AftermathPerfectBound e-book extra: Enter the World of Peter Robinson. The crime scene awaiting Acting Detective Superintendent Alan Banks is among the worst he has ever encountered. The assailant, Terence Payne, hovers close to death himself. And Payne's brutalized wife, Lucy -- whose overheard screams prompted the original call -- has already been moved to a local hospital for treatment. But these sins and tragedies pale before what else has transpired in a dank basement the press will soon dub the "House of Payne." Now that the fiend is in custody, the long nightmare appears over at last. But is it? In Alan Banks's mind too many questions need to be answered before he can rest easy. How could the heinous crimes of a popular teacher like Payne have so completely escaped the notice of his peers, his neighbors...his wife? And was fragile, abused Lucy Payne a victim or a reluctant accomplice? Despite the strain on his own personal life and relationships, Banks refuses to ease up on his investigation. Buried deep in the past are shards of irony, pity, and horror almost too painful to bear, and unspeakable betrayals that deformed more than one childhood. For Banks, for his lover, Annie Cabot -- who suspects heartless political forces are setting her up to destroy a life -- and for the beautiful consulting psychologist Dr. Jenny Fuller, there is much more that must be unearthed in the aftermath of abomination. Because the darkness has not yet lifted, and new casualties are mounting. And there are still monsters loose in the world...
Close to Home"
There are human bones buried in an open field, the remains of a lost teenaged boy whose disappearance devastated a community more than thirty-five years ago ... and scarred a guilt-ridden friend forever.
A long-hidden horror has been unearthed, dragging a tormented policeman back into a past he could never truly forget no matter how desperately he tried. A heinous crime that occurred too close to home still has its grip on Chief Inspector Alan Banks -- and it's leading him into a dark place where evil still dwells. Because the secrets that doomed young Graham Marshall back in 1965 remain alive and lethal -- and disturbing them could cost Banks much more than he ever imagined.
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Cold Is the GraveThe nude photo of a teenage runaway shows up on a pornographic website, and the girl's father turns to Detective Chief Inspector Alan banks for help. But these are typical circumstances, for the runaway is the daughter of a man who's determined to destroy the dedicated Yorkshire policeman's career and good name. Still it is a case that strikes painfully home, one that Banks -- a father himself -- dares not ignore as he follows it's squalid trail into teeming London, and into a world of drugs, sex, and crime. But murder follows soon after -- gruesome ,sensational, and, more than once -- pulling Banks in a direction that he dearly does not wish to go: into the past and private world of his most powerful enemy, Chief Constable Jimmy Riddle.
Playing with Fire"
Fire -- It consumes futures and pasts in a terrified heartbeat, devouring damning secrets while leaving even greater mysteries in the ashes.
The night sky is ablaze as flames engulf two barges moored side by side on an otherwise empty canal. On board are the blackened remains of two human beings. To the seasoned eye, this horror was no accident, the method so cruel and calculated that only the worst sort of fiend could have committed it. There are shocking secrets to be uncovered in the charred wreckage, grim evidence of lethal greed and twisted hunger, and of nightmare occurrences within the private confines of family. A terrible feeling is driving police inspector Alan Banks in his desperate hunt for answers -- an unshakable fear that this killer's work will not be done until Banks's own world is burned to the ground.
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