The Last Clinic

Book 1: Darla Cavannah

by Gary Gusick

Genres: Mystery; Suspense

Synopsis

In a fast-paced, suspenseful debut novel for fans of Harlan Coben and Lisa Gardner, detective Darla Cavannah goes Deep South in pursuit of a merciless killer.
 
Outside the local women’s health clinic, the Reverend Jimmy Aldridge waving his protest sign is a familiar sight. But that changes early one morning when someone shoots the beloved Reverend Jimmy dead. Sheriff Shelby Mitchell knows the preacher’s murder will shock the good people of Jackson—and the pressure to find the killer is immediate and intense, which is why Shelby calls in detective Darla Cavannah.
 
When police detective Darla moved from Philadelphia to Jackson with her husband—hometown football hero Hugh “the Glue” Cavannah—she never imagined the culture shock that awaited. Then after Hugh dies in a car crash, Darla enters a self-imposed exile in her Mississippi home, taking a leave of absence from the sheriff’s department. Now she’s called back to duty—or coerced, more like it, with Shelby slathering on his good-ole-boy charm nice and thick, like on a helping of barbecue.
 
Reluctantly partnered with a mulish Elvis impersonator, Darla keeps a cool head even as the community demands an arrest. The court of public opinion has already convicted the clinic’s doctor, Stephen Nicoletti, but Darla is just as sure he’s not guilty—even as she fights her growing attraction to him. From the genteel suburbs to a raunchy strip club, Darla follows a trail of dirty money and nasty secrets—until the day of judgment comes, and she faces down an ungodly assassin.

Release date: November 18, 2013

Publisher: Alibi

Print pages: 264

Sample

1

Morning Vigil

It was 6:00 a.m. and still dark when Reverend Jimmy Aldridge dragged the seven-foot pine cross from the back of his oversized SUV. He leaned the cross against the rear door and examined the spot where the two spiky poles intersected. The rawhide cord that held the stakes together was wrapped three times and tied nice and tight. He fumbled around in back of the SUV until he found the rolled-up poster with a photo of an infant with a quote asking “Aren’t you glad I was born?” He carefully unrolled the poster, pressed it flat to the cross, and whacked it with the staple gun four times. Top, bottom, right, and left.

He reached into the breast pocket of his suit coat and came out with an envelope bulging with money. He locked the envelope in the glove compartment behind an official state map of Mississippi. Feeling behind the front passenger’s seat, he removed a brown gunnysack robe from its hanger. He lifted his arms and slipped the robe over his suit, letting it fall until it reached his shoe tops.

Next he leaned his back against the SUV and pressed onto the cross, lifted his shoulders, and wrapped his arms around the beam. Bending at the waist, he hoisted the cross upward so that his back supported its weight. Then, step by step, he plodded up the hill a quarter mile until he reached the entrance to the Jackson Women’s Health Clinic.

He positioned himself next to the gate, placing the bottom of the cross on the sidewalk and holding the staff upright with one hand. With his free hand he took a small flashlight from his pants pocket, flipped it on, and angled the light upward toward the poster, illuminating the photo of the infant.

A set of headlights popped up over the hill. A truck, a twelve-wheeler, rumbled his way. He lifted the cross a few inches off the ground and shook it at the driver.

“Christ died so babies may live!”

His robe flapped in the breeze as the truck roared by, the driver failing to react.

A second vehicle, a Jackson school bus, followed. “The health clinic is a death clinic!” he yelled. This driver, a middle-aged hippie type, gave him the finger.

“Have a blessed day, brother,” he called out to the disappearing taillights. Then added, “You baby-killing son of a whore.”

The sun peeked over the horizon. A black SUV wheeled around the corner and came to a halt across the street, directly in Reverend Jimmy’s view.

“The unborn have a right to live,” he shouted to the occupant. “God’s work must be our own.”

The window on the driver’s side rolled down.

Reverend Jimmy’s face broadened into a smile. “What are you doing here at this hour?”

The driver said nothing.

Still smiling, the preacher propped the cross against the fence, clicked off the flashlight, and started toward the SUV. Two steps later, he saw the barrel of the shotgun pointing out the window at his groin.