The Hunter's Daughter - Softcover

Solvinic, Nicola

 
9780593639733: The Hunter's Daughter
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0593639731 ISBN 13: 9780593639733
Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

As seen on the TODAY show as “the best thriller.”

A hypnotic, sinister debut mystery about a seemingly good cop who is secretly the daughter of a notorious serial killer.

Anna Koray escaped her father’s darkness long ago. When she was a girl, her childhood memories were sealed away from her conscious mind by a controversial hypnosis treatment. She’s now a decorated sheriff’s lieutenant serving a rural county, conducting an ordinary life far from her father’s shadow. 

When Anna kills a man in the line of duty, her suppressed memories return. She dreams of her beloved father, his hands red with blood, surrounded by flower-decked corpses he had sacrificed to the god of the forest. 

To Anna’s horror, a serial killer emerges who is copying her father – and who knows who she really is. Is her father still alive, or is this the work of another? Will the killer expose her, destroying everything she has built for herself? Does she want him to?

But as she haunts the forest, using her father’s tricks to the hunt the killer, will she find what she needs most…or lose herself in the gathering darkness?

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Nicola Solvinic

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

1

Awakening

The first time I killed a man was on Tuesday.

I thought I could get through my whole life without killing someone. I thought I could be virtuous. Peaceful. That I could broker treaties among evil men and shattered hearts. And I thought wrong.

I'd been driving home from work. It was late summer, when the skies become silver around dusk and the leaves begin to curl yellow at the edges. The sun was up, and I had the windows down, trying to absorb that last bit of heat on my skin before cold winter settled into my bones. Wind slid through my blond ponytail with invisible fingers while I squinted at the sunset through sunglasses. The falling light painted the two-lane country road in flashes of gold and shadow. My elbow rested on the window and my fingers combed through the air, feeling the swish of it against my palms. The police radio in my car hummed along at medium volume, and I was only half paying attention to the radio traffic. Though I was officially off duty, I was curious to hear if Sergeant Calvert was finally going to take the chief's car to the car wash after losing a bet on a high school football game.

"This is S12. C1 is out of service," a voice announced glumly. That was Calvert, admitting defeat. Finally.

"Acknowledged, S12. C1 is out of service," Dispatch chirped merrily.

Someone keyed their radio and a burst of applause echoed in the car. That was probably Chief Nelson. He'd already left the office, but I was pretty sure the chief of the Detective Bureau listened to the radio in his sleep.

The dispatcher broke in, her tone all business. "Code 20 at 7071 Stroud's Road."

I glanced at the road. I was only about a mile away. That was a domestic call, and I was likely closest. The county was seven hundred square miles, and it would take a while for backup to arrive. But I didn't like the idea of anyone getting their teeth knocked out when I could help it.

I keyed the radio. "This is L4. I'm at Sunday Creek and Route 6. En route." I flipped on the lights on my unmarked Crown Victoria and stepped on the gas, soaring over the blacktopped roads as the radio chattered.

"Acknowledged, L4. D2 is at 442 and Coffrey."

I thumbed the radio again. "Thanks, D2. I'll wait for you." I didn't hesitate because I was a woman in plain clothes. Departmental policy was that no one went to a domestic alone. Domestic violence cases could be unpredictable as fuck.

Adrenaline twitched through me as I drove down a hill and the sun slipped behind the trees. I pulled up before a dented rural mailbox with 7071 painted on the side. A gravel driveway wound into forest, and I couldn't see the house through the trees. I reached into the back seat for my vest, shrugged it on over my T-shirt, and tightened the Velcro straps. I put my detective's badge on a lanyard around my neck and buckled on my utility belt. I checked my cuffs, gun, and Taser, then pulled a radio out of its charging station. I tucked the base into my belt and threaded the toggle control up to the collar of my vest.

A shadow swept across the hood of my car. Reflexively, I reached to my belt. But it was only a bird sweeping low across the road, so low that its feathers nearly brushed my windshield. My heart rose in my throat at the magnificence of it: a great blue heron, wings moving in slow motion as it flew across the road and vanished in the forest.

A gunshot rang out in the direction of that gravel driveway winding down into a shady valley.

