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PRAISE FOR HANGMAN

PRAISE FOR HANGMAN

‘Jack Heath’s writing grabs you by the throat, gnaws on your bones and washes it all down with a hefty dose of funny. Sick, twisted, violent and oh so good. In Timothy Blake, Heath has created a one-of-a-kind character. I hope.’—Emma Viskic, internationally bestselling author of And Fire Came Down

‘Blake is a brilliant, complex character … this quiet and unassuming figure might just be the most dangerous man in the room. Hangman is cinematic and grubby, brimming with pulpy noir.’—Michael Offer, producer, How to Get Away with Murder and Homeland

‘Wild and original, Hangman stamps a high and bloodied mark on this dark genre. Hannibal Lecter will be adding Jack Heath to his reading list.’—Ben Sanders, internationally bestselling author of American Blood

‘Let’s cut to the chase: Hangman is a great read! Jack Heath’s boundless imagination and singular voice have produced a truly unique thriller. By turns psychologically insightful, wonderfully disturbed and even darkly comedic, Hangman will keep you coursing through the pages at a lightning pace. Brilliant! (Probably best read with lights on and doors locked. I’m just saying.)’—Jeffery Deaver, No. 1 international bestselling author

‘Hangman is ghoulish fun, and fills the Dexter- and Hannibal-shaped holes in our lives.’—Books + Publishing

‘A grisly, efficiently written nail-biter packed with riddles and suspense, Hangman has bestseller written all over it. It’s a dark book, but one with plenty of humour, and a twisty plot that keeps you guessing to the very end.’—Sydney Morning Herald

‘Compelling … Heath keeps the suspense at a high level through to its stunning conclusion. An addictive and suspenseful thriller that will keep you reading well into the night.’—Canberra Weekly

‘Blake is a classic kind of hard-boiled hero, mixing cynicism and honour, brutality and sentimentality … he’s a chivalrous knight of the kind we have never seen before.’—Weekend Australian Review

‘A cracking read full of well-crafted twists and turns … Heath manages to bring Blake out from behind the shadow of his predecessors and stand on his own.’—Australian Crime Fiction

‘Heath has given the crime world an anti-hero for this century. Gifted and flawed, Blake will horrify and entrance readers, quite often at the same time. An exceptionally taut novel both in action and execution, this sledge-hammer story is sure to entice fans of serial crime fiction, taking readers into the dark and dirty recesses of Blake’s mind.’—Good Reading

‘Hangman is a pulpy and perverse delight … Heath makes Blake young, rough, streetwise, and precisely the sort of person Dr Lecter would avoid in the street. This is a gobsmackingly (or lip-smackingly) violent tale, but it is also bizarre, hilarious, and a stealthily astute commentary on post-financial crisis America. Give me more.’—Christopher Richardson (blog)

‘Richer than Reacher … an accomplished and compulsive thriller that kept my appetite to return to its banquet of kidnapping and bloody murder. Hangman literally tingles with tension, and Heath injects a healthy dose of dark humour.’—Sydney Arts Guide

‘Hangman is cheerful in its gore, with a knack for unexpected violence that’ll leave even the most jaded crime readers at least a little bit impressed … It’s all the best parts of noir fiction, all the spatter pattern ghoulishness of forensics-focused dramas, and so much fun it might just concern you a little bit.’—Hush Hush Biz (blog)

PRAISE FOR HUNTER

‘Gloriously f****d up.’—Gabriel Bergmoser, award-winning author of The Hunted

‘… nimbly written, sinister and suspenseful.’—Sydney Morning Herald and The Age

‘Blake remains the likeable bad guy protagonist, and Jack Heath does an astonishing job of continuing to make the reader root for the cannibal detective. Hunter is a solid follow-up to the first in the series, with no perceivable drop off in writing, tension, action or body count. Highly recommended!’—Carpe Librum (blog)

‘… funny, chilling and thought-provoking, with a killer ending (so to speak).’—Sun-Herald

‘Another compulsive page-turner. Heath seems determined to upend every rock he can find to expose the dark side of humanity to the point where hanging out with a cannibal seems like the best option.’—PS News

‘… compelling, enjoyable and disturbing.’—Canberra Weekly

‘A delicious delight … Heath throws everything at the reader in this brilliantly written crime caper. Don’t let all the chomping put you off—Blake’s still guided by a moral compass pointing in the right direction, and hopefully Heath will craft more adventures for our unlikely hero.’—Herald Sun

‘A rich, detailed thriller that keeps you turning pages, wanting to know what’s going to happen next.’—Noveltea Corner (blog)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jack Heath is the award-winning author of more than thirty novels for adults and children. His books have been translated into several languages, adapted for film and optioned for television. He lives on the land of the Ngunnawal people in Canberra, Australia.

