"Evans,.Linda.-.Far.Edge.Of.Darkness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Evans Linda)

Chapter One

Sibyl Johnson didn't own a rifle.

She wouldn't have known how to shoot one, if she had. And Tony
Bartlett had vanished, apparently right off the edge of the world.

None of which stopped Sibyl from wanting to center his face in the
sights of an honest-to-God, high-powered varmint gun. Sibyl had
spent her formative years increasingly disgusted with small-town
drunken quarrels that led to knifings and shootings on Saturday
nights. But if she ever saw Tony Bartlett again . . .

She'd do a whole lot more than wish for a gun.

Sibyl banged a fist against the steering wheel. How could I have
been so . . . so . . .

Stupid?

Blind?

Naпve?

Any number of scathing put-downs would be appropriate.

Another lightning strike jerked Sibyl back into the present reality of
creaking VW Beetle and steaming Florida heat. She tightened
sweaty hands around the cracked plastic of the steering wheel.
Another searing flash momentarily erased everything beyond her
car: the rutted dirt road, the dust-white trees clinging to the hillside
like forlorn mushrooms, the looming storm that had boiled up out of
a clear sky the way storms always did on summer afternoons.

An aftershock of thunder, shaking the very frame of her battered
car, was louder than the assorted groans, screeches, and bangs
issuing from the rear of the decaying vehicle. "C'mon, Nuggie, you
can do it," she encouraged the faltering car.

Nuggie didn't want to climb the long, shallow grade. She was glad
the old car was running at all, given the repairs it needed. If she'd
lived in mountainous country, like West Virginia or Colorado,
Nuggie would've gone to slag-heap heaven years ago—although
things might have turned out very differently, if she had lived
somewhere else. Tony Bartlett would've picked a different victim,
for one thing.

Sibyl punched the gas pedal savagely. Lightning flared again, even
closer. Thunder rattled side windows in their loose frames. Sibyl