Sleight Read Free Page A

any information on my own knacks. Other than Mr. Goodturn’s request to contact him I didn’t really know much about Kenwoode and it was clear that he was comfortable not sharing much about himself.
    I looked at Mr. Goodturn again. “A good sign. What happens next? Does he need something different?” I paused. “Do you think the ice is still necessary? He seems so cold. His skin is almost blue.”
    Sniffing, Mr. Kenwoode came closer to the bed and poked at one of the bags of ice with a finger. “I would expect not. Any motor movement, even if it is only his eyes, probably indicates that his physical body is not at risk of decay.”
    Decay? It was a little disrespectful, but that was part of Mr. Kenwoode’s questionable charm.
    “Yeah? Well, do you want me to get rid of it? What do we do next? Is there something else we should be doing?”
    Tugging at the bottom edge of his vest, he rolled his shoulders and cleared his throat. “Yes, I think that there are several things I can put you about.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
THREE: PLAYING WITH MATCHES
     
    AN HOUR LATER I had finished up in Mr. Goodturn’s room. I’d glanced at his face a dozen times but his eyes had remained closed and he hadn’t responded to my attempts to speak with him on my private frequency. Kenwoode had headed back to his favorite spot, and was engrossed in paperwork that covered a large desk in Mr. G’s library, essentially dismissing me.
    I headed back downstairs to the pawnshop.
    It was late morning and the light from outside was trying to get through all of the stuff in the shop’s windows, giving the interior of the pawnshop an eerie half-lit glow. Even though the shop had never been a busy environment, Mr. Goodturn’s presence had always given the place its own kind of energy. Heart, I guess. His small, yet exciting progress upstairs left me nervous and hopeful, but his reference to Breno was bouncing around in my head.
    What did he need from Breno, or what did Breno need from me? The big simpleminded superintendent had been scarce since we’d both escaped a near death experience. That had been at the hands of Sonja, the other lavender-eyed female in my life. He and I had ended up in the hospital. I’d used my knacks to sneak away, while Breno had been forced to remain there for days until Kenwoode had helped me get him discharged. Breno had been unusually quiet when we had taken him home, and when I had explained what had happened to Mr. Goodturn he had taken it hard. He’d cried all the way to the apartment building.
    Last year I’d uncovered the history and connection between Breno and Mr. Goodturn. Breno, as an angry teen, had possessed a knack for creating fire. That knack had drawn him into Mr. G’s circle somehow, sort of put him on the Knack Network Radar. Breno’s knack, his emotional instability and the abusive home he’d been raised in had resulted in a dramatic event that had ended with his parents being burned alive. Breno had become Mr. Goodturn’s responsibility, and not coincidentally, Breno’s fire-making ability and most of his intelligence had been wiped out as well.
    That had been a difficult time in my relationship with Mr. Goodturn. He’d justified what he’d done to Breno as necessary to protect Breno and others from Breno. I had seen it as him playing God. Mr. G’s reason for erasing Breno’s knack was understandable. And his regret over having unintentionally damaged Breno’s intellect had seemed genuine. But I’d had a hard time reconciling the whole thing. Eventually my belief in Mr. Goodturn’s noble motivation, and the fact that I thought of him as a father figure, had made it possible for me to see it as an accident born out of good intentions.
    Heck, I’ve made my share of mistakes while I was trying to do something good too.
    Not interested in opening the shop and needing some time to myself I left through the front door and knacked the lock behind me,