Warning: Hunter is unsuitable for children and some adults. It includes descriptions of sexual violence and suicide.

EPIGRAPH

Standing on the corner with a dollar in my hand, honey

Standing on the corner with a dollar in my hand, babe

Standing on the corner with a dollar in my hand

Standing here waiting for the Crawdad Man

Honey

Baby

Mine

—Civil War-era folk song

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 1

What has a neck but no head?

If Charlie Warner wants you dead, first she steals your shoes.

Not in person. She has people all over Houston.

One of them is James Tyrrell, a pudgy guy with Coke-bottle glasses and scar tissue on his arm where the number 88 used to be. A coded white supremacist tattoo—H is the eighth letter of the alphabet. The 88 means Heil Hitler. ‘I’m no Nazi,’ I heard him say once, ‘but if you want to survive Huntsville prison, you gotta pick a team.’

Tyrrell will open your front door with a police-issue lock-release gun and go to your bedroom wearing latex gloves and a hairnet. He’ll steal your most expensive pair of shoes. Usually black, always shiny—the kind you might wear to a funeral. He’ll take some socks, too, but won’t touch anything else on his way out.

Two more guys will drive a white van with stolen plates to wherever it is you work. Their names are Jordan Francis and Theo Sariklis. They both have thick necks, square jaws and crew cuts. It took me a while to tell them apart. Sariklis is the one with the drooping eyelid and the Ramones shirt. He’s been working for Warner longer than me. Francis is new—just moved here from San Jose, California. He’s the one who cracks jokes. Even in winter he wears a wife-beater to show off his biceps. He might go to the gym after killing you.

Francis will park the van next to the driver’s side of your car. Sariklis will open the sliding door on the side of the van and wait.

You’ll walk out of the office and approach your car. When you go to open the door, Francis will grab you and drag you into the van. It takes seconds. He’s had plenty of practice—in San Jose he worked for one of the Sureño gangs. You won’t even have time to scream before Francis shuts the van door.

You’ll know who they work for. Warner doesn’t target bystanders. They’re here because you stole from her, or lied to her, or informed on her. Or maybe you didn’t pay your tab at one of her businesses. An underground casino, a bordello, a drug den.

They’ll ask you questions. The first few are a test; they already know the answers. If you lie, Francis will hold you down, while Sariklis forces a water bottle into your mouth and pinches your nose shut so it feels like drowning. They do it like that because they’re still in the parking lot and there aren’t many quiet ways to torture someone.

Just when it feels like you’re gonna die, Sariklis will take the bottle out. You’ll throw up. Then he will ask you some more questions. The real ones. Whatever Warner needs to know. Who have you told? What are their names? Where do they live? Show us the messages.

The last question is always about the PIN for your bank account. You’ll answer that one gladly. You’ll think it means they only want money. You’ll think they’re going to let you go.

After you give them your PIN, Sariklis will stick the bottle back in your mouth. This time he won’t let up. He’ll drown you, right there in the parking lot. Three minutes until your heart gives up, four until brain death.

Francis will stay in the van with your body while Sariklis takes your car, your phone and your wallet to an ATM. He’ll withdraw as much as he can, then drive to a secluded stretch of beach in Galveston.

There he’ll meet Tyrrell, who has your shoes. Sariklis will place your shoes side by side on the sand, your wallet and keys tucked inside like frightened mice. Tyrrell will do a factory reset on your phone, switch it off and hurl it into the sea. They’ll abandon your car on the side of the road, within sight of the grey ocean, and take Tyrrell’s car back to Warner’s office to give her the cash.

I’ve only been to Warner’s office once, and I had a bag on my head for the whole journey. But I was memorising the turns, and counting the seconds. Afterwards I got them to drop me off someplace else, and I memorised that journey as well. Later I looked at a map, and narrowed it down to four city blocks near Market Square Park.

They usually take you on a Friday. If you live alone, you may not be reported missing until Monday. The police will find your car and shoes around Wednesday. Some of them will say you drowned accidentally while swimming. Others will suggest that it was suicide. The shoes are too classy for a normal swim, they’ll say, and there’s no towel. Plus, your bathing suit is still at your home.

Because of the ATM withdrawal, still others will say that you faked your death. You did have some powerful enemies, after all. Your missing phone lends credence to this theory. But anyone who suspects Warner will be smart enough not to say so.