I sucked in my breath. "Shit."

I lunged out of the car, drawing my gun with my right hand and keying my radio with my left. "This is L4, 52A, 52A at 7071 Stroud's Road."

"Copy, L4. Hold your position. Backup is five miles away."

Five miles was an eternity. Some unlucky woman could be bleeding out on her kitchen floor while her husband was booking it out the back door. That vision was clear for me, clear as a movie playing out behind my mind's eye: a woman lying on a crusty linoleum floor, fingers twitching as the last of her air whistled through her ruined lungs.

I gritted my teeth. I couldn't let that happen. I tried to be a good cop who always followed the rules, but someone needed me more than the rules needed me to follow them. Aiming my gun at the ground, I stalked down the gravel drive. My boots crunched in the pale gray rock while the birds screamed around me. The canopy of the forest closed over my head, casting me in shadow. Sweat prickled on my brow as I came into view of a tiny yellow bungalow with algae-streaked siding. Its roof was covered in moss. A brand-new pickup truck was parked out front, and I scanned the area for a propane tank. If I had to use my weapon, I sure as hell didn't want to hit that.

I advanced upon the shiny red pickup, approaching the driver's side. I saw no movement in the mirror. I drew down and aimed my gun into the cab. The window was down, but no one was there. Keys dangled in the ignition. I didn't know what kind of clusterfuck I was walking into, but I didn't want any perps or witnesses to drive off.

I stepped up on the running board, reached in, and yanked the keys out of the ignition. I bumped my head on the visor, and a cloud of white dust rained down on me. My sinuses were flooded with the acrid smell of a Magic Marker. A plastic bag landed on the floorboards.

I swore silently and rubbed my arm across my face. The powder was all over the seat and over me. No telling what it was yet: could be cocaine, PCP, or, worse, fentanyl.

I keyed my radio: "Base, this is L4. Suspected drugs on scene with exposure. Backup should have PPE and request medic." Whatever this shit was, I wanted someone with Narcan en route . . . for myself and whoever had driven that truck.

I pocketed the keys and ducked behind the truck's front fender. I slipped my hand up to the hood. It was warm. Likely, the conflict inside hadn't been going on long . . . but long enough for a gunshot to punctuate it.

I projected my voice toward the house. "Bayern County Sheriff's Office. We need to talk."

I was hoping that would startle the perpetrator; that he-and it was statistically most likely to be a "he"-would go flying out the back door into the woods. If he came out the front, the truck was between him and me. Worst-case scenario would be him taking a hostage. Best case . . . he thought the woods were crawling with cops.

The screen door banged open, and a mid-thirties man in jeans and a black T-shirt strode down the slimy wooden steps. He held a shotgun in his hands. He was breathing fast, glowering, panicked.

"It's all right," I called. "Put down the gun and we'll talk, okay?"

My radio chattered but I wasn't listening. I was watching the guy pump the shotgun. I sucked in my breath, hoping to hell he wasn't going to shoot at his shiny new truck. His shoes crunched in the gravel. I backed up and scuttled around the edge of the bumper, gun raised. My pulse was pounding in my forehead, and I flipped the safety off.

"She fucking cheated on me," he was muttering. "She fucking cheated . . ."

And I was all of a sudden face-to-face with this wild-eyed man with a shotgun. His black T-shirt was wet, and a spatter of blood stained his arm.

I lifted my hand. "It's okay," I said soothingly. "It's okay . . ."

He aimed at me and pulled the trigger. Hundreds of pieces of birdshot rattled into me, and the shotgun blast rocked me out of my crouch into the gravel on my back. Pain seared me, and I gasped.

My pulse pounded harder, faster than the panic. I hadn't let go of my gun. I pressed both my fists around the grips, sighted through my bloody sunglasses, and fired.

I hit him in the gut. He was on the way down, but I kept shooting. He dropped to the ground, still clutching the shotgun.

I climbed, wincing, to my...

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Verlag
Penguin Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2025
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593639731
ISBN 13 
9780593639733
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
385
Kontakt zum Hersteller
preigu GmbH & Co. KG
mail@preigu.de

Lengericher Landstr. 19
Osnabrück
Niedersachsen
49078
Deutschland

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