J.T. Ellison - The Immortals

“Carefully orchestrated plot twists and engrossing characters… The story moves at breakneck speed… Flawed yet identifiable characters and genuinely terrifying villains populate this impressive and arresting thriller.”

—Publishers Weekly on Judas Kiss [starred review]

“Crime fiction has a new name to watch.”

—John Connolly

“Combines The Silence of the Lambs with The Wire.”

—January Magazine on The Cold Room

“Darkly compelling and thoroughly chilling…everything a great crime thriller should be.”

—Allison Brennan on All the Pretty Girls

“A twisty, creepy and wonderful book…Ellison is relentless and grabs the reader from the first page and refuses to let go until the soul tearing climax.”

—Crimespree on 14

“[A] tight and powerful story. Judas Kiss moves at a rapid-fire rate…rushing like adrenaline through the bloodstream.”

—The Strand Magazine

“Flawlessly plotted, with well-defined characters and conflict…quite simply a gem.”

—RT Book Reviews [Top Pick] on The Cold Room

“A terrific lead character, terrific suspense, terrific twists…a completely convincing debut.”

—Lee Child on All the Pretty Girls

For Jill Thompson (ti amo molto!)

and my darling Randy.

These eight words the Rede fulfill:

“An ye harm none, do what ye will.”

—Doreen Valiente

The Wiccan Rede

Because I could not stop for Death,

He kindly stopped for me;

The carriage held but just ourselves

And Immortality.

—Emily Dickinson

Because I Could Not Stop for Death

Third Quarter Moon Samhain (Halloween)

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Waning Crescent Moon Twenty-five Percent of Full Hallowmas (All Saints' Day)

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Waning Crescent Moon Twenty Percent of Full Feast of Odin (All Souls' Day)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-Two

Chapter Fifty-Three

Chapter Fifty-Four

Chapter Fifty-Five

Chapter Fifty-Six

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Waning Crescent Moon Fifteen Percent of Full Three Days Past Samhain (Halloween)

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Chapter Sixty

Chapter Sixty-One

Acknowledgments

Nashville, Tennessee

October 31

3:30 p.m.

Taylor Jackson stood at attention, arms behind her back, her dress blues itching her wrists. She was feeling more than a bit embarrassed. She’d asked for this to be done without ceremony, just a simple here you go, you’re back in our good graces, but the chief was having nothing of it. He’d insisted she not only receive her lieutenant’s badge again, but be decorated as well, in a very public ceremony. Her union rep was thrilled, and at her direction, had dropped the lawsuit she’d been forced to file against the department when they demoted her without cause. Taylor was pleased, as well. She’d been fighting to get reinstated, and she had to admit it was nice to put all of this behind her. But the pomp and circumstance was a bit much.

It had been a long afternoon. Taylor felt like a show pony, was flushed with the overly exuberant praise of her career, her involvement in catching the Conductor, a serial killer who’d killed two women back-to-back, kidnapped a third and fled Nashville with Taylor hot on his heels. She’d arrested him in Italy, and the story had immediately caught international headlines, because at the same time, she’d been party to the capture of one of Italy’s most notorious serial killers, Il Macellaio. In the world of sound bites and news at your fingertips, taking two serial killers into custody had garnered so much attention that the chief had been forced into action.

Not only was she being reinstated; Taylor had command of the murder squad again, and her team was being reassembled. Detectives Lincoln Ross and Marcus Wade were shipped back up from the South Sector, and after a long discussion with the chief, she’d even talked him into allowing Renn McKenzie to become part of the permanent team. She had her boys back.

Most of them.

Pete Fitzgerald had fallen off the face of the earth. Taylor had last talked to him when he was in Barbados, anchored and waiting for a new part for his boat’s engine. He’d called to let her know he thought he’d seen their old nemesis, and she hadn’t heard from him since. She was sick with worry, convinced that Fitz had been taken by the Pretender, a killer so obscene, so cruel that he invaded her dreams and consumed her waking moments. A killer Taylor hadn’t caught; the one who’d quite literally gotten away.

Her concerns had been compounded just last week, when the Coast Guard had picked up a distress signal off the coast of North Carolina. The GPS beacon matched the registered number for Fitz’s boat. Despite countless days of searching, nothing had been found. The Coast Guard had been forced to call off the search, and the police in North Carolina couldn’t get involved because there was no crime to be investigated. She had a call in to the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations, in the hope they would see things differently, but she hadn’t heard anything yet.

Taylor tried to shake off the thought of Fitz, of his body broken and battered, of what the Pretender was doing to him, or had done. The guilt spilled through her blood, making it chilly. She’d issued a challenge to the Pretender, told him to come and get her. Instead, she was positive he’d taken her friend, the man closest to her, aside from Baldwin. Her father figure. She had probably gotten Fitz killed, and she found that knowledge desperately hard to stomach.

She looked into the crowd, the sea of blue seated in compact rows before her. John Baldwin, her fiancé, sat in the front, grinning. His hair was too long again, the black waves falling over his forehead and ears in a tumble. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes; that was sure to get on the evening news, and she didn’t want any more attention than she already had. She touched her engagement ring instead, twisting the channel-set diamonds around her finger.

Her team sat beside him: Lincoln Ross, hair grown out just enough to slip in some tiny dreadlocks; Marcus Wade, brown-eyed and sweetly happy. He was getting serious with his girlfriend, and Taylor had never seen him so content. The new member of the team, Renn McKenzie, was at Marcus’s left. Taylor saw McKenzie’s partner, Hugh Bangor, a few rows back. They’d been very discreet—only Taylor and Baldwin knew they were an item.