Eyeshot

EARLY BIRD BOOKS

FRESH EBOOK DEALS, DELIVERED DAILY

BE THE FIRST TO KNOW—

NEW DEALS HATCH EVERY DAY!

PRAISE FOR THE WRITING OF LYNN HIGHTOWER

“Lynn Hightower is a major talent.” —Jonathan Kellerman,
New York Times
–bestselling author

“Hightower is a writer of tremendous quality.” —
Library Journal

PRAISE FOR THE SONORA BLAIR MYSTERIES

Flashpoint

“Diabolically intriguing from start to finish.” —
Publishers Weekly

“Miraculously fresh and harrowing.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“Rings with gritty authenticity. You won't be able to put it down and you won't want to sleep again. Riveting.” —Lisa Scottoline,
New York Times
–bestselling author

Eyeshot

“Hightower has invented a heroine who is both flawed and likeable, and she knows how to keep the psychological pressure turned up high.” —
The Sunday Telegraph

“What gives [
Eyeshot
] depth and resonance is the way Hightower counterpoints the murder plot with the details of Sonora's daily life in homicide.” —
Publishers Weekly

No Good Deed

“Powerful, crisply paced.”—
Publishers Weekly

“Refreshingly different … A cracking tale told at a stunning pace.” —Frances Fyfield

The Debt Collector

“Hightower builds the suspense to an almost unbearable pitch.” —
Publishers Weekly

“Well-written and satisfyingly plotted. Best of all is Sonora herself—a feisty babe who packs a red lipstick along with her gun.” —
The Times
(London)

PRAISE FOR THE ELAKI NOVELS

“The crimes are out of
The Silence of the Lambs
, the cops out of
Lethal Weapon
, and the grimy future out of
Blade Runner
… Vivid and convincing.” —
Lexington Herald-Leader

“One of the best new series in the genre!” —
Science Fiction Chronicle

Alien Blues

“Hightower takes the setup and delivers a grittily realistic and down-and-dirty serial killer novel.… Impressive … A very promising first novel.” —
Locus

“Brilliantly entertaining. I recommend it highly. A crackerjack novel of police detection and an evocative glimpse of a possible future.” —Nancy Pickard, bestselling author of
I.O.U.

“[The] cast of characters is interesting and diverse, the setting credible, and the pacing rapid-fire and gripping.” —
Science Fiction Chronicle

“An exciting, science-fictional police procedural with truly alien aliens … An absorbing, well-written book.” —
Aboriginal Science Fiction

“Truly special … Original characters, plot twists galore, in a book that can be enjoyed for its mystery aspects as well as its SF … A real treat.” —Arlene Garcia

“Hightower shows both humans and Elaki as individuals with foibles and problems.
Alien Blues
provides plenty of fast-paced action.… An effective police drama.” —
SF Commentary

“Hightower tells her story with the cool efficiency of a Mafia hit man.… With its lean, matter-of-fact style, cliff-hanger chapter endings and plentiful (and often comic) dialogue,
Alien Blues
moves forward at warp speed!” —
Lexington Herald-Leader

“A great story … Fast and violent … Difficult to put down!” —
Kliatt

“An intriguing world!” —
Analog Science Fiction and Fact

Alien Eyes

“
Alien Eyes
is a page-turner.… Fun, fast-moving … A police procedural in a day-after-tomorrow world.” —
Lexington Herald-Leader

“Hightower takes elements of cyberpunk and novels about a benevolent alien invasion and combines them with a gritty realism of a police procedural to make stories that are completely her own.… A believable future with a believable alien culture … Interesting settings, intriguing ideas, fascinating characters [and] a high level of suspense!” —
Turret

“Complex … Snappy … Original.” —
Asimov's Science Fiction

“The sequel to the excellent
Alien Blues
[is] a very fine SF novel.… I'm looking forward to the next installment!” —
Science Fiction Chronicle

Eyeshot

A Sonora Blair Mystery

Lynn Hightower

For my buddy, Jim Lyon

Couldn't ask for a better friend

eye-shot:
the distance that a person can see; range of vision

1

Peter Peter, Pumpkin Eater

Had a wife and couldn't keep her

Put her in a pumpkin shell

And there he kept her very well

                —Children's nursery rhyme

It was one of those moments when Sonora hated police work.

