On a remote Highland mountain, the body of Elaine Buxton is burning. All that will be left to identify the respected lawyer are her teeth and a fragment of clothing.
In the concealed back room of a house in Edinburgh, the real Elaine Buxton screams into the darkness.
Detective Inspector Luc Callanach has barely set foot in his new office when Elaine's missing persons case is escalated to a murder investigation. Having left behind a promising career at Interpol, he's eager to prove himself to his new team. But Edinburgh, he discovers, is a long way from Lyon, and Elaine's killer has covered his tracks with meticulous care.
It's not long before another successful woman is abducted from her doorstep, and Callanach finds himself in a race against the clock. Or so he believes ... The real fate of the women will prove more twisted than he could have ever imagined.
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[He laid out the body with almost fatherly care, stretching each limb wide, allowing air to circulate freely around the skin]***
(@AvonBooksUK, 26 January 2017, 417 pages, ebook, borrowed from @AmazonKindle #PrimeReading)
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I've been keen to read the D.I. Callanach back catalogue since I read a #ARC of the latest book, Perfect Kill earlier this year. This is a great start to the series and I look forward to reading the rest. I feel some of the gaps I head reading Perfect Kill have been filled in a little. This is the perfect thriller, intense, well-paced and full of twists, turns and misdirection. This made me shiver. I felt so sorry for Elaine, tortured by a serial killer who's having a blast while the police believe a burned body is her due to some planted evidence. This book raises so many questions. Will the police realise the body isn't Elaine? What's the killer's motive? With the second woman be saved? The killer is a new level of intense creepy weirdo. There is also a second case about newborn babies being left outside to die. This is the kind of thriller I enjoy the most.