Time Bomb (65 page)

Twenty years ago, Gina Dickinson, Melissa’s mother, suffered a grisly assault that left the budding actress irreparably scarred and emotionally crippled. Now her acid-wielding assailant is out of prison and back in L.A.—and Melissa is terrified that the monster has returned to hurt Gina again. But before Alex Delaware can even begin to soothe his former patient’s fears, Gina, a recluse for twenty years, disappears. And now, unless Delaware turns crack detective to uncover the truth, Gina Dickinson will be just one more victim of a cold fury that has already spawned madness . . . and murder.

Time Bomb

By the time psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware reached the school the damage was done: A sniper had opened fire on a crowded playground, but was gunned down before any children were hurt.

While the TV news crews feasted on the scene and Alex began his therapy sessions with the traumatized children, he couldn’t escape the image of a slight teenager clutching an oversized rifle. What was the identity behind the name and face: a would-be assassin, or just another victim beneath an indifferent California sky? Intrigued by a request from the sniper’s father to conduct a “psychological autopsy” of his child, Alex begins to uncover a strange pattern—it is a trail of blood. In the dead sniper’s past was a dark and vicious plot. And in Alex Delaware’s future is the stuff of grown-up nightmares: the face of real human evil.

Silent Partner

At a party for a controversial Los Angeles sex therapist, Alex encounters a face from his own past—Sharon Ramson, an exquisite, alluring lover who left him abruptly more that a decade earlier. Sharon now hints that she desperately needs help, but Alex evades her. The next day she is dead, an apparent suicide.

Driven by guilt and sadness, Alex plunges into the maze of Sharon’s life—a journey that will take him through the pleasure palaces of California’s ultra-rich, into the alleyways of the mind, where childhood terrors still hold sway.

The Butcher’s Theater

They call the ancient hills of Jerusalem the butcher’s theater. Here, upon this bloodstained stage, a faceless killer performs his violent specialty. The first to die brutally is a girl. She is drained of blood, then carefully bathed and shrouded in white. Precisely one week later, a second victim is found.

From the sacred Wailing Wall to monasteries where dark secrets are cloistered, from black-clad Bedouin enclaves to labyrinthine midnight alleys, veteran police inspector Daniel Sharavi and his crack team plunge deep into a city simmering with religious and political passions to hunt for a murderer whose insatiable taste for bloodshed could destroy the delicate balance on which Jerusalem’s very survival depends.

Over the Edge

When six young prostitutes are found strangled in Los Angeles, an investigation begins that takes the reader on a wild ride involving powerful families and close friends. Child psychologist Alex Delaware has received a garbled, middle-of-the-night crisis call from an ex-patient. As Dr. Delaware becomes involved, he stumbles on a deep secret, one that has existed for over forty years. Along with detective Milo Sturgis, Delaware is about to find himself on a journey into an unforgettably brutal world of madness and murderous passion.

Blood Test

It is a case unlike any psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware has ever encountered. Five-year-old Woody Swope is ill, but the real problem is his parents. They refuse to agree to the one treatment that could save this boy’s life.

Alex sets out to convince Mr. and Mrs. Swope—only to find that the parents have left the hospital and taken their son with them. Worse, the sleazy motel room where the Swopes were staying is empty—except for the ominous bloodstain. The Swopes and their son have vanished into the sordid shadows of the city.

Now Alex and his friend, homicide detective Milo Sturgis, have no choice but to push the law to the breaking point. They’ve entered an amoral underworld where drugs, dreams, and sex are all for sale . . . where fantasies are fulfilled at any price—even at the cost of a young boy’s life.

When the Bough Breaks

Dr. Morton Handler practiced a strange brand of psychiatry. Among his specialties were fraud, extortion, and sexual manipulation. Handler paid for his sins when he was brutally murdered in his luxurious Pacific Palisades apartment. The police have no leads, but they do have one possible witness: seven-year-old Melody Quinn.

It’s psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware’s job to try to unlock the terrible secret buried in Melody’s memory. But as the sinister shadows in the girl’s mind begin to take shape, Alex discovers that the mystery touches a shocking incident in his own past.

This connection is only the beginning, a single link in a forty-year-old conspiracy. And behind it lies an unspeakable evil that Alex Delaware must expose before it claims another innocent victim: Melody Quinn.

A Ballantine Book

Published by The Ballantine Publishing Group

Copyright © 1989 by Jonathan Kellerman

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

Ballantine and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

www.ballantinebooks.com

eISBN 0-345-46378-1

This edition published by arrangement with Random House, Inc.

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