"C.E. Murphy - Banshee Cries" - читать интересную книгу автора (Murphy C. E)

Winter Moon
Banshee Cries

C.E. Murphy

This one’s for my mom, Rosie Murphy, who wanted to know what the story with
Jo’s mom was
 Dear Reader,

In September of 2004 I got an e-mail from my agent, the incomparable Jennifer
Jackson, saying she’d just spoken with my equally incomparable editor,
Mary-Theresa Hussey, who wanted to know if I’d be interested in participating in
a LUNA Books anthology as one of three contributing authors. The other two
authors were to be (need I say the incomparable?) Tanith Lee and Mercedes
Lackey.

Not being a great fool, I said yes.

A month of frenzied thought was interspersed with me singing, “One of these
things is not like the others,” followed by a flurry of frenzied writing. The result is
“Banshee Cries,” Book 1.5 of the Walker Papers. It fits chronologically between
book one, Urban Shaman, which came out in June 2005, and book two,
Thunderbird Falls, due out in May 2006.

I hope you enjoy the story!

C.E. Murphy


Chapter One

Sunday March 20th, 2:55 p.m.
Cell phones are the most detestable objects on the face of the earth. Worse than
those ocean-variety pill bugs that grow bigger than your head, which were on my
personal top ten list of Things To Avoid.
My life had been a lovely, cell-free zone until nine weeks, six days, and four hours
ago. Not that I was counting. On that fateful day I got an official business phone to
go with my bulletproof vest and billy stick. I’d even been given a gun to go with my
shiny new badge.
I wanted those things about as much as I’d wanted to bonk my head on the engine
block I’d sat up beneath when the phone rang. I rubbed my forehead and glared at
the engine, then felt horribly guilty. It wasn’t Petite’s fault I’d hurt myself, and she’d
been through enough lately that she didn’t need me scowling on top of it all.
The phone kept ringing. I rolled out from under the Mustang and crawled to her
open door, digging the phone out from under the driver’s seat. “What?”
Only one person outside of work had the phone number. As soon as I spoke I
realized that a politer pickup might have been kosher. The resounding silence from
the other end of the line confirmed my suspicion. Eventually a male voice said,
“Walker?”
I turned around to hook my arm over the bottom of the car’s door frame and did