Jeffery Deaver - The Bone Collector

CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR

JEFFERY DEAVERS

THE BONE COLLECTOR

Lightning-paced. Craftily blends cutting-edge

forensics; turn-of-the-century Manhattan

mayhem; pursuers becoming the pursued.

A breakneck thrill-ride.

Wall Street Journal

Fascinating forensics, quirky characters, and

stunning plot surprises.

People

Suspenseful reading ... intriguing.

Library Journal

Deaver marries forensic work, that would do

Patricia Cornwell proud, to a turbocharged

plot that puts benzedrine to shame.

Kirkus Reviews

The headlong narrative never lets up....

Genuine forensic knowledge ... dramatic

switcheroos up to the very last page,

and a climactic battle.

Publishers Weekly

CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR

A MAIDENS GRAVE

A hellish setting ... a hijacked bus-load of

schoolgirls ... a brilliantly conceived, utterly

amoral and unpredictable killer named Lou

Handy ... plus a rapist with a taste for young

girls ... and Arthur Potter, head of the FBI

rescue team who must negotiate with Handy

while fending off ravenous reporters, gung-ho

local militia, and a spy in the house.... If

gobbling a book in one sitting is an indicator,

then A Maidens Grave is a screaming hit.

New York Times Book Review

Hits hard and keeps hitting ... readers who

bite their fingernails might lose some fingers.

JohnLutz,author of Single White Female

Wonderful, riveting, vivid ... rings with an

atmosphere of haunting realism.

Steve Martini, author of The Judge

A gripping page-turner that deserves to be

read in a single sitting.

Denver Post

Tragic yet heroic, disquieting yet inspiring,

A Maidens Graveis a stunning achievement ...

one of the most suspenseful novels

Ive ever read.

Jeremiah Healy, author of Rescue

Compelling suspense in a chilling web of

madness and violence ... an all-night

page-turner!

San Francisco Chronicle

CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR

PRAYING FOR SLEEP

Superior.... A nightmarish 24-hours ...

twists, turns, and harrowing suspense!

James Patterson

Scary, smart, and compulsively readable!

Stephen King

A page-turning thriller.

Gregory McDonald

Harrowing ... undeniably throat-clutching!

Kirkus Reviews

A nerve-snapping climax.

Robert Crais

Just wonderful.

I Love A Mystery

Palpable suspense.

Publishers Weekly

SIGNET

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane,

London W8 5TZ, England

Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood,

Victoria, Australia

Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue,

Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2

Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road,

Auckland 10, New Zealand

Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:

Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England

Published by Signet, an imprint of Dutton NAL,

a member of Penguin Putnam Inc.

Previously published in a Viking edition.

First Signet Printing, April, 1998

10 9 8 7 6 5

Copyright Jeffery Deaver,

1997 All rights reserved

REGISTERED TRADEMARKMARCA REGISTRADA

Printed in the United States of America

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.

PUBLISHERS NOTE

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

BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE AT QUANTITY DISCOUNTS WHEN USED TO PROMOTE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES. FOR INFORMATION PLEASE WRITE TO PREMIUM MARKETING DIVISION, PENGUIN PUTNAM INC. 375 HUDSON STREET, NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10014.

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as unsold and destroyed to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this stripped book.

For my family ,

Dee , Danny, Julie, Ethel

and Nelson ...

Apples dont fall far .

And for Diana too .

KING FOR

A DAY

The present in New York is so powerful

that the past is lost .

JOHN JAY CHAPMAN

Friday, 10:30 p.m., to Saturday, 3:30 p.m.

She wanted only to sleep.

The plane had touched down two hours late and thered been a marathon wait for the luggage. And then the car service had messed up; the limod left an hour ago. So now they were waiting for a cab.

She stood in the line of passengers, her lean body listing against the weight of her laptop computer. John rattled on about interest rates and new ways of restructuring the deal but all she could think was: Friday night, 10:30. I wanna pull on my sweats and hit the hay.

Gazing at the endless stream of Yellow Cabs. Something about the color and the similarity of the cars reminded her of insects. And she shivered with the creepy-crawly feeling she remembered from her childhood in the mountains when she and her brotherd find a gut-killed badger or kick over a red-ant nest and gaze at the wet mass of squirming bodies and legs.

T.J. Colfax shuffled forward as the cab pulled up and squealed to a stop.

The cabbie popped the trunk but stayed in the car. They had to load their own luggage, which ticked John off. He was used to people doing things for him. Tammie Jean didnt care; she was still occasionally surprised to find that she had a secretary to type and file for her. She tossed her suitcase in, closed the trunk and climbed inside.

John got in after her, slammed the door and mopped his pudgy face and balding scalp as if the effort of pitching his suit-bag in the trunk had exhausted him.

First stop East Seventy-second, John muttered through the divider.

Then the Upper West Side, T.J. added. The Plexiglas between the front and back seats was badly scuffed and she could hardly see the driver.

The cab shot away from the curb and was soon cruising down the expressway toward Manhattan.

Look, John said, thats why all the crowds.

He was pointing at a billboard welcoming delegates to the UN peace conference, which was starting on Monday. There were going to be ten thousand visitors in town. T.J. gazed up at the billboardblacks and whites and Asians, waving and smiling. There was something wrong about the artwork, though. The proportions and the colors were off. And the faces all seemed pasty.