Promo: Todd Hollow Series - Adult Content
Marie Roy
TODD HOLLOW SERIES by Collette Thomas, Erotic Fiction Author
Two great summer reads by
DEADLY GAMES BOOK ONE IN THE TODD
HOLLOW SERIES made the best seller list at Coolerbooks. com
About the Book
Detective Jon Walker is facing a killer who's been targeting the women of his town (Todd Hollow). Helping him is the assistant medical examiner, Meghan Doyle. Meghan is quite familiar with loss and pain, and when the investigation reveals that the murderer stalks his prey based on their interest in BDSM, Meghan and Jon will have to trust each other to bring down a familiar stranger -- who turns out to be straight from Meghan's past.
(Contains romantic elements, BDSM, strong language and graphic images.)
BUY LINK FOR DEADLY GAMES:
http://www.damnatio nbooks.com/ book.php? isbn=97816157202 00
EXCERPT
Prologue
He followed her. He knew the exact path she took home, a path that took her through secluded woods around the lake.
He spotted the black Lincoln hearse parked at the side of the road and recognized it. They had probably picked up a removal. Sometimes the drivers would park like that, taking a break before taking the body in.
It was weird what they did, Davies thought, but he didn’t really mind working there after school hours.
They paid him really good for what he did, like running errands for them and helping with those removals and other things he was told to keep his mouth shut about. It was no skin off his nose what they did behind those closed doors. And the clients certainly weren’t about to complain. He chuckled at the thought.
Keeping his eyes on the girl, he stayed a safe distance behind so she wouldn’t spot him.
Once she got to the edge of the frozen lake, he’d make his move. Scare the hell out of her. She damn well needed to learn a good lesson. No one made a fool of him. Meghan Doyle needed to know that and the sooner the better.
* * * * *
The girl had sensed since leaving the school that someone was following her. She only had to cross the next short stretch of woods, then several more yards over a clearing. She would see the front of her house from there.
The fear kept rising inside, making her feel as if she were walking through thick sludge rather than over hard-packed snow.
She could hear the sound of crunching boots behind her and quickened her steps. Suddenly, someone pulled at her scarf, tugged at it, tried to yank it away from her neck. The forces pulled her backward. She grabbed at the knitted fabric, screamed a long, piercing shriek.
A startled flock of snowbirds shot straight into the air.
Snow started to fall. She stumbled, hit the ground face first, felt a sharp pain to the side of her head. She crawled and was suddenly rolling downward, kept rolling until she reached the bottom of a small ravine. Snow continued to fall, concealing her.
The last thing she saw was her red scarf, floating above as if it had flown into an upper tree branch. And then she heard more screams, a low wail, and someone calling for help.
Not her voice. Silence fell along with the snow.
Then total blackness.
Chapter One
Present Day
“A body putrefies mainly by climate and insects,” Meghan Doyle’s steady, no-nonsense voice began. She drew shut some of the blinds, eliminating the afternoon glare, then turned back to Edmond Cutler’s high school biology class to continue. “When a person dies, the body starts to decay right away. The same enzymes that help us digest our food in turn eat away at the decaying tissue and speed up the process of decomp…decomposition,” she corrected, remembering to shy away from forensic jargon. “If the person died of, say, a bacterial infection, then that process is sped up by the very existence of the bacteria.”
Meghan inwardly smiled at the mortified reactions on some faces. At least she captured their interest, especially those students sitting in the front seats who had an unobstructed view of her charts.
Doyle’s lectures at the local high school level had gained a reputation. They reminded many of gory horror flicks or those PSAs of traffic accidents meant to discourage teens from drinking and driving. Difficult to look at, but impossible to turn away from.
*****
A self-service station, a Chinese restaurant, a diner serving all-you-can eat specials on Thursday night, a coffee shop usually crowded with patrons from the local dance clubs on Saturday and Sunday mornings -- shutting down before the dinner hour -- and Wilcox’s New and Used Book Nook were Quinn Reilly’s closest neighbors.
On this quiet, wet Tuesday morning Quinn’s bones ached. Quinn didn’t mind the quiet, but he hated the dampness that came with these late spring rains.
Traffic was usually light in the small town of Todd Hollow, especially on Tuesday. A bedroom town nestled between two Connecticut cities, it confessed of some minor crime within its narrow borders, but far enough removed from urban corruption, it offered a peaceful enough existence for most of its residents.
And Quinn liked that just fine, not having to worry about what went on outside his dojo. With no classes running tonight, it gave him an opportunity to plow through a pile of mounting paperwork.
He worked a Tootsie Roll Pop out of its bag, peeled off the wrapper, and stuck the candy into the side of his mouth. He hung up the phone, relieved this time the caller wasn’t the local bank reminding him of his late mortgage payment. He needed no reminders. As he jotted down a few notes, his tongue caressed the chocolate candy.
“What? No class?”
Quinn spun around. Jon Walker stood in the outer doorway.
“The new class doesn’t start until next Tuesday. But hey, while you’re here and you have a few minutes, go hang up the bag and have a go at it. You know where the gloves are. I’d join you, but I whacked this hand good the other night demonstrating a backhanded punch,” Quinn said, rubbing the knuckles of his left hand.
Jon looked down at Quinn’s hand, his face showing mild concern -- followed by a grin. “Gotta go easy on yourself, old boy. You’re not getting any younger. And when are you going to quit eating that junk food?” he commented, eyeing the crushed wrappers scattered across a faded blue blotter. “All that sugar’s no good, especially on the nerves.”
Quinn merely smiled, then said, “Man’s got to have some vices.”
Jon snorted and slapped his hard, flat stomach. “I’m pushing thirty-eight, and I’m still in great shape.” He puffed, flexing arms that brandished well-formed biceps. “I eat right, get enough exercise, and keep my love life under control. That’s all it takes.” He laughed a hearty, contagious laugh.
Quinn couldn’t help but reciprocate in laughter. “Your love life, or the present lack of it, keeps you under control.” Quinn stood to help Jon lift the long punching bag onto a ceiling hook.
“Hey, Quinn, when are you going to come back full time?”
Quinn’s smile disappeared. “How’d we get on that subject?”
“I dunno. It’s been a couple of years. Somehow I never thought you’d go this long working only part time on the force. I know you have this dojo to fill your time, but knowing you…”
“Don’t waste your energy thinking about me.” With his uninjured hand, Quinn gave the bag a well-placed punch, peering at Jon from the other side.
He straightened to his full six feet one frame. “I changed my mind about the sparring. The hand is fine.” Quinn fixed his eyes on his opponent.
Jon pulled on a pair of gloves, ignored the cold, hard pain running up his right thigh, which always ached more on damp rainy nights serving as a constant reminder of the scar caused by a bullet . He assumed a fighting stance. “Let’s get started.”
Jon’s cell phone rang from the clip on his belt. The men looked at each other. It wasn’t Quinn’s personal phone. It was the dispatcher, and that meant official business.
Jon answered. His eyes dark turned serious, distracted. “Looks like I’m going to have to take a rain check on this. Someone found a body up near Lake Crandall” he told Quinn, snapping the phone shut. End of Excerpt
BUY LINK FOR DEADLY GAMES:
http://www.damnatio nbooks.com/ book.php? isbn=97816157202 00
AND THE SECOND IN THIS SERIES - DEADLY AFFAIRS
About the book: Murder and mayhem again wreak havoc in the small town of Todd Hollow. Detective Jon Walker with help from Fire Marshall Aidan McKay faces another killer who uses the method of arson to kill his victims. More dark secrets begin to unfold in this town as evil continues to penetrate this once serene community.
(Contains romantic elements, BDSM, strong language and graphic images.)
BUY LINK FOR DEADLY AFFAIRS: http://www.damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615720491
EXCERPT
Prologue
Martin Manheim smiled when he saw Danny Reilly coming through the doorway. He glanced up at the wall clock. “You’re right on time,” he said, a hint of surprise evident in his tone.
Danny nodded but did not return the smile.
Martin handed him a piece of paper. Danny read the words in fancy bold print.
“My first instructor gave me this.”
Mentally, Danny read the words.
