Crosscut

Table of Contents

 

 

 
China Lake

“Do me a favor, okay? Lay your hands on . . .
China Lake
. [It] had me at page one. Miss Gardiner makes it all work. . . . Amazingly entertaining.”—Stephen King

“[An] exciting mix. Great stuff.”—
Independent on Sunday

“With a colorful cast of richly delineated characters, a protagonist with whom the readers will easily identify—all big hearted, quick tongued, and hair-trigger tempered . . . a fast-paced ride through some of the more dubious nooks and crannies of the American dream.”—
The Guardian
(UK)

“Fast and hard-edged. Buy it, read it.”—
Hull Daily Mail

“A cracker, with memorable characters, memorable lines, and a plot that races along to an explosive ending. A great summer read.”—
Huddersfield Daily Examiner

“Very well written, racy, and witty.”—Tangled Web

“From beginning to end,
China Lake
is a book no reader of thrillers will be able to put down. Great characters, dynamic plot, nail-biting action—Meg Gardiner gives us everything.”

—Elizabeth George

 
Kill Chain

“Evan Delaney is a paragon for our times: tough, funny, clever, brave, tireless, and compassionate. The pace and inventiveness never flag, and the climax . . . is both nail-biting and moving. But the brilliant writing is what puts this thriller way ahead of the competition. Intelligent escapism at its best.”

—
The Guardian
(UK)

“I loved every minute of it. A breathtaking thriller, gripping and relentless.”—Caroline Carver, CWA Dagger-winning author of
Blood Junction

“A rattling good read.”—
News of the World

“Brilliant.”—
The Evening Telegraph
(Peterborough, UK)

“The action is high octane from the first page. Once you pick it up, it’s a very hard book to put down.”—
My Weekly

“Fast and furious.”—
The Literary Review

 
Crosscut

“Full of classic Gardiner one-liners . . . but mostly there’s a serious freezerload of scare-you-silly chills.”—Stephen King

“A tense and exciting thriller where almost anything seems possible. A conspiracy theorist’s must-have.”

—
Independent on Sunday

“Easily one of the best thrillers I’ve read this year. I could barely wait to get to the next page. If you start this book, be prepared to be unable to put it down. Meg Gardiner has written a cracker.”—Caroline Carver

“This book rips. It makes
Silence of the Lambs
look like Mary had a little one—it never lets up.”

—Adrienne Dines, author of
The Jigsaw Maker

 
Jericho Point

“Meg Gardiner dishes out the gripping plot in tense helpings. Short, punchy chapters keep the pace flowing, and you’ll find it impossible to find a resting point.”

—
Evening Times
(Glasgow)

“[Gardiner’s] depictions of the criminal elements of the Hollywood fringe and the local drugs culture is a tightly observed slice of realism. This is a relentless, claustrophobic examination of mistaken identity and the terror of being accused of a crime for which you are not responsible.”—
Sherlock

“Fast-paced, witty, and brutal.”

—
The Independent
(London)

“Meg Gardiner is a welcome addition to the ranks of American thriller writers.”—
The Daily Telegraph
(UK)

“Meg Gardiner has rekindled my interest in thrillers.”

—
The Independent
(London)

“Meg Gardiner is a class act at the top of her game.”

—
My Weekly

“Meg Gardiner has a powerful style—fast-paced, immediate, and imaginative.”—
Sherlock

“Meg Gardiner goes from strength to strength.”

—OneWord Radio

“Meg Gardiner is brilliant at making the over-the-top seem utterly convincing.”—
The Guardian
(UK)

“Meg Gardiner hard-boils her American crime with the best of them. . . . If you like Sue Grafton and Janet Evanovich, you ought to have discovered Gardiner by now.”

—
The Evening Telegraph
(Peterborough, UK)

“Meg Gardiner takes us to places we hope we’ll never have to go in reality.”—Caroline Carver

 
The Dirty Secrets Club

OBSIDIAN
Published by New American Library, a division of
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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Published by Obsidian, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. This is an authorized reprint of an edition published by Hodder & Stoughton. For information address: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd, 338 Euston Road, London NW1 3BH

First Obsidian Printing, September 2008

Copyright © Meg Gardiner, 2005

All rights reserved

OBSIDIAN and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE

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

eISBN : 978-0-451-22522-1

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

A number of people have helped with the creation of this novel. For their assistance, I thank my invaluable editor at Hodder & Stoughton, Sue Fletcher; Nancy Fraser, who knew that characters must go to the end of the line; and the writers’ group, who never let up: Mary Albanese, Suzanne Davidovac, Adrienne Dines, Kelly Gerrard, and Tammye Huf. My appreciation also goes to Sara Gardiner, MD, for her insight into post-traumatic stress disorder. And unbounded thanks, always, to Paul Shreve.

The breeze gusted through the wind chimes. They sang a jarring melody. Overhead a pair of fighter jets howled past, ripping silver across the sky above China Lake.

Kelly Colfax lugged a grocery bag from the trunk of her car. She had twelve things to do in the next two hours and she should have written them down. The desert heat was bad for her memory. Did Scotty say he was coming home early? She unstuck her skirt from the backs of her thighs. She had to change and get to the nightclub in time to set up. Tonight she meant to put things right.

She had forgotten her haircut, but that didn’t matter. Gaining twenty pounds in fifteen years mattered, but tonight she could smile and say,
See?
She had a good reason. It wasn’t the pressure. She wasn’t a screwup. People couldn’t blame her for all the things that had been going wrong. Couldn’t call her the B-Team anymore, or Slacker or Space Cadet. Tonight they would apologize. They would congratulate and envy her. With a little smile forming on her lips, she opened the door and walked into the kitchen.

A stranger was standing by the sink.

She saw short hair, olive skin, and eyes that seemed all pupil, deep and black. Dressed in utilities—working blues, like enlisted personnel wore. What was someone from the base doing in her kitchen? The stranger flexed both hands. Kelly saw them peripherally but couldn’t break from that black gaze. A gold aura flared at the corner of her vision.