Mississippi Blood
A father on trial for murder. A son whose world is falling apart.The No.1 New York Times bestselling final volume of the ground-breaking Natchez Burning Trilogy by Greg Iles.He’ll risk everything for the darkest secrets in historyFormer prosecutor Penn Cage sees his world collapsing around him. The woman he loves is gone and his father, Dr Tom Cage, is about to be tried for the murder of a former lover.The Double Eagle group, a savage splinter cell of the KKK, will stop at nothing to ensure that Tom either takes the fall for their past deeds, or takes his secrets to an early grave.Unable to trust anyone – not even his own mother – Penn battles to discover the secret history of both the Cage family and the South itself, risking the only thing he has left to gamble: his life.
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HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
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London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017
Copyright © Greg Iles 2017
Mannish Boy
Words and Music by McKinley Morganfield, Melvin London and Ellas McDaniel. Copyright © 1955 Arc Music Corp., Lonmel Publishing Inc. and Watertoons. Copyright Renewed. All Rights Administered by BMG Rights Management (US) LLC. All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission. Reprinted by Permission of Hal Leonard LLC
Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017
Cover photographs © Christian Adams/Getty Images (bridge);
Shutterstock.com (figures, background).
Greg Iles 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
This is entirely a work of fiction. Any references to real people, living or dead, real events, businesses, organizations and localities are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. All names, characters and incidents are either the product of the authorâs imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007411320
Ebook Edition © APRIL 2017 ISBN: 9780007483501
Version: 2018-08-21
For Betty and Jerry Iles,
who came out of tiny southern towns and climbed books like stairs to rise. Thank you for everything.
For the truth is a terrible thing. You dabble your foot in it and it is nothing. But you walk a little farther and you feel it pull you like an undertow or a whirlpool. First there is the slow pull so steady and gradual you scarcely notice it, then the acceleration, then the dizzy whirl and plunge into darkness. For there is a blackness of truth, too. They say it is a terrible thing to fall into the Grace of God. I am prepared to believe that.
âRobert Penn Warren, All the Kingâs Men
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6: Thursday
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10: Friday
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14: Saturday
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17: Sunday
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20: Monday
Chapter 21
Chapter 22: Tuesday
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36: Wednesday
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49: Thursday
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62: Friday
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by Greg Iles
About the Publisher
GRIEF IS THE most solitary emotion; it makes islands of us all.
Iâve spent a lot of time visiting graves over the past few weeks. Sometimes with Annie, but mostly alone. The people who see me there give me a wide berth. Iâm not sure why. For thirty miles around, almost everyone knows me. Penn Cage, the mayor of Natchez, Mississippi. When they avoid meâwaving from a distance, if at all, then hurrying on their wayâI sometimes wonder if I have taken on the mantle of death. Jewel Washington, the county coroner and a true friend, pulled me aside in City Hall last week and told me I look like living proof that ghosts exist. Maybe they do. Since Caitlin died, I have felt like nothing more than the ghost of myself.
