza and tried to remember what she’d been taught. She placed the heels of her hands, one atop the other, on the center of Remy’s chest and began compressions.
    Marlowe paced around her, vocalizing his concern.
    “It’s okay, buddy,” she said, breathlessly, still pumping. “We’re going to bring him back to us.”
    She stopped for a moment and checked again for a pulse. Still finding none, she reached into her back pocket for her phone to call 911—and found it empty.
    “Fuck!” she screamed in frustration, turning toward the living room, where she had landed when Remy had thrown her inside. Her eyes scanned the room, landing on a small pile of crushed bone smoldering in a patch of sunlight that managed to creep from beneath the pulled shades. She thought of the pale-skinned attacker and the weapon he’d wielded. She remembered the feel of it shattering beneath her foot as she stomped down upon it.
    It was real.
    She recalled the ferocity of the battle, Remy holding on to his foe as his hands began to burn. And there was the black, oily stain where the pale man had died, eaten alive by the fire that had come from her lover’s hands.
    It was real.
    Linda was suddenly dizzy, but the sound of Marlowe’s whines as he licked Remy’s ashen face spurred her on. She caught sight of the phone and lunged across the floor, snatching it up.
    Just as Marlowe erupted. The dog stood over Remy, staring beyond the open door to the foyer, barking furiously, black hackles raised the length of his back and tail standing out stiffly from his body.
    As if yet another threat was about to present itself.
    •   •   •
    Francis was in the basement apartment of the Newbury Street brownstone that he owned, trying to drown his anxieties in a tumbler of scotch and Sergio Leone’s
Once Upon a Time in the West
. But he hadn’t even made it to the introduction of Henry Fonda’s reptilian villain, Frank, before being forced to switch the Blu-ray player off.
    He couldn’t banish the look from his mind—the expression of