He wanted justice, truth, revenge... whichever came first. Prison-warden-turned-P.I. Jack "Keeper" Marconi understands the criminal mind. And he knows what it takes to break a man. His own life came apart the day a black Buick broadsided his car--and his wife died horrifically in the seat b...
The explosion took the back third of his head off, the meat, bone, and blood slapping up against the window glass directly behind him, while scarlet arterial blood gushed out both nostrils, pulsating with the final beats of his taken-entirely-by-surprise heart. His dark eyes went wide, as if he w...
There were lumber yards, steel mills, paper factories, ship building plants and ports of call that made the riverfront a longshoreman’s paradise. Everywhere you looked you would find strong-backs dressed in dungarees or overalls, lifting and hauling everything from one-hundred pound bags of iron ...
He closed the door and the Venetian blinds that covered the glass. Then, against department regulations, locked it.Back at his desk, he pulled a bottle of Seagrams 7 from the bottom right-hand drawer, set it out on his desk. Pouring a shot into a clear drinking glass he pulled back a quick shot, ...
The county Evidence Room is located between the Department Communications Center and the Archival Storage Room of the L.G.P.D. precinct basement. The single windowless room is brightly lit by a single ceiling-mounted fluorescent fixture. Floor-to-ceiling metal shelves line the walls. The shelves...
Taller than me anyway. Older too, but in pretty good shape. The old-fashioned trenchcoat he’s wearing makes him look like a character from an old Sam Fuller detective movie. The Naked Kiss maybe. Or Pickup on South Street. Pulp films aired on the Saturday CBS Late Night Movie back when I was a ki...
Having made our way flawlessly through safety inspection, we then move on to one of the Delta gates. Gate 35 to be precise. There to greet us is an attractive flight attendant. Tall, shapely, with long straight blond hair, the blue-miniskirted attendant unlocks the metal door and leads the wa...
The unmistakable sound of stone splitting. Something only a digger will recognize immediately. “You hear that, Chase?” Tony says. “Something’s giving way down here.” “Yeah,” I say. “But where’s it coming from?” I look all around me. But the louder t...
She was taken from me while we were having lunch at a café across from the cathedral in San Marco. I have been suffering a recurring, temporary blindness since my participation in the war in Afghanistan and had no way of seeing her being taken, nor the individual who did the taking. But only mome...
I roll my body under the cart and, emerging out the opposite side, get back up onto my feet at the very same moment Pony-Tail starts shooting at me from out of the shattered storefront. People scream, scatter about in every direction. It’s the kind of confusion and cover I need as I make an all-o...
Blaze orange. An orange so bright it almost hurts my eyes to look at it. My head hurts. But then, that’s not surprising considering the sucker punch those bearded bastards snuck in on me. My eyes suddenly regain focus and I realize the blaze orange I’m staring at is myself...
We do our best to follow while gunshots ring out, the bullets ricocheting against the stone platform, the shards of shattered rock spraying up into our faces. Located at the end of the platform is a metal gate and, beyond it, a landing and what I’m guessing is a short descending staircase. More s...
Michael set his hand on my leg. “Let’s skip town,” he said. “Why don’t we pack a quick bag, head down to New York for the night. Just like old times. We can get a room at the Gramercy Park, head out to Les Halles for steak frit, maybe a hit a bar or two. Just like we used to do.” It sounded very ...
The light that emanates from the stainless-steel umbrella fixture stings my eyes when I stare into it without blinking. The light leaves a black hole in my mind that even pierces the darkness.The injection is local.I wait on my back for the moment when all feeling will abandon my stomach. When it...