Butch Winchell sat across from her in the interview room, laying the family snapshots out on the table. There was brown-eyed Terry, three years old, Power Rangers sweatshirt barely covering a pouchy tummy. And baby sister Chrissie, struggling sideways in her lap, fine hair a wisp at the top of her head, sister's hand clutched in a tight and tiny grip.

Their mommy was missing.

Sonora liked it that the Winchell kids had normal names. None of the soap opera specials—Jasmine, Ridge, Taylor, or Noelle. She ran a finger along the edge of the table. Outside it was ninety degrees and sunny, but it was cold in the interview room. Everywhere in the city people were going boating, swimming, out to movies.

Homicide detectives never had any fun.

Sonora looked across the table at her partner, Sam Delarosa. If the baby pictures were bothering her, he'd be worse off. Softer hearted.

He smiled at her, gave her his “come hither” look. He was a big guy, big shoulders, dark brown hair side-parted and falling in his eyes. He looked young for his age, boyish—though Sonora, who knew him well, noted the careworn signs of worry around his mouth, and at the corners of his eyes. He had the kind of small-town, country-boy, Southern charm that made women want to confide in him, and men automatically include him as one of the boys. There was no doubt that he was the kind of guy who opened doors for women, watched football, and didn't like to shop. His normality was one of the things that attracted Sonora. They'd worked homicide together for five years.

And it was the second come hither look Sonora had gotten out of him this week. She was sure they had put all that stuff way behind them. He must be messing with her mind.

She smiled back, heavy on the eye contact, and he gave her a second glance before his eyes went back to Winchell.

“Her name is Julia, Detective Blair.” Winchell laid one more photo beside the rest. He looked up at Sonora.

Just like her kids, Sonora thought. Quick to pick up on a moment of inattention. She pushed hair out of her eyes. Too long, too curly. She wondered if cutting it would tame it down or pouf it up.

She picked the picture up off the desk.

It was a quickie Polaroid with the sticky glaze of constant handling. She gave it a long look, passed it across the table to Sam.

There was something breathtaking about Julia Winchell.

The hair was magnificent—red-lit brunette, thick and curly, rising from a widow's peak, pulled back from a heart-shaped face. She had a high forehead, a touch of severity about the mouth. The lips were lush, heavy at the bottom, the eyes almond-shaped, deep brown, with well-defined eyebrows. She had narrow shoulders, long slim fingers, delicate porcelain wrists.

She was the kind of woman you would expect to find vacationing in Paris, or exploring the countryside of southern Italy. She would order clothes from J. Peterman, shop at Abercrombie & Fitch.

Hard to believe the woman in the picture could be the wife of this ordinary man who looked petulant, uncertain, and afraid.

Married young, Sonora thought.

Winchell picked up the Styrofoam cup of coffee Sam had brought him and raised it to his lips, but didn't drink.

Bad coffee? Sonora wondered. Nerves?

“Mr. Winchell, would you like a soda or something?” she asked.

He shook his head. He'd be a medium to small, if attractiveness was measured like T-shirts, black hair wet with gel, heavy black rims on the glasses, a round sort of face. Sloping shoulders, paunchy stomach. The kind of extra weight nobody noticed on a man. The kind of extra weight that sent women screaming to the salad bar.

Somebody's brother, somebody's cousin, somebody's killer.

Sonora figured on a high probability that the man sitting across from her had killed his wife, provided she turned up dead. She might just have run away from home. Back when Sonora had been a wife, she'd wanted to run away from home.

But not enough to leave two little children behind, both babies still.

Winchell hunched forward in his chair, shoulders tense. He had hollows of darkness beneath his eyes. “You can't see it in the picture, but she's also got a tattoo on her ankle.” He pushed the glasses back on his nose. “It's not cheap-looking, okay? She did it graduation night when she was a senior in high school, and her mama like to kill her. It was just kids cutting up. She and her friends had been out to a Chinese restaurant to eat, and decided that they should get their birth year symbol tattooed on them somewhere. Hers is the year of the dragon—she was born in '64. None of the others went through with it. Can't blame them, if they were born in the year of the rat or the monkey or the pig or something. It's really kind of neat-looking, blue and green with red eyes and a long red tongue.”

Sonora leaned forward, memory stirring, cop instinct on edge. “Did you say left ankle?”

He hadn't said. Sam looked at her.