Turn to Dust

Rachel Amphlett

Description

When the body of a naked man is found in the middle of a barren field, a rural community is left in shock – and fear.Discovering that someone is offering money in return for information about the dead man and anyone connected to him, Detective Kay Hunter realises there is a dark side to the victim’s past.When a key witness disappears and a web of deceit and lies threatens to derail the investigation, she fears the worst.Can Kay and her team of detectives find out who is behind the man’s murder before another victim is targeted?Turn to Dust is the ninth book in the Detective Kay Hunter series by USA Today bestselling author Rachel Amphlett, and perfect for readers who love fast-paced murder mysteries.

Sujets

• Women
• Procedural
• Narrative
• Woman
• The Women
• Mystery
• Crime
• Police
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Saxon Publishing
• Date de parution: 15 décembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 5
• EAN13: 9781913498269
• Langue: English

Extrait

Turn to Dust
A Detective Kay Hunter crime thriller


Rachel Amphlett
Copyright © 2020 by Rachel Amphlett
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 written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. While the locations in this book are a mixture of real and imagined, the characters are totally fictitious. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Contents



Reading Order & Checklist


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53


About the Author
Missed a book? Download the FREE Official Reading Order and Checklist to Rachel Amphlett’s books here


Also available in audiobook:
Chapter One

The crows should have alerted him.
Ducking and wheeling across a bleak late spring sky, the birds cawed and cackled as they swooped upon the muddy undulating landscape before rising to the air once more.
They seemed distracted, hesitant to leave the field in pursuit of the tractor that rumbled over the adjacent land, dragging a seed drill in its wake. Back and forth, back and forth, following the furrows left behind from the plough only weeks before.
A cold wind whipped across the field, shaking the hedgerows and threatening to tear the ripening buds from a cluster of hazel shrubs that hunkered under a canopy of birch. A second blast of air shoved against the metal five-bar gate, rattling the chain looped between the frame and a wooden post.
Luke Martin blew into his hands and wished he’d worn an extra pair of socks.
Instead, the damp mud oozed around his calf-length rubber boots and chilled his toes, and every breath he took was expelled in a cloud of condensation.
His fingers fared little better.
The thermal-lined gloves he’d purchased had promised on the label to protect his extremities from temperatures down to five below zero Centigrade, but he reckoned now that the claim was overambitious.
He became aware of a vehicle approaching, the purr of the engine running under the crackle and snap of branches and woodland detritus disappearing under its wheels.
Luke turned away from the field to see a battered four-by-four round the corner in the single track.
Its roof caught on low-hanging tendrils of ash and oak while the vehicle rocked from side to side, the suspension groaning under duress.
Sunlight reflected off its dirt-streaked windscreen, obliterating the driver’s features, but not the way his hands gripped the steering wheel.
Gesturing to a grass-covered verge to the right of the gate, Luke walked around to the side of his own car as the four-by-four creaked to a standstill moments before the ratchet of the handbrake reached him, almost as an afterthought.
The driver swung his door open and swore as his boots met the soggy earth.
Tugging his woollen hat over his ears to protect his balding skull, Luke moved around to the front of the four-by-four and stuck out his hand.
‘Maybe Sonia was right,’ he said. ‘Maybe we should have taken up golf instead. That’s what most blokes our age do.’
‘It’d still be bloody freezing.’ Tom Coker took the outstretched hand in a tight grip, then glared at the mud smeared along the side of the vehicle. He jerked his chin at Luke’s car. ‘How long have you been here?’
‘About fifteen minutes. Traffic was lighter than I thought.’
‘Had a look yet?’
‘It doesn’t look too boggy. Hard going, but not waterlogged like I thought it’d be.’
‘That’s something, at least. Let’s get a move on. The longer we stand around here talking, the colder we’re going to get.’
Luke wandered back to his car, popped open the boot lid, and eyed the equipment laid out on a tarpaulin to protect the carpeted lining.
He lifted out the shovel first – an ancient tool passed down to his father by his grandfather, and now his. Since moving to the smaller house in Seal six months ago, he was using it for his hobby rather than tending a vegetable patch any more, and he remembered why when his back twinged as he straightened.
‘Come on, old man,’ said Coker. ‘Dennis said he wants to prep this field tomorrow, so we need to get a move on.’
Luke glanced over his shoulder. ‘Any problem with the contract?’
‘None at all – if we find anything, he takes a thirty per cent cut and the rest is ours.’
‘Sweet.’ He tugged the metal detector out from its swaddling of blankets, and shut the car boot. ‘Is this the only field we can use?’
‘For now. We’ll get another go at it towards the end of September after the harvest, and he said there might be another field nearer to the house on the other side of the woods we can take a look at as well.’
‘Let’s go, then.’
Luke fumbled the chain as he looped it away from the gate, his numb fingers clumsy while his thoughts turned to the flask of hot coffee Sonia had packed alongside two tuna salad sandwiches she’d insisted he take with him. The flask and food remained in the car, and would do so until mid-morning.
Losing track of time was one of the reasons he enjoyed metal detecting.
‘Have there been any finds near here?’ he said as he fastened the gate back in place and stumbled across the furrows alongside Coker.
‘Not on Dennis’s land, but then I don’t think he’s ever had anyone take a look. There were a couple of thirteenth-century brooches found a few miles away three years ago. And lots of musket balls.’
Luke groaned. ‘Always the bloody musket balls.’
‘I remember when you used to get excited about those.’
‘That was before I hit double figures. Honestly, if Charles I’s lot wasted that much ammunition during the Civil War, it’s no wonder they lost to Cromwell’s army. They obviously couldn’t shoot straight for shit.’
His friend snorted, then stopped and surveyed the landscape before them. ‘It’d be so quiet out here, if it wasn’t for those bloody birds. Dennis reckons he can’t even hear the A20 unless the wind’s blowing in this direction.’
Luke squinted against the cold chill that snapped at his coat collar, then inhaled the rich earthy air. ‘Beats being at work, too.’
‘You busy at the moment?’
He wrinkled his nose. ‘In between contracts. I spent yesterday sending out quotes, and a couple of those should come through in the next week or two. You?’
‘Skiving. I was meant to be rendering a house over at Sevenoaks this morning, but I sent two of the lads instead. Okay, shall we split up?’
Luke turned his attention to the rolling landscape, the noise from the tractor carrying over the hedgerow.
And still, those bloody crows. Caw, caw, caw.
‘I think I’m going to head down there. Looks as if it has a slight rise, then an indentation marked on the Ordnance Survey map I took a look at before you turned up. It might yield something. What about you?’
Coker pointed to the hedgerow separating the barren field with the one where the farmer worked. ‘I’ll start there. There’s a ditch system that runs parallel to the boundary. It could be an old trackway or something, so it’s worth checking out.’
Luke bumped his fist against his friend’s outstretched hand. ‘Be lucky. Break in a couple of hours?’
‘Sounds good.’
Pulling the headphones up over his head and adjusting the pads over his ears, he switched on the machine and listened to its beeps and whirrs as it nestled into the setting he programmed. Satisfied he was ready, he began to march towards his intended search area, sweeping the metal detector in front of his feet as he walked.
It’d be sod’s law if he missed a find in his hurry to reach the contoured land he had set his mind on.
The world contracted around him as he worked, the movement of the metal detector right to left and back almost tran