The Caller
In The Sunday Times bestselling novel ‘Darkhouse’, Alex Barclay took you on a terrifying excursion to hell and back. In ‘The Caller’, she leaves you stranded there…One way in… no way out.He targets victims in their own homes, subjecting them to a terrifying ordeal before leaving their lifeless bodies in their hallway for a loved one to find. at first the murders appear unrelated, the notion of a serial killer at large almost dismissed. But the killing hasn’t stopped.Back on the job after a year out, NYPD Detective Joe Lucchesi becomes the reluctant lead in the high-profile investigation. Battling with physical pain and tension in the task force and at home, he struggles to make progress.Then just when he feels close to making a breakthrough, the investigation itself is rocked by tragedy, and the body count rises…
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ALEX BARCLAY
The Caller
This 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.
HarperCollinsPublishers
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London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007
Copyright © Alex Barclay 2007
Daphne Du Maurier quote reproduced with permission of the
Curtis Brown Group Ltd on behalf of the Estate of Daphne Du Maurier
copyright © Daphne Du Maurier 1938
Cover design layout © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016
Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com
Alex Barclay 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 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 e-books
Source ISBN: 9780008180881
Ebook Edition © SEPTEMBER 2008 ISBN: 9780007279425
Version 2016-05-13
‘The rising star of the hard-boiled crime fiction world, combining wild characters, surprising plots and massive backdrops with a touch of dry humour’ Mirror
‘Tense, no-punches-pulled thriller that will have you on the edge of your deckchair.’ Woman and Home
‘Explosive’ Company
‘Darkhouse is a terrific debut by an exciting new writer’ Independent on Sunday
‘Compelling’ Glamour
‘Excellent summer reading … Barclay has the confidence to move her story along slowly, and deftly explores the relationships between her characters’ Sunday Telegraph
‘The thriller of the summer’ Irish Independent
‘If you haven’t discovered Alex Barclay, it’s time to jump on the bandwagon’ Image Magazine
To Ciaran, Ronan, Lorraine and Damien
With screaming eyes
And weakened breath
’Twas not for life
He begged,
’Twas death.
Anonymous
Table of Contents
The room was eight by ten and windowless. Weak shafts of light stretched through the bars that ran from floor to ceiling across one wall. The small television, mounted on a black shelf outside, was full-volume white noise. On a tray by the door lay the shriveled remains of an overcooked dinner.
The bed, pushed against the right-hand wall, was perfectly made, each corner tight under the thin mattress, the coarse green cover smooth except for where he sat, hunched and focused. Sweat darkened the folds and underarms of his blue shirt, the odor mixing with the rising stench from the discarded food.
He opened his eyes and turned to the desk lamp beside him, flicking the switch. Under the brilliant white light, he held a model; a plaster replica of the thirty-two human teeth he could recall so easily as he traced his thumb over the contours; the imperfection of a prominent incisor, a pointed canine tip, the uneven surface of a chipped premolar. Only once had he seen the teeth in a smile: at the beginning, a quick flash before the terror struck. For hours afterwards, they had been clamped shut in agony or visible only as the lips curled back from them in a silent scream.
He bent forward and slid a box from under the bed, pulling it up to rest on his knees. Twisting his body, he removed a key from his pocket, then unlocked the box. He looked at the model one last time, then set it down inside with the others. One, two, three. Four.
The day after you watch your first victim die is not very different to the day before. You still wake up. Maybe you skip breakfast, even lunch, but you will eat … eventually. And you’ll sleep. And you’ll slip into a rhythm. Not identical to the one before; there might be an erratic beat, but at least it’s a silent beat. Yours.
He pushed the box under the bed, where other reminders lay – of lives taken and lives spared. He closed his eyes and breathed in the warm, captive air.
My prison is a tool, a training ground, a stopover. I look at the bars behind me, the space around me, the confinement. I think of where you are and how tragic for you it is that here I am, there you are, but oh so quickly, there I am. Right with you.
