Paragon Walk

Начало книги

Inspector Pitt stared down at the girl, and an overwhelming sense of loss soaked through him. He had never known her in life, but he knew and treasured all the things that now she had lost.

She was slight, with fair brown hair, a childish seventeen. Lying on the white morgue table, she looked brittle enough to have snapped if he had touched her. There were bruises on her arms where she had fought.

She was expensively dressed in lavender silk, and there was a gold and pearl chain around her throat-things he could never have afforded. They were pretty, trivial enough in the face of death, and yet he would like to have been able to give such things to Charlotte.

Thoughts of Charlotte, safe and warm at home, brought a sickness tightening in his stomach. Had some man loved this girl as he loved Charlotte? Was there someone right now for whom everything clean and bright and gentle had gone? All laughter snatched away, with the breaking of this fragile body?

Читать дальше →