The Night Watchman

by Mynheir, Mark

• ISBN13: 9781590529355
• ISBN10: 1590529359
• Edition: Original
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2009-05-05
• Publisher: Multnomah

Summary

Eleven months ago, Ray Quinn was a tough, quick-witted Orlando homicide detective at the top of his gameuntil a barrage of bullets ended his career...and his partner's life. Now medically retired with a painful handicap, Ray battles the haunting guilt for his partner's death. Numbing the pain with alcohol and attitude, Ray takes a job as a night watchman at a swanky Orlando condo. But when a pastor and an exotic dancer are found dead in one of the condos in an apparent murder-suicide, Ray can no longer linger in the shadows. The pastor's sister is convinced her brother was framed and begs Ray to take on an impossible caseto challenge the evidence and clear her brother's name. Ray reluctantly pulls the threads of this supposedly dead-end case only to unravel a murder investigation so deep that it threatens to turn the Orlando political landscape upside down and transform old friends into new enemies. As Ray chases down leads and interrogates suspects, someone is watching his every move, someone determined to keep him from ever finding out the truthat any cost.

Author Biography

A detective with the Criminal Investigations Unit in Central Florida, Mark Mynheir investigates violent crimes and writes riveting Christian fiction. Mark has worked on narcotics units, SWAT teams, and in myriad high-risk situations. His four novels offer a realistic glimpse into the gritty world of law enforcement and the rarely seen raw emotions behind the badge. Mark lives in Florida with his wife and three children.

Excerpts

Just after I of my pickup truck, the two men stalking me had emerged from the shadows and then trailed me though the parking lot.


They lagged behind me about fifty feet. I slowed my pace, not that I wasn’t as slow as a tree slug already, to see if they would overtake me or hang back.


They hung back. Not good.


Any human at a normal pace should have passed me by now. I could feel their eyes punching holes in me, waiting for the right time to move.


Since I wasn’t up for dealing with any problems, I stepped it out as best I could. With a new-and-improved plastic pelvis and hip, along with tenmonths of physical therapy, I should be able to hobble a little faster. No such luck.The cane and gimpy leg would only go so fast. Grandma Moses on a pogo stick could hop circles
around me.


Using the rearview mirrors on the cars parked along Lake Avenue, I kept tabs on my new friends without being too obvious, a little trick I picked up when I worked undercover.No need to give them more of an advantage than they already had.


The big one, a black kidmaybe twenty years old, wore a white wife-beater muscle shirt and black jean shorts. Mini-dreads jetted from his head like a frayed ball of yarn.The other kid, probably the same age, was an anemic white with a tattoo sprawled on his neck and a shaved head that glistened under the streetlights.


With each glance I caught, they feigned like they were talking to each other, but I could sense they were planning to pounce. And why not? I was an easy mark—a crippled guy negotiating the Orlando streets alone at night. One more block to go until I was at work.


Eleven months ago I would have enjoyed this game of cat and mouse. But then I would have been the cat, a big hungry one ready to swallow those thugs like the rodents they were. I hoped they were just playing a game.


I stole a furtive glance behind me, and my tails were nowhere in sight. I stopped and shifted all the way around.Gone.Must have headed up an alley.Maybe I was just losingmy mind.Hadn’t been out much lately.


I used to love the Orlando nightlife, the clubs and things to do; the pulse of the city at night energized me. It had changed so much in a short amount of time. Faster, meaner, a stranger to me. Like I was living on a different planet. I had grown up here, not long after Mickey scurried in, back when Orlando was more of a cowtown.
Now it’s a big city plagued with big-city problems.


As I approached the corner of Lake and East Jackson,Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumber raced around the corner right in front of me, both out of breath.They must have sprinted down the alley behind the store to cut me off just before I reached the intersection.


This wouldn’t end pretty.


“Hey, old man.”The ugly white kid checked up and down the street, like felons do when they’re preparing to do something monumentally stupid.


His buddy invaded my personal space on my left. “How about some spare change?” he said with an accent, maybe Haitian.


“Don’t have any change.” I eyed possible escape routes, though escape wasn’t likely in my condition. And I couldn’t count on anyone to help me, or even to notice, for that matter.On this corner, in a city of over two hundred thousand people, I was on my own…as usual.


“Then give up your wallet, or I bust your head like your leg is.”


The black kid pressed in on me.


“Okay.Okay.” I held upmy right hand while leaning more on the cane with my left. “I’ll give you my wallet. Just don’t hurt me.”


“Hurry up!”The white kid spit as he spoke, clenching his fists at his sides. “I ain’t got all night.”He was the alpha dog of the two.


If they w

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Excerpted from The Night Watchman by Mark Mynheir
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.