Twenty Years Later

Charlie Donlea

Chapters (95)

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Books by Charlie Donlea

SUMMIT LAKE

THE GIRL WHO WAS TAKEN

DON’T BELIEVE IT

SOME CHOOSE DARKNESS

THE SUICIDE HOUSE

TWENTY YEARS LATER

Published by Kensington Publishing Corp.

Title Page

TWENTY YEARS LATER

CHARLIE DONLEA

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Copyright Page

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by

Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018

Library of Congress Card Catalogue Number: 2021944896

The K logo is a trademark of Kensington Publishing Corp.

ISBN: 978-1-4967-2716-9

First Kensington Hardcover Edition: January 2022

ISBN: 978-1-4967-2720-6 (ebook)

From invention is born progress
From reinvention is born freedom
—Anonymous

Catskill Mountains - July 15, 2001 Two Months Before 9/11

Catskill Mountains

July 15, 2001 Two Months Before 9/11

DEATH WAS IN THE AIR.

He smelled it as soon as he ducked under the crime scene tape and stepped onto the front lawn of the palatial estate. The Catskill Mountains rose above the roofline as the early morning sun stretched shadows of trees across the yard. The breeze rolled down from the foothills and carried the smell of decay, causing his upper lip to twitch when it reached his nostrils. The smell of death filled him with excitement. He hoped it was because this was his first case as a newly minted homicide detective, and not from some perverse fetish he had never known he possessed.

A uniformed police officer led him across the lawn and around to the back of the property. There, he found the source of the foul odor. The victim was hanging naked from a second-story balcony, his feet suspended at eye level, and the white rope around his neck angling his head like a broken-stemmed lollipop. The detective looked up to the terrace. The rope stretched over the railing, tight and challenged by the weight of the body. The twine disappeared through French doors that led, he presumed, into the bedroom.