Kiss of Evil _1.jpg

Table of Contents

Cover

Copyright

About the Author

Praise for Richard Montanari

Also by Richard Montanari

Dedication

Kiss of Evil

Part One: Altar

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

Part Two: Spell

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

Part Three: Brujo

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73

Chapter 74

Chapter 75

Chapter 76

Chapter 77

Chapter 78

Chapter 79

Chapter 80

Chapter 81

Epilogue

Other books of this author

This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

Version 1.0

Epub ISBN 9781409035930

www.randomhouse.co.uk

Reissued by Arrow Books 2009

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

Copyright © Richard Montanari, 2001

Richard Montanari has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

This book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

First published in 2001 by HarperCollins Publishers

Arrow Books

The Random House Group Limited

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www.rbooks.co.uk

Addresses for companies within The Random House Group Limited can be found at: www.randomhouse.co.uk/offices.htm

The Random House Group Limited Reg. No. 954009

A CIP catalogue record for this book

is available from the British Library

ISBN 9780099524847

The Random House Group Limited supports The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), the leading international forest certification organisation. All our titles that are printed on Greenpeace approved FSC certified paper carry the FSC logo. Our paper procurement policy can be found at www.rbooks.co.uk/environment

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About the Author

Richard Montanari is the Top Ten Sunday Times bestselling author of The Devil’s Garden, Play Dead, The Rosary Girls, The Skin Gods and Broken Angels, as well as the internationally acclaimed thrillers The Violet Hour and Deviant Way. He lives in Cleveland, Ohio.

Praise for Richard Montanari

‘A relentlessly suspenseful, soul-chilling thriller that hooks you instantly.’ Tess Gerritsen

‘Readers of this terrifying page-turner are in the hands of a master storyteller. Be prepared to stay up all night.’ James Ellroy

‘A specialist in serial killer tales . . . a wonderfully evocative writer’ Publishers Weekly

‘A no-holds-barred thriller that thrusts the reader into the black soul of the killer . . . those with a taste for Thomas Harris will look forward to the sure-to-follow sequel’ Library Journal

‘Montanari’s superior thriller . . . [is] a welcome change from the gore typical of the serial killer subgenre. Likewise, Byrne and Balzano possess a psychological depth all too rare in such fiction.’ Publishers Weekly

‘One of the most terrifyingly evil stories I have read. Yet, with all its violence, it is balanced by much compassion and beauty. I just couldn’t put it down. This could be the book of the year.’

Norman Goldman, Barnes & Noble

Also available by Richard Montanari

Deviant Way

The Violet Hour

The Rosary Girls

The Skin Gods

Broken Angels

Play Dead

The Devil’s Garden

For my mother,

who first gave me a spoon.

Kes lusigaga alustab, see kulbiga lobetab,

Kes kulbiga alustab, see lusigaga lobetab.

—ESTONIAN PROVERB

If there be demons, there must be demonesses.

—VOLTAIRE

TWO YEARS AGO . . .

Michael Ryan sits in a gray leatherette swivel chair, in a dimly lit hotel room, tapping his right foot to some unheard song from the nineties, thinking: This is so much better than sex, it doesn’t even show up on the radar; thinking:

This moment, this lunatic moment, is why he became a cop in the first place.

His pulse rages.

The Glock 9 holstered under his left arm feels as long as a cannon and twice as heavy.

The young woman sitting on the edge of the bed in front of him is a tall, graceful beauty, uptown in a manner of fashion and speech and poise that had always driven Mike Ryan around the bend, even when he was just a cocksure, working-class kid from the wrong side of the Cuyahoga. Tonight the woman is wearing a teal blue dress, sexy heels, diamond earrings. Try as he had, he had not been able to evict her from his thoughts for more than fifteen minutes during the past two weeks, had seen her face in every movie, every magazine, every catalog.

She is not a classic beauty, but to Michael Ryan she is perfect: long, shapely legs; porcelain skin; dusky, almost-Asian eyes. It had taken four meetings to get her and this amount of money in the same room, and at each of those meetings she had looked better — sweats to jeans to slacks to this damned dress.

In the back of Michael’s mind, Dolores Alessio Ryan, his Sicilian-tempered wife of fifteen years, threatens castration. This woman had gotten way under his skin.

He wants this over.

“I’m happy,” Michael says. “You?”

“Yes,” she replies, softly.

He had just handed her the envelope. She, in turn, had just handed him the four stacks of cash. Ten thousand dollars, small bills, well worn. Invisible. Except for the twenty-dollar bill on top of one of the stacks. The twenty on top had some kind of red mark on it, a strange little drawing of a bow and arrow.


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