Tales of Crime & Violence is available in a paperback collection of three volumes, or on Kindle as a complete ‘box-set’.
This remakable three volume collection encompasses numerous and vairid stories of actsand deeds of Crime & Violence.
Paul White has once again woven his masterly spell of intrigue into each stories plot.
Secrecy,scheming, plotting and conspiracy loom, whilst a foreboding and omnious sense of sinister, psycolocical appehension lingers in the dark shodows.
Why are these people there? Are they the perpetrators? Have they been forced or coerced, or are they simply victims?
Excerpt
The Bridge
I pulled the car into the small layby by the bridge, turned the engine off and leaned back in my seat. Opening the window, I put a cigarette between my lips.
I had to grip my right hand with my left to steady the uncontrollable trembling as I brought the flame of my lighter to the end of the Marlborough.
My heart was pounding, thumping against my rib cage; I could feel each powerful beat reverberate inside my brain.
That is what was causing my hands to tremble. That and the fear and the adrenaline and the dark excitement.
I knew that I only had a few moments, a few minutes for contemplation before they came, before they would find me.
What I would do then was an uncertainty. Maybe I would just react, fight or flight? Although I doubt if I could resist them, no one ever does, at least not for long.
That left the option of flight. But I had done that. That was what had brought me here, to the bridge.
The Humber Bridge is monumental. It is suspended by a mass of giant pythons, twisted metal cables one hundred feet above the sludge brown of the river. From tower to tower it is one mile and the road continues to reach out from there, grabbing the riverbanks with blackened tarmac and concrete fingers.
Yet, for all the earth destroying steel and concrete construction, the bridge has an illusion of beauty that is enhanced by nature itself. Somehow the two blend, even complement each other, an amalgamation of converse contraries.
So this is where I find myself. Sitting in my car and pondering the events that led me here, while considering my options for the future, the near, the very near future, beyond which…………
*
The first occurrence that started me on this journey was when my wife left me; when she walked out that Sunday afternoon. The reasons, the facts, the truth for her leaving are now irrelevant, past history that has no bearing on this moment, besides being the initial catalyst to a string of events.
The second of which was losing my job. Being fired, sacked. In my depression from losing my wife I drank more and more often than I should have. The knock on effect was lateness, laziness and a very short and abusive temperament.
This did not bode well with the company. So they fired me.
And rightly so.
In hindsight I can see it clearly, but at the time I felt betrayed and angry. I struck out. Criminal damage they called it. The second was arson. I was jailed for two years; leniency was shown by the judge.
I bare him no Ill will.
My home was repossessed by the mortgage company. I was evicted, thrown onto the streets on Tuesday the sixteenth of March.
The anniversary of my daughter, Annabella’s death.
Annabella was five weeks old. My wife was never quite the same after that.
In truth, neither was I.
I was a happy family man, wife, new born, new house, good job. Now I was an ex-criminal living on the streets.
No, now I was a criminal, not long out of jail, living on the streets and planning to rob a post office, (again).
Only this time everything went wrong. That old man should not have interfered, the young girl should not have screamed so loud and the gun should not have been loaded.
I have never seen so much blood before. That girls white dress simply turned bright red in a millisecond, puddles of shiny blood spread out from under her like a tin of red gloss paint spilling across the floor.
I had only just managed to start the car when the police arrived. I sped away with them in pursuit. I had to drive faster than I have ever done in my life.
That is why I am shaking so violently.
That is how I know I do not have long before they find me.
My heart has subsided a little. Perhaps it is because I know what I must do.
Lighting a second Marlborough I got out of the car and walked onto the bridge. I had been over this bridge many times and I love the view from the middle. You can see the river stretching and winding like a fat brown snake, disappearing into the overgrowth of the city.
They came; blue lights flashing. Four cars slowing as they approached where I was standing.
This was it.
This was the end.
As I plunged towards the fat brown snake, I prayed that the fast flowing sludge of the waters would snap my neck. That I would die quickly without suffering, even if I did not deserve such mercy.
At least I would see my Annabella once again.
Professional Reviews
Shooting for the top
Starts with a bang and carries on surprising, page after page.
Top tale telling.
In June, 2000, two college students — Amy Shute and Jason Burgeson — were approached by a group of men. Forced into the backseat and driven to a remote location, they were murdered in cold blood.
Following this brutal double homicide, Johnston, RI D
