We hope you enjoyed reading Angel of Death. If you did, please leave a review. If you’d like to gift a copy, this book is available to purchase in paperback, hardback, large print and audio.
Dance with the Enemy, the first instalment in another brilliant blockbuster thriller series, is available to buy now by clicking on the image below. Or read on for an exclusive extract…
Prologue
They say that before you die your whole life flashes before you. But nobody can know for sure what happens in those moments before death. If you do see your life flashing before your eyes, does that mean you’ve got no chance? And if it doesn’t, does that mean you’re going to be okay?
Carl Logan didn’t know. Five months ago, on the day he almost died, no bright light had been calling him in, no images from his childhood had flickered through his mind. There had been only pain and suffering.
Logan had been on his last breath. His brain had submitted. His body, too. He shouldn’t have been alive. But after his heart had beaten its last beat, it had beaten one more time. And then it had beaten again.
And it had kept on going.
It hadn’t been his time to go.
But he hadn’t been saved. Not by a long stretch.
Chapter One
Maybe the psychologist had been right. Maybe he was an addict. Who else would put themselves in these positions willingly? Knowingly?
He had the man in a hammerlock. It was a classic submission hold. Its ease of application, and the fact it could be used from an upright position, meant it was a favored hold of bouncers and law enforcement the world over. Logan was in neither of those professions, but it was a move that he had found to suit many purposes nonetheless.
He pulled the man’s wrist further up toward the shoulder, feeling the resistance as the shoulder joint was pushed to bursting point. The man let out a yelp at what was becoming an inevitable outcome. His friends, just five yards in front of Logan at the other end of the bar, continued to look on, forming a physical barrier between Logan and where he wanted to be – the exit.
‘Move out of my way. Now,’ Logan said. ‘Don’t think for a second I won’t do it.’
Despite the threat, the man’s three friends stood their ground. They weren’t about to back down. But they weren’t looking like they were about to make a move either. For now, it was a standoff. Neither side wanted to take it to the next level.
Yet.
Logan looked them over, one by one. Rednecks would be a harsh way to describe them. They were probably just average working guys letting off steam on a weekend, albeit guys who were bulked up through steroids and overuse of weights, and fueled by alcohol and God knows what else. Each one of them was big and menacing. And judging by the non-situation that had started this, they were looking for a fight tonight.
And for no sane reason, other than he was who he was, Logan was prepared to grant them their wish. He wasn’t the strongest guy in the world, but he could handle himself just fine. Despite the odds, he still fancied his chances against this lot.
‘I warned you,’ Logan said.
He pulled the man’s wrist further, as hard and as fast as he could, pushing against the resistance until he heard the tell-tale pop as the man’s arm dislocated from the shoulder. The way it suddenly flopped in his hand told Logan it had probably dislocated at the elbow too. The man shrieked in pain and slumped to the floor as Logan let go, readying himself for the next stage of his latest battle.
The three friends, wide-eyed and staring, looked shocked at what had just happened. Maybe their macho standoffs didn’t normally go this far. And yet they continued to stand their ground. Logan was a little surprised by that.
But then he saw it. The man on the left. It was nothing more than a flinch. Maybe just a twitch, even. But it was enough for Logan. Enough to tell him that this wasn’t over yet. And that man was now his next focus.
But just as Logan was about to leap forward, something unexpected happened.
He heard the noise before he felt anything. A dull thud. He was on his knees before the searing pain in the back of his leg took hold. Then came the thud again. This time pain shot across his back.
In an instant, unable to stop himself, he was face down on the floor.
He tried to stand up, but the combination of whisky and whatever had just hit him was too much. Instead, he just lay there, hearing the thuds that kept on coming. Feeling the pain with each strike, but unable to muster a response. He saw boots crowding around him. Saw them pulling back and kicking him. Pulling back and kicking. The thuds kept on coming across his back.
He took a boot to the face and felt his lip open up, blood pouring into his mouth. The blows kept on coming but Logan didn’t move. He wasn’t sure he could anymore. He closed his eyes, wondering how things had gone so wrong this time. Maybe he was losing it. Maybe he had never really got it back. He had been out of action for too long. Five months had gone by now since his last fateful assignment. Five months of hell.
His mind began to wander, his awareness of the blows raining down on him fading. Before consciousness left him, he felt a slither of an unlikely smile form on his face.
The psychologist was right. He was an addict.
But it wasn’t the fighting that he was addicted to. It wasn’t the pain either – he was no masochist. Too many years had gone by living a life that wasn’t a life at all. He didn’t want to be their machine anymore. He couldn’t. That was his addiction – the clamor for some sort of normality. He just wanted to live and to feel like everyone else did. Nights like this, in a twisted logic that made sense only to him, allowed him that.
He just wanted to be normal.
And yet he knew that would never be the case.
We hope you enjoyed this exclusive extract. Dance with the Enemy is available to buy now by clicking on the image below: