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Closer Than Blood: An addictive and gripping crime thriller
Paul Grzegorzek
You would do anything for your family. Wouldn’t you? A gripping crime thriller, perfect for fans of Peter James. ‘Writes with raw, engaging, authenticity’ Peter James The real nightmare begins when the missing person returns… PC Gareth Bell is about to arrest a cocaine dealer on Brighton Marina, when he makes a shocking discovery that turns his world upside down: the dealer is his long-lost brother, Jake, someone he thought had died years ago. But their reunion is short lived. For Jake is on the run from a cold-blooded killer, whose network reaches all the way into the police force itself. Now that his brother’s life is on the line, Bell has only two choices. Family, or duty?
Closer Than Blood
PAUL GRZEGORZEK
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers
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KillerReads
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019
Copyright © Paul Grzegorzek 2019
Cover design by Andrew Davis © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019
Cover photograph © Shutterstock.com (http://Shutterstock.com)
Paul Grzegorzek 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 author’s 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.
Ebook Edition © August 2019 ISBN: 9780008329990
Version: 2019-07-16
To all those who dedicate their lives to saving ours
Table of Contents
Cover (#u84cf3433-ecaf-5a1e-9bee-e3c8044e4496)
Title Page (#u2925ffc1-c13e-5dd7-bdd3-2f2e281b3593)
Copyright (#u997fc7bb-a7ae-55fa-9a84-5b053b24825a)
Dedication (#u58310b8a-551b-594a-adb1-278e2f9f2cf8)
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
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Author’s Note
Keep Reading …
Also by Paul Grzegorzek
About the Author
About the Publisher
Chapter 1 (#u0b0d2862-92c5-5237-b960-fad7aaa8c638)
It’s been ten years since I killed a man. Not in cold blood, but in hot rage born of fear for those I loved. Ten years of terrible dreams by night and frustration by day. Ten years of watching those younger and less capable than me get promoted, while I remain an eternal sergeant, a relic at the back of the office no one is sure what to do with.
Killing a man tarnishes your soul as well as your reputation. I used to live by the creed that if I could look myself in the eye every morning and not feel ashamed then I was doing things right. Now, when I look at myself in the mirror I see a killer, a man who knows what he’s capable of when the chains come off.
After this long I’ve made some measure of peace with it, but I still have moments when the darkness rears up, trying to drag me back into those old memories of pain and blood and death.
“Contact, contact, we have eyeball on the X-ray.”
The voice jerked me back to the present and I straightened up behind the wheel, glancing across to my colleague, Tom. He was younger than me, somewhere in his mid-twenties, and he still had the fire and zeal that coppers radiate before they get burned out.
“Should we move, Sarge?” he asked, almost bouncing on the edge of his seat. No wonder; we’d been after our target for months now, slowly building up enough evidence to put him away for years. Eric Simmonds, charmer, socialite and club owner, with no fewer than three of Brighton’s premier entertainment venues displaying his name above the door. He is also, we discovered from a discontented former employee, responsible for a good twenty percent of the city’s cocaine distribution.
“Not yet. Let’s see which way he’s going first.”
Simmonds lived in one of the palatial flats in Palmeira Square, a hundred and fifty square metres of space in a building called Palmeira Grand that overlooks the sculpted public gardens.
It was home turf for me, just one street over from my flat, a tiny, functional place that was all I could afford after a messy divorce.
“X-ray is moving south into Palmeira Square, heading towards his car. Confirm he is carrying a black rucksack. Also wearing a red jacket and black trousers. I have the eyeball.”
“All received,” I said, touching the pressel hidden in my pocket to send. “Units two and three to box the square north and east. Tom and I will take south.”
