Archer Mayor - The snipers wife

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

WARNER BOOKS EDITION

Copyright 2002 by Archer Mayor

Excerpt from Gatekeeper copyright 2003 by Archer Mayor

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Cover design and art by Robert Santora

Warner Books, Inc., Hachette Book Group, 237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

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First eBook Edition: December 2008

ISBN: 978-0-446-55449-7

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ACCOLADES FOR THE SNIPERS WIFE AND

ARCHER MAYOR

The unfamiliar setting brings out a new, edge-of-the-knife side of Kunkles incisive descriptive powers.

Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review

The writing is strong, with sharp social observations throughout. Gunther grows on you from novel to novel.

Washington Post Book World

As always in a Mayor novel, the investigation is detailed and authoritative.

Philadelphia Inquirer

Mayor keeps getting better with age. Few writers deliver such well-rounded novels of such consistently high quality.

Arizona Daily Star

Here, Mayor does for New York what he has done for Vermont: He takes a longer, more careful look at the odd parts of a city we thought we knew all about.

Hartford Courant

Mayors understanding of human behavior makes his tortured protagonist an unforgettable character. His powers of description not confined to Vermont, the author imbues well-known and obscure New York neighborhoods with a sparkling sense of place.

Publishers Weekly (starred review)

One of the best contemporary American mystery writers.

Providence Sunday Journal

Mayor, a master of the slow-paced, small-town mystery, proves equally capable here of tightening his grip around the neck of the hard-boiled novelwithout losing his feel for the subtlety of human interaction.

Booklist

A must read. Kunkle is a complex character. The early police procedural takes off into an action-packed crescendo.

www.bookloons.com

Deserves to move [Mayor] onto the A-list of mystery authors. The plot is flawless, the writing is smooth, and, like all good mysteries, we care about the characters as much as the story. Mayor has written one of the better mysteries of the year.

www.MyShelf.com

Stronga powerful police procedural not so much because of the three seemingly separate parallel investigations but on account of the deep insight into what makes Willy what he is today.

www.bookbrowser.com

One of the sharpest writers of police procedurals.

Midwest Book Review

A great storyteller.

Maine Sunday Telegram

Lead a cheer for Archer Mayor and his ability not only to understand human relationships, but to convey them to his readers.

Washington Sunday Times

Mayors major strength is his ability to etch personalities in their settings so that they are as vivid as a video.

St. Petersburg Times

Mayors strength lies in his dedication to the old-fashioned puzzle, brought to a reasonable conclusion.

San Jose Mercury News

Mayor knows how to keep you turning pages.

Trenton Times

One of Mayors strongest points is his detailed knowledge and application of police procedure.

Southbridge Evening News (MA)

Other Books by Archer Mayor

Tucker Peak

The Marble Mask

Occams Razor

The Disposable Man

Bellows Falls

The Ragmans Memory

The Dark Root

Fruits of the Poisonous Tree

The Skeletons Knee

Scent of Evil

Borderlines

Open Season

To Bob Maas, for letting me glance

over his shoulder from the front

row seat.

Seasoned veterans of the Joe Gunther series will note a change of approach in this book, not only with the narrative viewpoint, but with the setting as well. The Snipers Wife is placed in New York City for the most part. This onetime change of locale is just thatI will not be abandoning the places and people that I and my readers have come to call our own over the years. But I do hope I will be forever exploring new ideas and concepts as Ive done in the past, and that you will all continue to enjoy the ride.

That having been said, I owe a big debt of thanks to a great many people who helped me get as good a grip on New York and the workings of its police and corrections departments as possible. I hope I have not let them downa more generous and encouraging group I have rarely metbut if I have, the fault is mine. I have nothing but gratitude to those listed below and to the many others who lent me a hand along the way.

The New York City Police Department, in particular Commissioner (retired) Bernard Kerick; Deputy Chief Joe Reznick; Detective Walter Burnes; Officer Mel Maurice; Sergeant (retired) Bob Maas; and Deputy Chief Jane Perlov (NYPD retired, currently Chief of Police, Raleigh, North Carolina, Police Department).

The New York City Department of Correction, in particular Commander William Fraser; Captain William Burgos; Officer Richard De Jesus; and Officer Edward Ray Raymond.

The Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Police Department, in particular Lieutenant Janet Champlin.

The Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, in particular Joe Green.

And also:

Phil Sarcione

Frank Thornton

Ana Mayor

Caroline and Tim Scully

Nick Bernstein

Dick Flynn

Fred Gardy

Colleen Mohyde

Michael J. and Sandra Lewis Smith

John McDonough, a true dinosaur from Massachusetts

To all of you, my deepest appreciation.

W illy Kunkle dipped his large right hand into the sink and scooped a splash of warm water onto his face, washing away the last of the shaving soap. He straightened, used the edge of a towel hanging to the right of the mirror to mop his cheeks and chin with the same hand, and studied his reflection in the harsh fluorescent light.

He wasnt looking for flaws in his shaving. And, God knows, there was no narcissism taking place. Willy was the first to acknowledge his was a purely functional appearance. He had what was necessary: a nose, two eyes, a mouth, none of it particularly remarkable. As far as it went, it was just a face.

And yet he studied it every morning the same way, carefully, warily, especially watching the eyes for any deepening of the intensity which even he found disturbing. Had he seen them on somebody else, they were eyes that would have given him pauseeyes which troubled him all the more that they were his. They were what made of the whole truly something to remember, and although he didnt know it, they were the one feature almost every-one remembered about his face.