Free The Golem of Hollywood by Jonathan Kellerman Page A

Lead-Free. He disjointed the drying rack and gave the pieces to his neighbor, who had a working fireplace. A pawnbroker offered him thirty dollars for the kiln, a sum so meager that it brought remorse down on him like a bootheel.
    Fifty with the tools.
    Jacob said no, thanks, he’d decided to keep those.
    He took his thirty bucks and went back to the garage, combing through the bags in search of anything worth salvaging. He’d done an unfortunately thorough job of venting his anger: mostly it was shards and dust.
    A few items swathed in newspaper had survived. A couple of coffee mugs. A double-handled cup for washing hands. A
mezuzah
. A lidded jar with strong, thin walls whose exact function he could not determine. He placed them carefully in a duffel bag lined with towels.
    One well-padded bundle turned out to be several dozen smaller pieces, individually wrapped. Curious, he pulled away a corner of the paper and was startled by the appearance of a tiny, alien face. He unwrapped the rest of the pieces and discovered more of the same.
    He had long assumed that his mother’s switch to plates and cups had something to do with Judaism’s disapproval of depictions of the human form—an outgrowth of the ban on idolatry.
    Or maybe she had given herself an out, on a technicality: certainly,the things in his hands weren’t
human
in any conventional sense. Gray, mottled with black and dark green, strongly organic, they shimmered, and their limbs writhed as though to escape.
    Bina had invited people to handle her creations. Even the simplest pieces responded to touch.
    These appeared to resent it.
    Surrounded by junk on the floor of the broiling garage, his hair sticking up, he’d stared at the figurines, wondering if and how he’d misjudged her.
    He wrapped them up and put them in the duffel.
    He’d borne this sad legacy through two marriages and countless apartments, nailing up the
mezuzah
, putting the washing cup by the kitchen sink, filling the jar with sugar. He took his coffee black, but it gave him something pleasant to offer a lady friend in the morning. They oohed and aahed at his good taste.
    The potter’s tools he displayed in the bookcase: they were objects of beauty in themselves, their smooth wooden handles glowing from within. He could look at them and be reminded that life was fragile and strange and brief. For some reason, that made him feel good.
    The figurines creeped Renee out so badly that he’d moved them to a safe deposit box.
    Probably not worth the monthly rental. Anyway, nobody around to protest now, and as he peered down into the pleated canyon, he thought that he ought to go retrieve them.
    A black hand smacked the glass.
    He crashed backward, Glock up, shouting orders at an empty room.
    Silence.
    The thing that had made the noise—it was outside
,
clinging to the window.
    Squat, domelike. Black segmented underbelly. Flittering wings tonguing the glass.
    He shook his head and laughed at himself. He’d almost put twobullets in a bug. Twenty hours without sleep or proper nutrition could do that to you.
    He holstered his gun, left the house, and jogged to the Honda. He reached down and grasped one of the liquor bottles. He took a few sips, leaving himself just shy of impairment, just enough control to get home, drink more, and fall asleep.
    â€”
    T HAT NIGHT , he dreamt of an endless garden, lush and dripping. At its crowning center stood Mai. She was naked, her arms open to him. He stretched for her but he could not reach her, and the chasm between them ached, for he understood that on the other side lay a homecoming.

CHAPTER NINE
    U p early, wired, Jacob hacked away at the keyboard, nursing a cup of spiked coffee and neglecting an Eggo waffle.
    The murder house belonged to a trust, which belonged to another trust, which belonged to a holding company in the Cayman Islands, which belonged to a shell corporation in Dubai, which belonged to another holding