KillerReads
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019
Copyright © Mary-Jane Riley 2019
Cover design Micaela Alcaino © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019
Cover images © Shutterstock.com
Mary-Jane Riley asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
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.
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Ebook Edition © May 2019 ISBN: 9780008340254
Version: 2019-03-27
He watched them kill her. Not a needle in her arm, not a quick bullet in the brain, but blows to the head with a large, heavy rock – one blow to each temple. Then they rolled her over on the plastic sheeting they had laid on the floor and stove in the back of her head. The iron, meaty smell of her blood mingled with the sweat of her killers.
He tried to remember her name.
They would throw her into the sea and let the water and the rocks cover up their dirty work. She might never be found – after all, the sea doesn’t always deliver the dead back to the living.
Or maybe they would take her to one of the many out of the way foot crossings on the Norwich to London railway line. He didn’t have the strength or the will to intervene. Not yet. All he could do was watch and commit it to his memory. Commit that last look she gave him, that last sad, defeated look, to his memory.
By the time her body was found, there would be no evidence that she had been murdered.
Cora Winterton dabbed concealer under her eyes and applied shocking pink lipstick to her lips. She peered at herself in the mirror, then grimaced. She looked terrible. Nothing a few good nights’ sleep and some decent meals wouldn’t cure, but she wasn’t going to get those any time soon. Working nights was a bitch. Especially when she didn’t get much sleep during the day. Couldn’t do it. Even after all these years her body clock wouldn’t adjust to hospital shifts. But she wasn’t going to put it off any longer. She couldn’t pretend any more that Rick had moved sites or was staying in a hostel. Besides, she had been around all the obvious places, and plenty of the not so obvious ones and there was still no sign of him. But she had to check once more, there were still some people she hadn’t talked to.
Where was he?
Her head began to swim. She leaned forward and grabbed the sides of the washbasin, trying to breathe deeply and evenly. Lack of food, lack of sleep, worry about her landlord putting up her rent – all of that. More deep breaths and her head felt better.