Verwandte Artikel zu Hand for a Hand

9781616951818: Hand for a Hand
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 1616951818 ISBN 13: 9781616951818
Verlag: Soho Crime, 2012

Inhaltsangabe

The first book in a taut, action-packed new series set in St. Andrews, Scotland.

Murder. It’s the only word in a note clutched by the dismembered hand found on the lush green of a golf course in St. Andrews, Scotland. When DCI Andy Gilchrist learns the note is addressed to him, he realizes the thing he feared most has come to pass: a killer is deliberately targeting him. Though Gilchrist is no new hand at solving murders, this time he is overwhelmed by the flood of seemingly unconnected crises—the note clutched in the hand, his son’s missing girlfriend, his ex-wife’s failing health, and his boss’s decision to pair Gilchrist up with a scumbag detective from his past, who in turn is hiding evidence. Worse, the hand turns out to be just the beginning, and soon he’s faced with relentless parade of body parts.

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

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Born in Glasgow, Frank Muir was plagued from a young age with the urge to see more of the world than the rain sodden slopes of the Campsie Fells. Thirty-plus years of living and working overseas helped him appreciate the raw beauty of his home country. Now a dual US/UK citizen, Frank makes his home in the outskirts of Glasgow, Scotland, from where he visits St. Andrews regularly to research in the town s many pubs and restaurants.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1
Seventeenth Hole, Old Course
St. Andrews, Scotland

   Tam Dunn watched the golf ball take a hard kick left and slip
into the infamous Road Hole Bunker, a sandy-bottomed pothole
that fronted the seventeenth green.
   Bud Amherst, one of an American four-ball that teed off at
7:00 that morning, first on the ballot, threw his five-iron to the
ground. “Goddammit,” he shouted, turning to Tam. “Course’s
nuthin but sand traps. Why didn’t you tell me it was there?”
The way Bud played golf it would have made no difference if
Tam had first led him by the hand and stood him in the bunker.
But Tam the caddy, always hopeful of an American-sized tip, bit
his tongue. “My mistake, sir.”
   Close to the green, the bunker looked more like a hole in the
ground, its face a vertical wall of divot bricks that even the pros
struggled to overcome.                                                          
   “Whaddaya think?” Bud asked Tam.
   “Sand-iron, sir.”
   “I know that, goddammit. Which way’s it gonna break?”
   “About three feet from the left.”
   “As much as that?”
   “At least, sir.”
   Tam kept tight-lipped as Bud took a few clumsy practice
swings. The only way Bud was going to get the ball onto
that green, he thought, was to lift it and place it. Bud turned
to the bunker, prepared to step down into it, then stumbled
backwards.
   “Aw God, aw God.”
   “Sir?”
   Bud slumped to his knees. The sand-iron slipped from his
grip.
   One of the Americans, the tall one called JD, trotted across the
green. “Hey, Bud, you okay?”
   Bud stretched an arm out and flapped it at the bunker.
Tam stepped to its lip and stared down at the hand, at skin as
white as porcelain, bony fingers clawed like talons. Even from
where he stood he could tell it was a woman’s hand, a fine hand,
he thought, except the wrist looked butchered and bloodied, like
a cut of meat hacked, not sliced, the bone glistening like a white
disc smeared with blood.
   And all of Tam’s hopes for an American-sized tip evaporated
in the cold Scottish air.
   “You’d better get down here, Andy.”
   “Where’s here, Nance?”
   “Seventeenth green on the Old Course. Next to the Jigger.”
   Gilchrist drew his Mercedes SLK Roadster to the side of the
road and pressed his mobile to his ear. It had been a while since
he had heard DS Nancy Wilson as breathless. Not since they had
run the length of the West Sands chasing what’s-his-name. Blake.
That was it. Murray Blake. Rapist, serial shagger, petty thief.
How some people thought they could get away with it never
failed to amaze him.
   “What’s got you fired up?” he tried.
   “Severed hand in a bunker. Victim’s in her early twenties, late
teens—”
   “Her early twenties?”
   “Sorry. Yes. It’s a woman’s hand.”
   Gilchrist tugged the steering wheel, felt the tail-end throw out
as the Merc spun in a tight circle. “Any rings?” he asked. “Moles?
Scars?”
   “Nothing obvious. Fingernails are short. Not varnished. Skin’s
a bit rough.”
   “As in manual labour?”
   “As in someone who doesn’t use hand lotion.”
   “Or couldn’t afford to.”
   “Maybe.”
   “It couldn’t have come from the mortuary or been cut from—?”
   “Not a chance, Andy. She’s been murdered.”

Chapter 2

   “Get on to the University. Find out if any students have gone
missing, called in sick, not turned up, whatever.”
   “Got it.”
   “Has Mackie seen it yet?”
   “Just arrived. Along with the SOCOs.”
   “Make sure they take fingerprints and run them through the
AFR system.”
   “Got it.”
   If the victim had no criminal record, the Automatic
Fingerprint Registration System would draw a blank. But it was
worth a shot. “Estimated time of. . . .” He wanted to say, death,
then chose, “. . . amputation?”
   “Couldn’t say.”
   “How about the other bunkers?”
   “We’ve got a team walking the course. Nothing back from
them yet.”
   “Any thoughts?” he asked.
   “Nothing definite. The sand was smooth, which might suggest
the hand was placed in the bunker.”
   “As opposed to thrown in?”
   “Odd, don’t you think?”
   “Maybe.” Gilchrist was again struck by the undercurrent of
excitement in Nance’s voice. He thought back to her statement—
Not a chance. She’s been murdered—and knew from the firmness of
her response that there had to be more. “What’re you not telling
me, Nance?”
   “She, I mean . . . the hand was holding a note. Addressed to
you.”
   A frisson of ice touched his neck. He booted the Merc to seventy.
   “What’s it say?”
   “Murder.”
   Murder? “So whoever severed the hand is sending me a message.”
   “Looks that way.”
   “How was the note addressed?”
   “On the envelope. Your name. DCI Andrew Gilchrist.”
   Andrew. Not Andy. Was that significant? “Typed? Or handprinted?”
   “Looks like a computer printer. Ink hasn’t run. Maybe a laser
printer.”
   Something tugged at his mind. “I thought you said note.”
   “I did.”
   “Inside the envelope?”
   “Yes.”
   “Someone opened the envelope?”
   “It wasn’t sealed.”
   Although the envelope was addressed to him, found in the
clutches of a severed hand, it niggled him that it had been opened
and read. “Why use an envelope to put a note inside?” he asked.
   “Why not just the note? Why the envelope, then the note?”
   “To keep the note dry?”
   “Maybe.”
   “Greaves wants to assign you as SIO.”
   Senior Investigating Officer. Gilchrist laughed. “I would have
thought a severed hand clutching a note addressed to me would
make it obvious that I should be SIO.”
   Hearing his own words made something slump to the pit of
his stomach. He had always dreaded this moment, the day when
he would be targeted by some sick pervert. And the pervert who
severed the...

„Über diesen Titel“ kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Verlag
Soho Crime
Erscheinungsdatum
2012
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
1616951818
ISBN 13 
9781616951818
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
321
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar