Locked Doors (44 page)

“Go to sleep.”

He almost said go to sleep angel.

Her head rested in the crook of his arm.

She rubbed her cheek against his.

“What are you doing?”

“Max never had a beard.
 
I like yours.
 
I like how it smells.”

“You
gonna
keep me up all night?”

“I just might.”

10/14/03

Haines Junction, Yukon

Spent last night at the Raven Hotel.
 
Pricey.
 
Look for something more reasonable this evening.
 
Breakfast at Bill’s Diner.
 
Coffee.
 
Two delicious
bearclaws
.
 
C$11.56.
 
AT came to the village again in that old CJ-5.
 
(he went to the library)
 
I drove out to his cabin.
 
5.9 miles down Borealis Road.
 
A one-
laner
.
 
Rough.
 
Beautiful weather.
 
Cold.
 
Saw his driveway but didn’t turn in.
 
Too nervous.
 
(don’t be such a
chickenshit
)
 
Think I’ll return on foot tonight and approach through woods under the cover of
  

The intercom broke in: “At this time, we would like to begin boarding Flight 6346 with nonstop service to Whitehorse, Yukon.”

The tattered purple notebook closed.
 

On its cover, “H. BOONE” had been neatly printed in black magic marker:

The passenger of seat 14C slipped the notebook into a leather satchel, slung it over his shoulder, and strolled toward the gate.

His hair is blond and short now, but if you look closely, the roots are still black.

Read on for an excerpt from DESERT PLACES, the prequel to LOCKED DOORS, also available on Kindle, but first…

Author’s Afterward

So what's up with this ending? And will there ever be a conclusion to the Andrew Thomas/Luther Kite saga?

I'm good friends with thriller author J.A.
Konrath
, and our writing has covered many of the same themes of good and evil. I love Joe’s Det. Jack Daniels Series, which showcase his own unique, disturbing take on the serial killer genre.

In 2010, we wrote a novella together called SERIAL UNCUT (available on Amazon), combining some of the characters from his work and my work, including Jack Daniels, Taylor (from AFRAID and TRAPPED, written under Joe’s pen name, Jack
Kilborn
), and Mr. K. It also features Orson Thomas and Luther Kite from DESERT PLACES and LOCKED DOORS.

Joe approached me with a simple, yet unique, idea: Wouldn't it be fun to have Jack and Luther square off in a full length novel? I was all for it. That novel is STIRRED, which we're currently writing.

If you're new to my books, or Joe's books, and want to get caught up on the entire history of these characters before reading STIRRED, here is the order they go in, along with the characters they spotlight:

SHOT OF TEQUILA by JA
Konrath
(1991, Jack Daniels)

DESERT PLACES by Blake Crouch (1996, Luther Kite)

LOCKED DOORS by Blake Crouch (2003, Luther Kite)

WHISKEY SOUR by JA
Konrath
(2004, Jack Daniels, Alex
Kork
)

BLOODY MARY by JA
Konrath
(2005, Jack Daniels)

RUSTY NAIL by JA
Konrath
(2006, Jack Daniels, Alex
Kork
)

DIRTY MARTINI by JA
Konrath
(2007, Jack Daniels)

SERIAL UNCUT by Black Crouch, Jack
Kilborn
, and JA
Konrath
(1978-2010, Jack Daniels, Luther Kite, Taylor, Mr. K)

AFRAID by Jack
Kilborn
(2008, Taylor)

JACK DANIELS STORIES by JA
Konrath
(2004-2010, Jack Daniels)

FUZZY NAVEL by JA
Konrath
(2008, Jack Daniels, Alex
Kork
)

CHERRY BOMB by JA
Konrath
(2009, Jack Daniels, Alex
Kork
)

TRAPPED by Jack
Kilborn
(2010, Taylor)

SHAKEN by JA
Konrath
(2010, Jack Daniels, Mr. K, Luther Kite)

STIRRED by Blake Crouch and JA
Konrath
(2011, Jack Daniels, Luther Kite)

This may seem like a devious effort by us to get you to buy everything we've written. I swear it isn't. If it was, I would have mentioned Joe’s novels ORIGIN, DISTURB, THE LIST, and ENDURANCE, and my novels ABANDON and SNOWBOUND.

Seriously, though. It really isn't necessary for you to read any of these previous novels to enjoy STIRRED.

But we'd love you even more if you did. :)

Blake Crouch, 10/2/10

Durango, CO

DESERT PLACES

Published in January 2004 by Thomas Dunne Books

DESCRIPTION: Andrew Z. Thomas is a successful writer of suspense thrillers, living the dream at his lake house in the piedmont of North Carolina. One afternoon in late spring, he receives a bizarre letter that eventually threatens his career, his sanity, and the lives of everyone he loves. A murderer is designing his future, and for the life of him, Andrew can’t get away.

