Sara Morningsky by Lee Driver

SARA MORNINGSKY
    by Lee Driver

    This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual
events, locales or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Any
slights of people, places, or organizations is purely
unintentional.

    Copyright ©2001 by Lee Driver
    All rights reserved.
    This short story or parts thereof, may not be
reproduced in any form without permission.

    Smashwords Edition

SARA MORNINGSKY

    It crouched in the dense underbrush and
watched the scene unfold behind a boarded-up packing plant. The
moon cast silhouettes of two figures as they emerged from a
dark-colored vehicle. As the driver opened the trunk, a police car
arrived tailed by a black limousine.
    The gray wolf’s keen sense of smell detected
fear. It watched with the same intensity as it would a prey, head
lowered, ears raised. Instinct told it that danger was near. The
wolf took two steps forward, then back, unsure whether to react to
the scent of danger. Two muffled pops startled the animal. Quickly
it moved from its hiding place toward the body bleeding on the
ground, toward the man with the raised gun. The men were too
startled to react. With teeth bared, the wolf leaped at the
policeman who yelled for his friends to shoot it. The wolf rushed
back to the forest with its trophy in its mouth, but it didn’t feel
safe. It could hear the men in pursuit, the men with guns.
    Swiftly the wolf leaped twelve feet up to a
branch. What had been thick paws changed into sturdy talons, and
the one-hundred-pound body of a wolf transformed into a two-pound
gray hawk. It watched the men run under the tree branch still in
pursuit of the wolf.
    Gripping the trophy with its hooked beak, the
hawk took flight, soaring silently, its wings flat and graceful. It
made several quick beats of its wings as it followed the limousine,
noticing with acute eyesight the license plate number.
    The hawk flew across town, over lit streets
that crisscrossed subdivisions, and the narrow creek that ran along
the expressway. The hawk saw rabbits and ground squirrels from its
high altitude, but had no interest in feeding. With wings level, it
glided down over a forest to a remote house in a clearing and then
through an opened balcony window. It landed gracefully on two feet,
human feet. Dropping the trophy to the floor, the figure climbed
into bed weeping. The object the men had chased the wolf for, its
trophy, was the policeman’s badge.

    “ I don’t understand you, Dagger.” The
attractive woman paced the tiled floor on stiletto heels. Flipping
back errant strands of platinum hair, she gazed disapprovingly at
the cramped office located above a downtown bar. “You can’t attract
high-paying customers in a dump like this.”
    Dagger eyed his fiancée from her well-turned
heel to her shapely thighs, past the short hemline of her skirt.
“I’m just interested in customers, Sheila. I couldn’t care less how
rich they are.” He snapped the newspaper open and turned to the
second page of the headline story.
    Sheila inhaled deeply, grimaced, and quickly
changed her mood. “That’s okay. No problem. Daddy’s going to have a
spot for you at his newspaper, maybe as an editor. You won’t need
to do anything but proofread.”
    “ I like being a private investigator.”
He returned to the article. Changing the subject, he asked, “How
could your father print this crap about Lieutenant
Fazio?”
    Sheila stopped pacing and jammed her fists
onto her narrow hips. “You haven’t listened to a word I’ve
said.”
    A shrill sound came from inside a cage in the
corner of the room. “AWK. WICKED WITCH OF THE WEST. AWK.” A scarlet
macaw lifted its colorful wings and fanned out its tail.
    Sheila tossed a disparaging glance over her
shoulder at the macaw. “Shut up you poor excuse for an oversized
crow.”
    “ AWWWKK, STICKS AND STONES.”
    “ Leave Einstein