Embalming is the process of chemically treating a dead human body to reduce the presence and growth of microorganisms, to retard organic decomposition, and to restore an acceptable physical appearance.
Danny stared at Martin and realized he was in the prep room for that one purpose; to become initiated into a process that he would not be allowed to perform just yet, not until he finished the necessary education. Martin had been doing this for over twenty years –chemically treating the dead for grieving families.
Unlike what he was feeling earlier when he got up that morning, he no longer felt the urge to bolt from the room. Nor did he want to disappoint Martin, who had become more or less a mentor over the last six months. The part time summer job had become more than just earning extra money over the summer months. It was beginning to look more like a door to his future.
Danny looked at the hydraulic porcelain preparation table and at the numerous instruments, in various sizes, and shapes and modifications.
What took place here did not prolong life in the sense an operating room promised.
“I can tell there’s a lot going on inside that mind of yours,” Martin said. “One thing that we all get drummed into us, is that this body, this cadaver, this once beloved soul of those who now bereave its loss, is the guest of honor at his last function they share together. And the most important thing we do for the family is provide them a perfect body for that one last visit.”
Danny’s mind whirled with thoughts that struggled to comprehend Martin’s words.
“Now with that all said and done, let’s get started.” He gave an oblique glance Danny’s way, and asked, “Did you have breakfast?”
Danny shook his head, swallowed hard as he approached the table.
“Good. Don’t worry after awhile if you stay with this long enough, it won’t be a problem and you’ll be glad you went ahead and ate that grand slam special they serve at the Waffle Emporium on Wednesdays.”
Danny still said nothing but looked on as Martin started to do his thing, all the while thinking that he was damn glad he hadn’t eaten anything, and wondered if what Martin said was going to true.
At the moment, he didn’t believe it and felt if he stayed with this long enough, he’d never enjoy any meal at the Waffle Emporium again.
CHAPTER ONE
Meghan Doyle took quick deliberate strides out of the Canterville Superior Court House. Detective Jon Sloane followed behind. Neither said a word to each other upon hearing the judge’s pronouncement of a mistrial.
Meghan squinted into the bright sunlight against a clear blue sky that marked another rainless day, a reminder that it hadn’t rained for weeks in the area.
The fair weather did nothing to relieve her of her building angst or the disbelief that justice had failed the small town where Matthew Manheim and his cohorts once wreaked havoc.
The jury had felt there was not enough reasonable doubt, plus things had gone wrong for the prosecution to warrant this mistrial.
Three short words--“a hung jury”—filled her head.
“How fucking often does that happen?” she asked aloud.
Jon did not respond as if sensing the question was a rhetorical one and that she wasn‘t looking for answers.
“Was that jury blind? Were they deaf? Did they not understand any of the evidence presented?” she rambled on. “Were they all out to lunch? Now I know how Marcia Clarke felt when they came back with that non-guilty verdict for Simpson. Damn.” She remembered following that infamous case back in the mid nineties and like everyone else was as shock feeling that the evidence had proven otherwise.
The verdict had acquitted the man of murdering his ex wife Nicole Simpson.
If the glove doesn’t fit, then we must acquit!
As if Cochran, part of the defense’s ‘dream team’ had come back from the dead, the now infamous phrase incessantly echoed inside her brain.
Mistrials especially in these cases were usually rare and seldom happened in cases where the D.A. reassured it would go their way.
No one anticipated Judge Gerald Mahoney’s declaration of this mistrial based on a deadlocked jury of twelve people who were unable to come to a unanimous decision that could keep Matthew Manheim behind bars.
Matthew Manheim once again a free man, was free to finish what he long ago promised.
He had killed her grandfather.
He had killed her husband.
He had tried killing her.
No one could make her think differently.
Could he succeed in finishing what he started?
She couldn’t rationalize what happened in that court room but from that point on she’d always be looking over one shoulder.
Matthew Manheim started the deadly game, a game she could still end up losing.
End of Excerpt
BUY LINK FOR DEADLY AFFAIRS: http://www.damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615720491
You won’t want to miss this series, but be forewarned, these stories are NOT for the faint of heart.
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