Twelve Days of Winter: Crime at Christmas

Начало книги

Billy Partridge wasn’t really cut out to be a cat burglar, but Dillon hadn’t really given him any option. It was either do the job, or come up with thirteen grand by Thursday . . . or have both legs shattered. And the leg thing didn’t even write-off what they owed Dillon, just deferred the interest. Come the 15th of January, there’d still be thirteen thousand to pay.

Grunting, Billy hoisted himself further up the tree, his XXL designer jeans smeared with moss and dirt. That’s what he got for trusting Twitch to bring the sodding stepladder.

Of course Twitch didn’t need a stepladder. He’d clambered over the outside wall like a bloody monkey, so the old oak tree growing close to the manor house hadn’t been much of a challenge. Even if it was strung all over with heavy-duty Christmas lights. But then Twitch looked like a collection of manky coat hangers – dressed up in drainpipe trousers, baseball cap and camouflage hoodie – not a single ounce of spare flesh on him, while Billy had to haul twenty-one stone of asthmatic underachiever from branch to branch, wheezing like his lungs were about to explode.

Читать дальше →