Another good one from the always reliable McKimmey. An honest cop is determined to bring down a local mobster. His Captain is no help at all.
Inspector Jack Cummings is watching a man die in the hospital. He’d been shot three times and a lot of money is missing from his hotel room. The man’s wife is sitting quietly in a corner with her blue mascara running down her face. The man dies.
Jack is sure it has something to do with Knocko Cutter and he goes to see him. He gets rough with him and that doesn’t sit well with Captain Otto Blaine. Blaine warns him and Jack tells him he knows the fix is in. It may be at a level higher that the Captain, but it’s there.
His obsession with Knocko began when a hooker was brutally murdered by two of his henchmen, Bernie and Abner. In the course of his investigation a fourteen year old girl at the same hotel says she was raped. Her parents are drunks and she may be lying.
Jack got the dead man’s wife a motel room so she wouldn’t have to go back to the hotel where her husband was shot. His investigations continue and the hotel switchboard operator confesses to the murder. Jack finally figures both cases out but his troubles aren’t over.
He goes to visit the girl in the motel room. No answer. He tries again a day later. Same thing. He gets a key from the manager. She’s dead in the tub with slit wrists. She had company earlier. Jack is sure it was Bernie and Abner. Jack takes matters into his own hands.
This is a gritty book and Jack is an interesting character with a God complex. Good action filled ending. Defintely pick this one up.
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