Sacrifice
Innocent people are dying. Who will be next? Find out in the second Detective Mark ‘Heck’ Heckenburg from #1 ebook bestseller Paul Finch.A vicious serial killer is holding the country to ransom, publicly - and gruesomely - murdering his victims.When a man is burnt alive on a bonfire, it seems like a tragic Guy Fawkes Night accident. But with the discovery of a young couple on Valentine’s Day – each with an arrow through the heart – something more sinister becomes clear. A ‘calendar killer’ is on the loose.Detective Mark ‘Heck’ Heckenburg is up against it. With a rising body count and the public’s eyes on him, Heck must find the killer before he executes more victims.Because this killer has a plan. And nothing will stop him completing it.A heart-stopping and grisly thriller that will enthral fans of Stuart MacBride and Katia Lief.
Читать Sacrifice онлайн беплатно
Published by Avon an imprint of
HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street,
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2013
Copyright © Paul Finch 2013
Cover photographs © Arcangel & Roberto Pastrovicchio
Cover design © Henry Steadman 2013
Paul Finch 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 authorâs imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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 e-book 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.
Source ISBN: 9780007492312
Ebook Edition ISBN: 9780007492329
Version: 2017-11-14
For my lovely wife, Catherine, whose selfless and unswerving support has been the bedrock on which Iâve built my career
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
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
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
Acknowledgements
The whole of Holbeck should be bombed.
That was Alan Ernshawâs view. Okay, he was a relatively new police officer â just ten months in the job â so if anyone overheard him make such a politically incorrect statement and complained, heâd have an excuse. But the gaffers still wouldnât be impressed. Holbeck, the old warehouse district located just south of Leeds city centre, might well consist mainly of buildings that were now empty shells, its Victorian terraced housing might now mostly be derelict, the few parts of it that were inhabited reduced to grotty concrete cul-de-sacs strewn with litter and covered in graffiti, but policemen didnât take these sorts of things personally anymore. Or at least, they werenât supposed to.
Ernshaw yawned and scratched the dried razor-cut on his otherwise smoothly shaven jaw.
Radio static crackled. â1762 from Three?â
Ernshaw yawned again. âGo ahead.â
âWhat are you and Keith doing, over?â
âWell weâre not sitting down for a turkey dinner, put it that way.â
âJoin the club. Listen, if youâve nothing else on, can you get over to Kempâs Mill on Franklyn Road?â
Ernshaw, who was from Harrogate, some fifteen miles to the north, and still didnât completely know his way around West Yorkshireâs sprawling capital city, glanced to his right, where PC Keith Rodwell slouched behind the steering wheel.
Rodwell, a heavy-jowled veteran of twenty years, nodded. âETA ⦠three.â
âYeah, three minutes, over,â Ernshaw said into his radio.
âThanks for that.â
âWhatâs the job?â
âItâs a bit of an odd one actually. Anonymous phone call says weâll find something interesting there.â
Rodwell didnât comment, just swung the van into a three-point turn.
âNothing more?â Ernshaw asked, puzzled.
âLike I say, itâs an odd one. Came from a call-box in the city centre. No names, no further details.â
âSounds like a ball-acher, but hey, weâve nothing else to do this Christmas morning.â
âMuch appreciated, over.â
It wasnât just Christmas morning; it was a snowy Christmas morning. Even Holbeck looked picture-postcard perfect as they cruised along its narrow, silent streets. The rotted facades and rusted hulks of abandoned vehicles lay half-buried under deep, creamy pillows. Spears of ice hung glinting over gaping windows and bashed-in doors. The fresh layer muffling the roads and pavements was pristine, only occasionally marked by the grooves of tyres. There was almost no traffic and even fewer pedestrians, but it wasnât nine oâclock yet, and at that time on December 25 only fools like Ernshaw and Rodwell were likely to be up and about.