Harrowing...terrific...a whacked out combination of Stephen King and
Cormac
McCarthy.
PAT CONROY

[C]
arried
by rich, image-filled prose. Crouch will handcuff you, blindfold you, throw you in the trunk of a car, and drag you kicking and screaming through a story so intense, so emotionally packed, that you will walk away stunned.
WINSTON-SALEM JOURNAL

Excerpt from Desert Places…

On a lovely May evening, I sat on my deck, watching the sun descend upon Lake Norman. So far, it had been a perfect day. I’d risen at 5:00 a.m. as I always do, put on a pot of French roast, and prepared my usual breakfast of scrambled eggs and a bowl of fresh pineapple. By six o’clock, I was writing, and I didn’t stop until noon. I fried two white crappies I’d caught the night before, and the moment I sat down for lunch, my agent called. Cynthia fields my messages when I’m close to finishing a book, and she had several for me, the only one of real importance being that the movie deal for my latest novel, Blue Murder, had closed. It was good news of course, but two other movies had been made from my books, so I was used to it by now.

I worked in my study for the remainder of the afternoon and quit at 6:30. My final edits of the new as yet untitled manuscript would be finished tomorrow. I was tired, but my new thriller, The Scorcher, would be on bookshelves within the week. I savored the exhaustion that followed a full day of work. My hands sore from typing, eyes dry and strained, I shut down the computer and rolled back from the desk in my swivel chair.

I went outside and walked up the long gravel drive toward the mailbox. It was the first time I’d been out all day, and the sharp sunlight burned my eyes as it squeezed through the tall rows of loblollies that bordered both sides of the drive. It was so quiet here. Fifteen miles south, Charlotte was still gridlocked in rush-hour traffic, and I was grateful not to be a part of that madness. As the tiny rocks crunched beneath my feet, I pictured my best friend, Walter Lancing, fuming in his Cadillac. He’d be
cursingthe
drone of horns and the profusion of taillights as he inched away from his suite in uptown Charlotte, leaving the quarterly nature magazine Hiker to return home to his wife and children. Not me, I thought, the solitary one.

For once, my mailbox wasn’t overflowing. Two envelopes lay inside, one a bill, the other blank except for my address typed on the outside. Fan mail.

Back inside, I mixed myself a Jack Daniel’s and Sun-Drop and took my mail and a book on criminal pathology out onto the deck. Settling into a rocking chair, I set everything but my drink on a small glass table and gazed down to the water. My backyard is narrow, and the woods flourish a quarter mile on either side, keeping my home of ten years in isolation from my closest neighbors. Spring had not come this year until mid-April, so the last of the pink and white dogwood blossoms still specked the variably green interior of the surrounding forest. Bright grass ran down to a weathered gray pier at the water’s edge, where an ancient weeping willow sagged over the bank, the tips of its branches dabbling in the surface of the water.

The lake is more than a mile wide where it touches my property, making houses on the opposite shore visible only in winter, when the blanket of leaves has been stripped from the trees. So now, in the thick of spring, branches thriving with baby greens and yellows, the lake was mine alone, and I felt like the only living soul for miles around.

I put my glass down half-empty and opened the first envelope. As expected, I found a bill from the phone company, and I scrutinized the lengthy list of calls. When I’d finished, I set it down and lifted the lighter envelope. There was no stamp, which I thought strange, and upon slicing it open, I extracted a single piece of white paper and unfolded it. In the center of the page, one paragraph had been typed in black ink:
Greetings. There is a body buried on your property, covered in your blood. The unfortunate young lady’s name is Rita Jones. You’ve seen this missing schoolteacher’s face on the news, I’m sure. In her jeans pocket you’ll find a slip of paper with a phone number on it. You have one day to call that number. If I have not heard from you by 8:00 p.m. tomorrow (5/17), the Charlotte Police Department will receive an anonymous phone call. I’ll tell them where Rita Jones is buried on Andrew Thomas’s lakefront property, how he killed her, and where the murder weapon can be found in his house. (I do believe a paring knife is missing from your kitchen.) I hope for your sake I don’t have to make that call. I’ve placed a property marker on the grave site. Just walk along the shoreline toward the southern boundary of your property and you’ll find it. I strongly advise against going to the police, as I am always watching you.

A smile edged across my lips. I even chuckled to myself. Because my novels treat crime and violence, my fans often have a demented sense of humor. I’ve received death threats, graphic artwork, even notes from people claiming to have murdered in the same fashion as the serial killers in my books. But I’ll save this, I thought. I couldn’t remember one so original.

I read it again, but a premonitory twinge struck me the second time, particularly because the author had some knowledge regarding the layout of my property. And a paring knife was, in fact, missing from my cutlery block. Carefully refolding the letter, I slipped it into the pocket of my khakis and walked down the steps toward the lake.

As the sun cascaded through the hazy sky, beams of light drained like spilled paint across the western horizon. Looking at the lacquered lake suffused with deep orange, garnet, and magenta, I stood by the shore for several moments, watching two sunsets collide.