Like a Knife Read Online Free

who she was. "Look, my mother was ... my mother was killed in front of me," she said at last. "Shot. In a robbery." She took a breath and plunged into the rest. "Perhaps you heard about it. Her name was Paula Goodman."
    He turned to her in surprise. "The Paula Goodman? You're David Goodman's daughter?"
    Rachel said dryly, "I guess that means you know all the particulars." She wasn't surprised'. After all, who didn't know the details of her mother's murder and the subsequent founding of the Safer America movement by Rachel's father? The story was public legend.
    "I didn't realize he had a child," Nick said.
    Rachel threw him a pale smile. "Neither did he most of the time. Too buay selling that new world order." The old bitterness began to engulf her, but she wasn't about to get into a long sob story about her father. She changed the subject. "You know that boy today, Joselito... it was really great the way you spoke to him."
    He shrugged, and she could tell the praise made him uncomfortable.
    "I didn't do much."
    "Yeah, but you did it in Spanish." She tore into another slice of pizza and peered at him, wondering how far to push. "He's Peruvian, so that's all he understands right now. His parents were anthropologists. They were living in the highlands, studying Andean culture, when they ran into the Shining Path. Ever heard of them?"
    Something happened to Nick; a subtle kind of withdrawal she'd seen him do before. One minute he was there, and the next he'd drifted away, this time gazing out over the night as if he could see through it. "Yeah, I've heard of them," he said softly.
    "They gunned down his parents like animals and left Joselito to watch them bleed to death. His only relative was an aunt who lives here."
    An icy misery bit into Nick, and with it came flashes of memory. The improvised airstrip hacked out of the jungle. The ground meeting his feet as he swung down from the belly of the plane. He heard the thickset mestizo shouting rapid orders, the crack of a crate pried open, the first testing rattle of machine-gun fire.
    All at once, he was opening his apartment door again, letting the dark thing that was his past inside. Hands suddenly clammy, he looked around for signs of Rennie. They were out in the open, easy targets. Instantly he scanned the cars parked nearby, looking for tails, for anything and anyone that shouldn't be there.
    "It's been very hard for Joselito," Rachel was saying. "He lost everything. His parents, his country, even his language."
    Her voice brought him back to the present, and to her bright eyes, which were turned so expectantly on him.
    "He needs a friend," she said.
    He understood what she was asking. But friends like him were the last thing that little boy needed. He wiped his hand on a paper napkin and forced calm into his voice. "Are you finished? We should go."
    She sent a shrewd glance his way, a look that saw more than he cared to show, but in the end she only smiled. "I guess it is late." She finished,the last of her slice and began gathering up the remains of their meal.
    Uneasiness flickered low in his gut as he took the trash to the can. Irrational as it was, he couldn't escape the notion that Rennie was out there, watching. And the last thing Nick wanted his old boss to see was Rachel beside him.
    While Nick cleaned up, Rachel slid behind the wheel of her car, watching him through the windshield. Something had happened a moment ago, something that brought wariness back to his face. She was tempted to ask about it but stifled her natural impulses. He wasn't one of her kids, and she wasn't his confessor. Besides, she knew from experience that wounded creatures heal in their own time. But she couldn't resist one tiny piece of information, so when he got in the car and she pulled away, she risked a direct question.
    "Your Spanish sounded good. Where old you learn?"
    She sensed another withdrawal, but when he spoke, his voice was offhand, almost indifferent. "Traveling. Spain, South