Free Clint Faraday Mysteries Collection B :This Job is Murder Collector's Edition by CD Moulton Page B

said
they could see the Caribbean this time of the year, but it wasn’t
very often you could see the Pacific. It was the rainy season that
side of the mountains.
    There was one small patch in the clouds where
the Pacific could be glimpsed. The Caribbean was visible most of
the time. Everyone was thrilled, but went back to the house. Matt
was a bit winded, as was Ann. Clint told them they were at an
altitude where the air was getting a bit thin. Mike said he felt
that and Mark said the only places that had affected him much were
at Machu Pichu and La Paz.
    They went back for dinner. Pork aguisada with
rice and beans. There was a stew of a number of vegetables that
were found in the mountains. Lila had boiled a pan of mustard
greens because she knew how Clint liked them. The Indios seldom ate
mustard, but it was a weed around the place. She put some pork skin
in the pot when she boiled them (at Cori’s suggestion) and Judi
brought vinegar. Obilio and Lila tasted them that way and said they
would probably be eating them all along if they knew how to fix
them. The vinegar and pork skin made them very tasty. Cori said
mustard greens were called the perfect green. It had everything a
green leafy vegetable could have in the way of healthy vitamins and
minerals.
    When they went to bed the men went in one
room and the women in the other. Pablo and Maria wanted to stay in
the bodega. They weren’t used to sleeping in the same room as
others since they were very young and slept in the same room as
their brothers and sisters. If anyone had a curse on them the
others in the room might suffer when it came.
    Judi shook her head. When they went out to
the bodega Mike said that was the kind of thing he heard everywhere
on the islands. Some curse or a zombie or a demon was chasing
everyone for one reason or another. People were downright paranoid
about it. It was tiresome. They had to live with a lot of terrors –
all in their own heads. You could see what it did to the psychology
of the people. Everyone on this jaunt was having fun except
them.
    Clint was amused when there were only two
pallets and two blankets. They had bathed in the stream. Obilio and
Clint were on one pallet and Mike joined them. Mark and Matt took
the other. Mike said if anything happened he wouldn’t want it to be
with his father or brother. Matt said that was true. Anyone he
screwed ended up thinking they were in love with him and that
wouldn’t be right with a little brother.
    When they first got in bed Clint and Obilio
laid close together and Mike grinned and hugged them both. Matt and
Mark were a bit apart when they went to bed. They were together
later after the temperature had dropped into the mid-fifties when
they awoke to a scream from the direction of the bodega sometime
after midnight. They all jumped up and ran for the shed.
    The moonlight makes things fairly visible at
that altitude. The door to the bodega was open. Pablo was inside,
ripped from his neck to his crotch with what looked like three
large deep claw tears. His throat was ripped open. He was obviously
dead. Maria was nowhere to be seen.
    “ What the hell did that?!” Mike
exclaimed. Judi, Ann, Cori and Lila came running from the house and
Clint stopped them and said Pablo was dead. Go inside and stay
there.
    “ What kind of animal up here could do
that?” Mark asked.
    “ There are no animals up here that
could do that,” Obilio said. “There is a story of a demon that
kills people who invade the natural places. It only kills on dark
nights. This is not a dark night. It kills by breaking the neck,
not with claws.”
    “ We have to find Maria,” Matt said.
“There’s something I’ve heard. There’s something they were running
from. Pablo said he was trying to break a curse on him a couple of
times. A vengeful ghost was chasing him.
    “ No ghost did that!”
     
    Live and Learn
    Clint used his cell phone to call the police,
who said it was in the comarca so would be handled by the