Simon Toyne - Broken Promise - A Solomon Creed Novella

This novel is entirely a work of fiction.

The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are

the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to

actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is

entirely coincidental.

HarperCollins Publishers

1 London Bridge Street,

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published by HarperCollins Publishers 2018

Copyright © Simon Toyne 2018

Simon Toyne asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

Cover design by Claire Ward © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018

Cover photographs:

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books

Ebook Edition © JUNE 2017 ISBN: 9780008300807

Version 2018-03-07

This is for my readers.

Without you I’m just a crazy person sitting alone in a room.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page BROKEN PROMISE FEATURING SOLOMON CREED Simon Toyne

Copyright This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental. HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk Published by HarperCollins Publishers 2018 Copyright © Simon Toyne 2018 Simon Toyne asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work Cover design by Claire Ward © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018 Cover photographs: A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books Ebook Edition © JUNE 2017 ISBN: 9780008300807 Version 2018-03-07

Dedication This is for my readers. Without you I’m just a crazy person sitting alone in a room.

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

AUTHOR’S NOTE

If you enjoyed Broken Promise, read on for an exclusive extract from the next Solomon Creed thriller:

KEEP READING…

How can he save a man who is already dead?

Also by Simon Toyne

About the Author

About the Publisher

Solomon Creed walked east, away from Arizona and all the complications that spilt blood tends to bring. He kept to the minor roads and travelled mostly at night, dodging the traffic and the sledgehammer sun, sipping water from a plastic gallon jug he’d found crumpled in a roadside ditch outside Bisbee.

He tipped it up now and drank the blood-warm water until the jug was empty. He could fill it again at the next gas station, or diner, or truck stop. Water was not a problem. You could pick up water for free if you stuck to the roads. But not food. Food you had to pay for, or take what you could find, baked and rancid by the side of the road.

On day one it had been a cottontail that had been clipped by a car then limped off to die in the shade of an ephedra bush. He’d skinned and gutted it using the jagged edge of a broken beer bottle then roasted it over a small fire coaxed from mesquite straw using the same bottle and the sun’s fierce rays. Day two was a rattlesnake he’d disturbed in a storm drain while taking shelter from the rising heat. It had struck from the shadows, the rattle coming at the same time as the fangs. Solomon had felt the minute shift in air pressure and twitched out of the way, catching it behind the head, grabbing its tail then cracking it like a bullwhip, so sharp that it snapped the head clean off. He had drunk its blood, the bitter warmth soaking life back into his tired muscles, then gutted it and chewed slowly on its cooling flesh. He had a fleeting memory of doing something similar in a different desert, but like most memories regarding himself, it was gone before he could catch a hold of it. He had sat cross-legged, in the dusty dark, licking snake blood from his fingers and sucking the warm, viscous contents of the leathery eggs the mother had been laying. That had been thirty-six hours ago now. The only things that had passed his lips since were air and water so hot from the jug you could brew tea with it. But there was something up ahead, something carried on the wind and getting stronger with each step he took. It was the smell of hot grease and salt, fried potatoes and ham, eggs and coffee, and his stomach rumbled in response whenever the wind shifted. He had smelled similar at every greasy-windowed truck stop he’d passed along the way and had always got no further than the parking lot, the need to catch another ride and put distance between himself and Arizona stronger than his hunger. But Arizona was four days, hundreds of miles and a state and a half behind him now. And his legs ached and his stomach growled and the thought of another road-kill meal washed down with plastic-tasting water made him feel sick to his empty stomach. The problem was no longer urgency, it was economic. Because a sit-down meal with seasoning and sauces, and iced-water on the side, would cost money and the only coin he had to his name was a single, worn-down quarter he’d found by a city limits sign a hundred miles or more back.

He reached into the pocket of the pale suit jacket he wore and palmed the quarter, rolling it over his knuckles as smoothly as he rolled the problem of his poverty over and over in his mind until he saw a skinny tower rise up ahead on the eastbound side of the I-10. Red neon letters burned on the side spelling out ‘ BOBBY D’s EATS ’, and an arrow buzzed below it, pointing down to a one-storey building surrounded by dusty cars and big rigs.

Solomon left the highway and walked through lines of trucks with confederate flags and the silhouettes of pneumatic women on their mud-flaps. He passed a boarded-up gas station with decommissioned pumps and a printed sheet of paper taped to the door announcing that the place was due to be sold at auction on July 21st along with some land. He had no idea what day it was but the diner was still open and cooking food, which was all that mattered to him right now. He dropped the empty gallon jug by the door and stepped inside.