All this is assuming you’re one of the lucky ones, and Warner doesn’t want the credit for your death. Sometimes she kills someone to send a message. No stolen shoes, no water bottle. The body turns up in dozens of pieces, each removed from a living person.

Once upon a time Warner’s men would have just thrown your body into the ocean. The water in your lungs would make sense on the autopsy report. But the bruising around your lips and wrists, plus the damage to your gums, might raise some eyebrows. Now they have a better way.

While Sariklis and Tyrrell bring the cash to Warner’s office, Francis will take the van onto State Highway 12, alone. Your body will be in the back under a sheet, slowly going cold. Francis will drive through the dark, watching the buildings disappear and the trees get taller and taller.

Then he’ll see a beat-up Toyota parked on the shoulder, miles from anywhere. He’ll pull over. Despite what he’s seen and done, he’ll shudder before he gets out of the car.

Then he’ll slide open the van door, and give your body to me.

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 2

What flies without wings and cries without eyes?

He’s late.

I pace up and down the shoulder, watching the road for headlights. The trees whisper secrets in the gentle breeze. My breath makes clouds in front of my face. It’s not snowing, but the sky is seriously considering it. People think Texas is hot, but in early December it falls below fifty.

Normally I’d stay in the driver’s seat, working on riddles. Strangers mail them to me, and I solve them for twenty bucks each. This started out as a money-laundering scheme, and surprised me by becoming an actual job. But tonight I have to get out of the car. A diet of primarily meat, stale bread and salted coffee has ugly side effects. I’m having stomach cramps.

I check my phone, squinting at the tiny screen. It’s two am. The phone is a burner, small and cheap. Warner told me to keep it switched on and with me at all times. The battery never lasts long, so I know she installed a hidden tracking app. She probably assumed I’d figure that out, but she also knows I’m smart enough to play dumb.

My guts gurgle, twisting in my belly. I need a bathroom break. But if I’m not here when Francis arrives, I don’t know what he’ll do.

I take deep breaths. That only makes it worse. I try to think about the van instead, cruising towards me with the body inside.

The dead man is named Aaron Elliott. An investment banker. He hit one of Warner’s callgirls, leaving her with a busted nose. Now she can’t work. Warner said it would be bad business to let something like that go unpunished.

The body is supposed to be big. Six foot, two hundred pounds. Might be a challenge for me to dispose of.

The pressure from my insides is getting unbearable. I take one more hopeful look at the road, but there’s still no sign of the van, so I scurry into the woods.

Living your whole life in the city, you forget how dark it gets beyond the edge. Even when I was sleeping on the streets, there was always light around. A fizzing streetlight here, the glow of a gas station there. No trees to block the moonlight. Out here, there’s nothing but the smell of earth and the buzz of insects. An eastern screech owl trills somewhere above me. I fumble through the foliage, using the flashlight app to find a good spot.

Then something stops me. The smell of meat.

I’ve always had a good sense of smell. Starvation does that to you. I turn around, slowly. Taking rapid, sharp sniffs, like a dog. It’s not cooked meat, but it’s also not a dead animal. There’s none of that farmy, furry odour. And it’s … this way.

Curiosity has taken my mind off the stomach cramps. I push through the brush, branches scratching at my legs and arms, until I reach the source of the smell.

It’s a dead body.

The man is naked. Thin, short—not Elliott. Facedown, with one arm outstretched, as though he’s swimming. His other hand is trapped under his torso.

I sweep the phone over him. The glow illuminates his face. He’s white, mid-forties, with a short beard and grey-flecked hair. His eyes are wide, his teeth bared. Pained, enraged or terrified—can’t tell.

People with hypothermia sometimes take their clothes off right before they die. Their body temperature gets so low that the air feels hot around them, and they start shedding layers. But even in winter, it would take at least an hour to die of exposure, and he’s barely fifty feet from the road.

In the dark, it’s impossible to know which direction he came from. But there’s nothing out here—that’s why Warner picked this spot—so I assume a car dropped him off. Sometimes the police do that. Take your clothes and kick you out of the car, miles from anywhere in the freezing cold. Murder by weather.

But in that scenario, he would have stayed on the road in case a car came by. He wouldn’t have run into the woods.

So he was trying to escape from the driver. Maybe he even threw himself from a moving vehicle, although I don’t see any grazes on his palms or his knees. His skin is pristine. I touch it. Soft, too. He hasn’t been dead long. A day at the most.

