'The Library at Mount Char' (US 2015): Book Excerpt - Live Science
Carolyn, blood-drenched and barefoot, walked alone down the two lane stretch of blacktop that the Americans called Highway 78. Most of the librarians, Carolyn included, had come to think of this road as the Path of Tacos, so-called in honor of a... Oak leaves, reddish-orange and delightfully crunchy, crackled underfoot as she walked. The obsidian knife she had used to murder Detective Miner lay nestled in the small of her back, sharp and secret. The one braking to a halt now, a battered Ford F-250, was the third that had stopped to take a closer look. When the window came down she smelled chewing tobacco, old grease, and hay. A white-haired man sat behind the wheel. "Jesus," he said. " His voice was warm with concern — the real kind, not the predator's fake that the last man had tried. She heard this and knew the old man was seeing her as a father might see his daughter. "Nope," she said, eyeing the dog. One of the horses. " There was no barn, no horse. But she knew from the smell of the man that he would be sympathetic to animals, and that he would understand their business could be bloody. " She smiled ruefully and held her hands to frame her torso, the green silk now black and stiff with Detective Miner's blood. "Try a little club sody," the man said dryly. The dog growled a little. Source: www.livescience.com
