Mystery / Thriller
Date Published: 03-01-2022
Publisher: Barringer Press
Homicide detective John Carver thought he'd seen it all. But when a young woman's body is discovered floating in the rooftop water tank at a skid-row hotel and a local new-age psychic claims to have seen that young woman moments before her death, he quickly realizes he's in unfamiliar territory. Soon he's thrust into an investigation that makes him question everything he believes in.
~~ Amazon ~~
Excerpt
It’s time. The SS bolts on the watch he wore while policing the Sobibor Concentration Camp 75 years ago whisper, the Holocaust Memorial service is starting. He glances down at the lot. Full. The cars that circled the streets on all sides of the temple have parked. Their drivers are inside the sanctuary.
He lives his hiding place, beside a
dormer, and scurries crablike across the sloping roof over to the air vent
twenty feet away. He wears a state-of-the-art military grade gas mask and
carries a limp bag that swings back and
forth. He reaches the main air vent, stops, and rubs his fingers over it,
savoring the chill of flesh against metal. Now in a borrowed body, he’s
flushed, excited. His senses have returned. He feels everything: the quickening
of his breath; the infinitesimal widening of an artery; the fevered pulse of
elation.
He unscrews the vent. He hears a
violin playing softly in a minor key. The voice of a frail old man who speaks of suffering. He smiles. Music,
memories and prayers won’t help.
The Master of Death is no longer an
outcast. Shulamit’s perfumed hair will turn to ashes again.
He unscrews the vent, removes his gift from the bag, and carefully drops the pellets of Zykon B. Flattening his body along the roof, he tries to make himself invisible, and waits for the cries of the dying to reach his ears.
About the Author
Stephen Wechselblatt received his Ph.D. from the University of Iowa. Thirty years later he moved to the mountains of North Carolina and began writing fiction. His book of short stories, Diamonds and Moths was published in 2017. Worse than Murder is his first novel.
~~ Website ~~
Sounds good.
ReplyDeletecreepy
ReplyDeleteVery good excerpt
ReplyDeleteInteresting.
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