Free The Shadow Hunter by Michael Prescott

were listed, but with any luck, one of the available units would be on the fourth floor. And the units were furnished; she could move in immediately.
    By the end of the day, if all went well, she would be Raymond Hickle’s new neighbor.

7
    The dough was soft and supple like a woman, and George Zachareas’s big, callused, age-spotted hands worked it with a lover’s touch, pushing and pulling, folding and turning. Gradually he fell into a rhythm, arms and shoulders and upper body thrusting together in a slow, practiced dance. Zachareas—Zack to all who knew him, owner and proprietor of Zack’s Donut Shack—found himself smiling, relishing the sheer sensual pleasure of the task.
    “I appreciate you staying past your shift,” he told the tall young man who stood beside him in a matching red apron and cap, working the same mound of dough.
    “No problem,” Raymond Hickle said.
    Zack was alone with Hickle in the kitchen, having left Susie Parker, a worthless, barely literate high school dropout, on duty at the counter. He figured it was safe to let Susie fly solo at this time of day. Midafternoon was slow; the shop did most of its business in the morning and the late-night hours. Ordinarily Zack didn’t come in during the day at all, but Hickle had called him a half hour ago with word that the two hundred pounds of dough made by the baker on the night shift had been used up, and Zack had opted to stop by personally and make an extra fifty-poundbatch. It was possible to knead the stuff mechanically, by inserting a dough hook in one of the electric mixers, but Zack preferred to do the job by hand. Hickle had volunteered to help.
    “You’re a trouper, Ray,” Zack said in a voice that approached the decibel level of a divine command. He had been going deaf for years and refused to admit it. “To hang around when you don’t have to. After eight hours on the job, you must want out of here pretty bad.”
    “Not really.”
    “Any special plans for the evening?”
    “No.”
    “How about the weekend? It’s coming up. You got something in mind?”
    “I’m working on Saturday, filling in for Emilio.”
    “Again?”
    “I don’t mind. It’s extra money.”
    “There’s more to life than work, Ray, especially when you work in a place like this.”
    “I had the day off yesterday.”
    “Yeah, so you did. Do something fun?”
    “Went to the beach.”
    “Glad to hear it. Look, don’t get me wrong. You do a great job, you’re the best, but plying dough at a donut store is no life for you. Where’s your future?”
    “I’m doing all right.”
    Zack shook his head. At sixty-four he was a tall and vigorous man, but Hickle, three decades younger, was taller still, six foot one, with the potential to develop a boxer’s physique if he applied himself. He had a sallow, intense face and thoughtful eyes, and a mop of black hair that was thick and unruly at the top but cropped close at the nape. He could have been handsome, Zack supposed, but he’d missed his chance somehow. His complexion was too pale, his eyes too small and too deeply sunken under his heavy brows, his features slightly out of proportion in a way that was hard to define.
    “You could do better,” Zack told him. “Hell, you’re a smart guy.” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial shout. “Plenty smarter than those clowns I got working the other shifts. Maybe in a couple months we can talk about making you a supervisor—”
    “No, thanks.”
    Zack paused in his labor. “You don’t want a promotion?”
    “I’m happy doing what I do.”
    After a moment Zack resumed attacking the dough. He had no way to figure out Raymond Hickle. The guy said he was happy, but how could he be? He had no ambition, no personal life, nothing but eight hours a day spent on menial chores for indifferent customers.
    Some of his time was passed behind the counter, making coffee and microwaving muffins and toasting bagels, and some of it was spent in the kitchen amid the