Don’t do it. It’s the voice of Agent Reese Thistle, my old FBI handler. I haven’t seen her in months, but I still hear her in my head. She’s what I have instead of a conscience.

Walk away, she says.

Ignoring her, I squeeze the man’s upper arm. It’s the perfect mixture of fat and muscle. I squeeze it, and lean in close. My heart rate is through the roof. I can hardly breathe.

Are you kidding me? Thistle says. You don’t know who he is, where he came from, how he died or who might be looking for him. Plus, you got another body on the way. You don’t need this.

She’s right. But she’s too late to stop me. It was too late the moment I saw the body.

Just one bite, I tell myself, and rip a chunk out of his arm with my teeth.

He screams.

I rear back, but it’s not him. Something else has screeched—maybe that owl from before.

A flashlight flits between the trees in the distance.

Holy shit. I duck down, gore dribbling from my mouth. I’m not alone in this forest. Someone is here, probably tracking the dead man. Maybe the driver of the car he escaped from. Or a cop, doing search and rescue. Either way, the person with the flashlight will be armed, unlike me. Boots trample the undergrowth, closer every second.

I could run back to my car. But when the tracker finds the body, he or she will notice the fresh bite, clearly made by human teeth. The tracker will start looking for me. If they are with the police, they’ll call in reinforcements. The forest will be surrounded, the highway blocked off. The cops will stop me, see the blood on my face, and it’s over.

So I can’t let the tracker find the body.

I heave the dead man over my shoulder. He weighs maybe a hundred and sixty pounds. Less than me, but still it’s hard to walk with him on my back. My feet sink deeper into the undergrowth with every step. Leaves crunch, branches rattle. Hopefully the tracker won’t hear me over his own footsteps.

Soon I’ve reached the edge of the forest. I look around. No sign of any cars on the road other than mine. I hustle out of the forest and run over to my Toyota. My fingers are shaking as I open the trunk, leaving blood on the handle.

Headlights in the distance. Engine noise. If that’s anyone other than Francis, I’m in trouble.

There’s a thirty-gallon plastic tub in the trunk. I dump the dead man in and slam the lid. I keep my face turned away from the car as it passes.

The car slows down, but doesn’t stop. I’m not sure how much the driver would have seen. Even less sure how likely they are to report anything they did see.

One more thing before I go. I pick up a rock about the size of a deck of cards, and pitch it as far as I can, over the tops of the trees. It crashes down somewhere in the distance. I can’t see the flashlight, but I can hear the tracker changing direction, moving with renewed urgency.

I wait until the sound fades. Then I start the engine, release the park brake and pull out onto the highway.

•

My house is a dilapidated two-bedroom, one-bathroom thing in a bad neighbourhood just outside the loop. The rent is surprisingly high for such a crummy place. Ideally I’d split it with someone, but since I ate my last roommate—a drug-dealing rapist—the idea makes me nervous. It’s safest for everyone if I live alone.

I reverse the car into the carport, jump out and open the trunk. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not always darkest before dawn. Already a cold blue glow is starting to spill across the street. The sun will be up in an hour. I need to get the body inside before someone—

‘Morning, Timothy!’

I look up. My neighbour is on the sidewalk, dressed in a tank top and sweatbands. A blond labrador sniffs around his running shoes.

I always feel sorry for dogs, even though I’ve been bitten a few times. Like me, they’re keen observers of body language and have a good sense of smell. Also like me, they love meat, they have poor impulse control and they’re usually at someone else’s mercy.

‘Hi, Shawn,’ I say. ‘You’re up early.’

Can he see the blood on my face and my shirt? Probably not, if I stay in the shadows of the carport. And from this angle, he can’t see the inside of the trunk. I casually close the lid.

‘New Year’s resolution,’ Shawn is saying. He does an exaggerated hamstring stretch. ‘I’m gonna get into shape.’

Shawn is already in shape. I’ve often thought he looks tasty. Two hundred pounds, five foot nine, thirty years old, black. There’s no sweat in his moustache, so he hasn’t started his run yet.

‘It’s December,’ I say.

‘I know. I’m training for New Year’s.’

‘Oh. Have fun.’

The dog looks very interested in the trunk of my car. She strains at the chain.

Shawn tugs her back towards him. ‘You should come with me,’ he says. ‘We could make it a regular thing.’

‘Maybe another time,’ I say.

Shawn has lived next door to me for years, but only started talking to me recently, after my roommate disappeared. I think Shawn was scared of him. He should have been scared of me instead. He seems like a good guy, so I try to avoid him. I don’t want him to get hurt.

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