LAST RITES
What do you see in your dying moments…?A young woman is on the run, her boyfriend found brutally slain in their bed. A simple crime of passion. Or is it?Find out in the new heart-stopping thriller from the acclaimed author of LOST SOULS.The Lancashire town of Blackley has been rocked by the violent death of Luke Howarth. The fingers of suspicion point towards his girlfriend, Sarah Goode - missing since his murder. Just another crime of passion with a tragic end.Or is it? Reporter Jack Garrett isn't so sure - especially when he's asked by Sarah's distraught parents to find their daughter. Their description of caring schoolteacher Sarah doesn't tally with the media's portrayal of a cold-blooded killer.But as he hunts for Sarah, Jack finds himself immersed in the town's troubled history and discovers that dangerous rituals from the past are impacting on the present.Jack's girlfriend, DC Laura McGanity, in the midst of a tough custody battle, must be content to sit on the sidelines. But she soon finds herself caught up in the investigation, as the mystery surrounding Sarah's disappearance dramatically unravels.Jack and Laura find themselves in mortal danger as they come face to face with an unhinged killer who is determined that they will pay with their lives…
Читать LAST RITES онлайн беплатно
NEIL WHITE
Last Rites
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
AVON
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
Copyright © Neil White 2009
Neil White asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication
Source ISBN: 9781847560193
Ebook Edition © 2009 ISBN: 9780007322725 Version: 2018-05-31
To Thomas, Sam and Joe, as always
Contents
Abigail Hobbs looked up and shivered as she opened the door to her stone cottage. The wind was blowing hard from the west, October ending with a snarl, the first bad mood of winter. It roared along the sides of Pendle Hill, a huge mound of millstone grit covered in grass and heather. The hill dominated the surroundings, dark and gloomy, and kept the sunlight from her windows. She pulled her coat to her chest and flipped the collar to her ears. She was too old for mornings like this.
‘Tibbs? Tibbs?’
She couldn't find her cat, a grey British Shorthair, all smile and floppy paws. He was always there when she woke, waiting on her windowsill, blinking at her. But not that morning.
‘Tibbs?’
She looked around. Still nothing. Her voice wasn't as strong as it had once been, and it died on the breeze, but she knew something wasn't right.
Abigail stepped onto the path, the stones sunken and uneven, and listened out. She could hear something, but at first she thought it was the wind. A knocking sound; a fast rattle. She edged along the path, her slippers making slapping noises on the stones. There was the noise again, like metal banging against wood. And there was something else. A crying sound, distressed.
‘Tibbs?’
Abigail got nearer to the end of the house, long grass trailing against her ankles. The noise seemed louder. She called out again. The sound was still there.
She reached an old outhouse, a brick add-on to the cottage that was used to store garden tools. The door was banging, the metal latch clattering, and as her footsteps got closer, the crying got louder.
‘Tibbs, wait there. What have you done?’
She pulled on the outhouse door but it didn't give at first. It felt stiff, like someone was holding the other side. She could feel the vibrations in the door, the cries from inside louder now. She yanked at the door, and then as it opened she saw Tibbs, her cat, suspended in mid-air, struggling, thrashing, something wrapped around him.
