Free While Galileo Preys by Joshua Corin Page A

most vulnerable.
    Adding what happened today at the hospital to that little fact and Darcy was fortunate her stress hadn’t flared into the full-blown anxiety attack. The irony, of course, was that she could do the job. She had been at the top of her class at the Academy, and not because the instructors had offered a local girl special treatment. The reality had been exactly the opposite, but Darcy had persevered and now she was here in Amarillo, on her first case as a member of the most elite task force in the entire FBI. Her first case. And possibly her last.
    She detoured to the Hallmark greetings. A get-well card for Tom wasn’t totally out of line. It was thoughtful. After all, her boss had been shot. And he wouldn’t very well tell her to pack her bags after she gave him a get-well card, would he? Would he?
    “Miss, are you all right?”
    Darcy glanced to her left. A sandy-haired man in his forties stood there, a kind smile on his face. He woreranchers’ gloves, and held out a handkerchief in one of his gloved hands.
    “I’m fine. It’s just allergies.” She chuckled a bit to herself. “I know that’s what people say when…but, really, I’m fine.”
    He pocketed the handkerchief in his weather-beaten jean jacket and added, with a chuckle of his own, “Valentine’s Day takes its toll on us all.”
    Darcy nodded. With all that had happened, she’d completely forgotten today was a holiday. Not that she had a sweetheart back in Virginia. A social life was, well, low on her list of priorities. If she got lonely, she had relatives she could visit in almost every county in Virginia. She wouldn’t be like Esme Stuart. Her commitment to the FBI would be permanent. Surely Tom recognized that about her.
    “But I see you’re not even looking for Valentine’s Day cards, are you? How foolish of me to jump to that conclusion. But that’s what I do. Look before I leap. That’s me. But someone you know is ill.” He offered a look of sympathy. “That’s why I’m here too, actually.”
    “Oh?”
    The sandy-haired man shrugged humbly. “It’s unfortunate, really. The ways things happen in this life. We do what we do and meanwhile people get hurt, every day, and that’s just the way the universe works.”
    “I don’t know if it’s as bleak as all that,” replied Darcy. She noticed the man wore a shoulder-holster. What was that tucked inside, a Beretta? Normally she’d be concerned, but this was Texas. The Second Amendment was as beloved here as any of the Ten Commandments. “God only gives us what we can handle.”
    He mumbled something in response, probably in agreement, then looked around the aisle. He suddenly seemed weighed down with despair.
    “Who are you getting your card for?” she asked him.
    “It’s not someone I know very well. But sometimes the message is really more important to the messenger than to anyone else. You know?”
    Darcy reflected on her own semi-selfish reasons for card-shopping. “Yeah,” she said, and felt a bit ashamed.
    “The unfortunate part of it is—her condition’s terminal and she doesn’t even know it. I mean, all of us are dying in increments, but…”
    “That’s terrible.”
    He nodded sadly. “It is.”
    He picked out one of his cards and, with impressive dexterity considering the thickness of his gloves, was able to take a pen out of one of his jacket’s many inside pockets and scrawl a message on its inside. All the while his eyes appeared moist. Not from allergies. Darcy wanted to give the man a hug.
    “Ah, well,” he sighed.
    He returned the pen to its pocket, took out his silenced Beretta, and with it shot Darcy twice in the forehead. He placed the get-well card (a Shoebox Greeting) on her chest and strolled away.
     
    It was Lilly Toro who picked the parking garage for the clandestine meet, not out of any affection forWoodward and Bernstein but because it was, at this late hour, so reliably vacant. She perched on the hood of her VW Beetle and