A game most foul, p.29
A Game Most Foul, page 29
A chintz armchair had been upended nearby, a coffee table overturned, and the drapes covering the windows were hanging on by threads.
The officer stayed put, feet planted firmly on the ground. The floor was covered in broken glass—shattered beakers, he presumed. Perhaps strangest of all was the gaping hole in the coffee table, as if some sort of acid had eaten away at the wood.
As the officer continued to catalogue his surroundings, he realized that the mysterious hole in the coffee table wasn’t the strangest thing about all this.
It was the hand that lay on the floor, its skeletal fingers curled tightly around a blackened disc of metal the officer couldn’t identify.
It was only because the owner of the hand was thankfully hidden from view behind the sofa that the officer didn’t lose his breakfast then and there.
It was a sight that would become permanently engrained in the young man’s memory and the source of more than a few nightmares.
He used the toe of his boot to swing the door to the flat shut on his way out and addressed the pub owner now lurking at the top of the stairs
“I’m just going to nip outside for a phone call. Won’t be a moment.”
“What for?” the owner demanded as the now lightheaded officer passed him on the stairs.
He didn’t answer, gasping in relief when the crisp, night air outside offered a reprieve from the stench.
Truthfully, the young man was now questioning his choice in careers, but there was nothing else for it now. He was going to have to ring the station for backup.
And here he thought this was going to be like every other normal, bland night he’d had for the last twenty-six years of his life. Clearly it was about to be anything but.
Acknowledgments
This project ended up being one of the hardest things I’ve ever written, so there are plenty of people to thank who helped get me to the finish line.
Firstly, my amazing agent, Shannon Hassan, and my fabulous editors at Blink YA, Katherine Jacobs and Mary Hassinger: Thank you for taking a chance on me and this story! I am so grateful for your support, guidance, and patience along the way. I sincerely think I’d be lost without you! It’s been such a pleasure working with you and I hope we get to do it again in the future. Sara Merritt, Abby Van Wormer, and Jessica Westra, I want to thank you too for your help in all things marketing and for putting up with my reluctance to dabble in BookTok!
To my friends Samantha Duke, Brianna Schenkel, and Staci Nichols—thank you for your endless amounts of encouragement! I desperately needed it and your friendship. Megan Walker and Amy Bell, you deserve a special thanks for putting up with my panic-induced text messages about this story and for our amazing writing retreat. I don’t know about you two, but I am really looking forward to going back to the lake house.
To my author friends Caroline Leech and Christina June, thank you for always being willing to answer my countless questions and/or making sure I didn’t mess up the British slang . . .
Mom, thanks for instilling a love of mysteries and Sherlock Holmes in me from such a young age. I wouldn’t be where I am now if it weren’t for you and Dad. I love you both.
Tyler, thanks for holding the fort down while I finished writing this thing—I know it wasn’t easy. Our girls are a handful and you’re a real champ for putting up with my random bouts of crying.
And to my other friends and family members too countless to name, I’m thinking of you too. You’ve helped and supported me in one way or another along my writing journey, and I’m so thankful to you all.
Alison Gervais, A Game Most Foul
