Primal Scream Read Free Page A

situation, for either way—linger or avert your gaze—she had your number, so she had you. With honey-blond hair, cobalt eyes, high cheekbones, and bee-stung lips, Spann reminded Craven of Ursula Andress in Doctor No , and watching the movie, it was hard to stare at the shell in her hand. Not only was Spann a looker, but she had pedigree, too. Kathy was the cop who had taken the Headhunter down. She had been shot and almost killed in the line of duty. Posted abroad, she had served with distinction in Thailand, India, Colombia, and Haiti. Now rumor was DeClercq was grooming her for head of Administration at Special X, a rapid climb given her age . . . but some folks had it all.
    If Spann rose to inspector, Nick hoped to land her current job.
    Inspector Zinc Chandler was head of Operations. He had been promoted during the Africa case, and was DeClercq's second in command. Six foot two and almost two hundred pounds, his physique was muscled from working the Saskatchewan farm. Rugged and sharp-featured, his face was hard and gaunt, years of pain subtracting from his handsome good looks. Zinc's natural steel-gray hair was the color of his eyes, its metallic tint responsible for his given name. The Special External Section of the RCMP investigated crimes with links outside Canada. Special X cases sent its Members around the world, where Zinc had taken a shot to the head in Hong Kong, a knife to the back on Deadman's Island, and barely escaped being ripped apart by Terrible Ones in Botswana. Until the chief returned from France, Chandler was commanding officer of Special X, so Craven handed him the parcel forwarded from H.Q. up the street.
    With stamps but no return address, the plain brown wrapper read:
     
    Commanding Officer
    Special External Section
    Royal Canadian Mounted Police
    5255 Heather Street Vancouver, B.C. V5Z 1K6
     
    "Security check it?" Chandler asked. The Force had recently endured a kamikaze bomb.
    "X-ray and dog sniff," Craven replied. "Arrived in the morning mail. Nothing exposed on-screen but several small rings."
    "What time's your flight?" Chandler asked Spann as he undid the wrapper, revealing the six-inch-square box within.
    "Ten," she said, glowering at the downpour hammering on the windows, slanted dismal gray streaks masking Queen Elizabeth Park crowning Little Mountain. "Shitty day to travel."
    "I'll drive you to the airport. What's up?" Craven asked.
    "The headless body the Mad Dog found in the woods up north? It was missing a phalange from the right ring finger. Which matches an Idaho hunter who vanished near there last month."
    "Maybe the animals turned the tables and bagged his head as a trophy."
    "Christ!" cursed Chandler, dropping the box like a hot potato so what it contained tumbled out and rolled across the desk.
    "Is that what I think it is?" gasped Spann.
    "Those animals are smarter than I thought," Craven muttered.
    Chandler recovered quickly from his reflex. "Could be we've got the jigsaw piece that completes the headless hunter."
    For on the desk lay a shrunken head the size of a navel orange. The wrinkled, shriveled skin was bleached ash white. Streaming from the miniature face was silken black hair. The eyes were stitched shut, and so was the mouth. The thin lips were pierced with small gold rings laced together hoop to hoop with a zigzag black leather thong.
     
     

 
     
     
    The Mad Charcutier
     
     
    Domfront, France
     
    For the first time in a long time DeClercq savored contentment. He stood at the north window of the piano salon on the second floor of La Maison de la Resistance and gazed up across the slope of the hill at the castle ruins on top. Domfront, a medieval town, was steeped in history, so as he watched the shadows of twilight creep around the battlements, his mind pictured incidents from the Dark Ages. Here, six hundred feet above the Varenne Valley, Duke William (not yet "the Conqueror") seized the first castle in 1049 to make this Normandy. His son, Henry I of