Written by C.D. Steele
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Today, for my stop on the blog tour organised by Rachel of Rachel's Random Resources, I'm delighted to have an extract from Hidden Truth. As if that isn't enough, there's a raffle to win one of three copies of False Truth or a copy of Dark Truth.
Hidden Truth is the third book in the Joe Wilde Investigation Series and is independently published by its author, C.D. Steele.
The blurb:
Hidden TruthPrivate Investigator Joe Wilde is investigating the murder of Philippa Redmond a former Labour MP. She had been found dead in her sauna over the Christmas holidays six weeks ago. The majority of her family had been staying with her at the time, but the police didn’t regard any of them as suspects. Evidence suggested an intruder had got into her home.
Joe also takes on a cold case of a missing woman named Julie Turnbull. She had disappeared six years ago without a trace. Meanwhile Joe’s good friend DI Whatmore is investigating the horrific murder of a woman who was burnt alive in her own home. His investigation crosses over with Joe’s missing person investigation. As they conduct their own investigations there are more killings.
DI Whatmore and Joe must join forces to track down a serial killer and solve a puzzling mystery, but doing so puts them and others in grave danger.
Enjoy this short extract from Hidden Truth
This extract is from Chapter 7. Joe is attending the scene of the murder of the former MP Philippa Redmond.
Joe spent his time walking slowly back and forth between the rear patio door and the sauna room. He had studied the crime scene photographs for hours, but it was not the same as actually being there and getting a sense of the place.
The property itself was a large Victorian house which had been completely modernised inside.
The distance between the patio door and the sauna room was just over fifty meters. The family called it the sauna room but it was effectively a utility room in which they had installed a sauna. Beside the sauna was a sink and underneath the sink was a washing machine and a tumble dryer. There was a five foot by twenty foot gap between the front of the sauna and the wall of the utility room that had the doorway in which to enter.
The sauna itself was twenty foot by ten foot in size. Inside there were three tiered benches at the back. Philippa Redmond had been found lying face down on the top one. The sauna was fitted with an electric heater not a conventional coal heater.
According to the police there had been no forensic evidence apart from the muddy footprints leading to the sauna. The detectives who had worked on the case had surmised that the killer must have worn gloves and covered Philippa’s nose and mouth with their hands or used a cushion or plastic bag to smother her.
Nothing had been stolen so burglary had been ruled out as a motive. The police theorised that the killer must have been staking out the property for some time and when the patio door had been left open had taken the opportunity to strike. Joe didn’t particularly subscribe to this theory, as for him, if the killer had been staking out the property for some time they would have known that Philippa was not in her house alone. The whole family was staying with her for the Christmas and New Year period, so the killer would have been taking a hell of a risk trying to pull off a murder with a house full of people.
Like most expensive properties, a state of the art CCTV system had been installed. There was a camera at the front of the property, one at the back and one at each side of the house. The ones at the side of the house were static and placed at the back and projected outwards so they covered the full length of the side passages. The cameras at the front and the back of the property rotated from side to side, but the camera at the back that was placed directly above the patio door was not working properly so didn’t rotate from side to side. It was stuck in a position that meant only half of the back garden was being covered by camera.
The police believed the killer had climbed over the wall that separates the garden from the woodland behind it, as there were footprints in the soil which matched the muddy footprints found in the house. They hypothesised the killer made their way towards the patio door on the left side of the back garden which wasn’t covered by the camera. Once they had got to the patio door they would have been directly underneath the camera and therefore hidden from view.
Joe had now made his way into the main hallway which was large in size and rather majestic. It had a flight of stairs on each side of the hallway leading up to a landing. Hung on the wall above the middle of the landing were two large paintings that could be seen from down below in the hallway. To Joe it looked more like one would expect a hallway to look in a mansion.
He walked up one of the flights of stairs to take a look at the paintings. The painting on the left was clearly a portrait of Philippa Redmond; the other Joe assumed was a painting of her late husband the Rt Hon Alan Redmond. Joe heard the sound of the front door opening, he turned round to see the victim’s daughter Melanie walk in.
| Author Bio – C.D Steele
C.D Steele works as an Executive Officer in the Civil Service. He has a degree in Recreation Management and lives in County Down, Northern Ireland. This is his third novel and is the next book in the Joe Wilde Series after False Truth and Dark Truth . |
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| Amazon Author Page | C D Steele |
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