Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #2: Books 5-8 (A Dead Cold Box Set) Blake Banner (read out loud books txt) 📖

a red, wooden bridge over it. Beyond the bridge, there was a man in a saffron robe, down on his knees tending to a bed of flowering shrubs. As we approached, I began to see him more clearly. He looked as though he was in his early sixties. His skin was dark and weathered from the desert. His hair was cut very short and seemed to be turning to gray. From what I could see he was slim and lithe, and strong.

We crossed the bridge and stood at the edge of the garden looking down at him. He turned to face us and shielded his eyes from the sun, which was low in the southern sky. I smiled at him and said, “Adrian Simon Philips?”

He smiled and stood, stepping out of the garden so that the sun was no longer in his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “I am blinded by the light.” He laughed. “I’m afraid Adrian Philips is dead. I am Ananda. Can I help you?”

He spoke what the Brits call cut glass English. The English of the upper classes, Oxford Dons and High Court Judges.

“I hope so,” I said. “You sound and look more English than Sri Lankan.”

He chuckled. “Karmapa once said, ‘Anyone who thinks that reality is an illusion is an idiot. And anyone who thinks it isn’t, is an even bigger idiot.’”

“That’s cute. It also doesn’t mean anything and neatly avoids answering my question.”

“I am sorry, I wasn’t aware you had asked a question. I thought you had simply made an observation. Who are you?”

“My name is John Stone, and this is Carmen Dehan. We are detectives with the New York Police Department. We have no jurisdiction in Arizona, so we are not here in an official capacity.”

“Oh, yes, I understand. And you are looking for Adrian Philips because you are reopening the investigation into David Thorndike’s murder, and his investigation into Carol Hennessy.”

“You’re well informed.”

He laughed. “Oh, yes! Yes, I am very well informed.” He pointed at an oxblood pagoda where there was a round table with some chairs. “If you’ll join me in some tea, I will try to answer as many of your questions as I can.”

We followed him along the short, graveled path and climbed the steps into the pagoda. There he produced from somewhere, it may have been in his robes, a brass bell which he rang vigorously just before he sat. We sat, too, and a few moments later a young girl in her early twenties appeared. She had a stud in her nose, faded jeans, and a gray sweater. She ignored us and bowed to Ananda.

“Nayaka Ananda.”

“Bring us some tea, would you, Betty? Thank you.”

She left and he looked at Dehan and then at me. “What would you like to know?”

“Was Adrian Philips employed by Senator Carol Hennessy to murder these people?”

I reached in my pocket and handed him the list that we had been sent. He took it and examined it carefully, name by name. Then he nodded and handed it back.

“Yes, these and a few more. I would be happy to provide you with a complete list.”

Dehan shook her head. “If you are not Adrian Philips, why have you got that kind of detailed knowledge?”

His look was direct and unwavering. He seemed to hold her face in the invisible grip of his mind as he answered, “Don’t ask why, Carmen. It’s an impossible question to answer. How do I have this detailed knowledge about Adrian? Because I know Adrian very intimately. We were very close. When he died, I…” He took a deep breath and paused, like he was scanning a list of possible verbs. Finally, he said, “I inherited his files and documents, and a great deal of information.”

“Did Adrian die in Pakistan, in 2007?”

“That was one of the places where he died.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“We die and re-become at every instant, Carmen, in a million tiny ways. But some people die in major ways, at major points in their lives. They experience catastrophic change, which annihilate their identity, such as it was, and they become something, or someone new. That happened to Adrian several times. The last was in a very appropriate bomb blast in Pakistan.” He smiled at her. “But your pursuit of Adrian will not move you along in your hunt for David Thorndike’s killer. It will only tantalize your curiosity, lead you astray and fail to satisfy you.”

Betty appeared with a tray, a teapot, and three cups. She set it down on the table and poured for us. The tea was pale green and smelled slightly of rosemary and fennel. She bowed to Ananda and left.

I said, “Did you supply David with documentary, video, and audio proof of Adrian’s work for Hennessy?”

He nodded. “Yes, I did. I gave him copies of the originals, which I have here.” He paused for a moment, as though thinking. Then he said, “Adrian Simon Philips, had he ever had the good sense to go to a psychologist, would probably have been diagnosed as a sociopath. He was completely devoid, at least as far as he was aware, of any capacity for compassion or empathy. He could look on the suffering of others without any feeling at all. In that sense he was the mirror image of the Buddha, whose entire motivation in life was to help people to stop suffering. That is what is at the heart of Buddhism.

“Adrian was physically very strong and very healthy. He realized in his teens that he could make a lucrative career out of killing, because it was something that commanded a very high price and which very few people had the skill and the emotional capacity to do. So he joined the SAS, became highly skilled, and also well connected. When he was ready to move on, into