Tracking Shot by Colin Campbell (i can read book club .txt) 📗

TRACKING SHOT

A Vince McNulty Thriller

Colin Campbell

PRAISE FOR THE BOOKS BY COLIN CAMPBELL

“Very real. And very good.” —Lee Child

“There’s nothing soft about Campbell’s writing. If you enjoy your crime fiction hard-boiled, the Jim Grant series is a must read.” —Bruce Robert Coffin, author of the Detective Byron series

“A cop with a sharp eye, keen mind, and a lion’s heart.” —Reed Farrel Coleman

“Campbell writes smart, rollercoaster tales with unstoppable forward momentum and thrilling authenticity.” —Nick Petrie

“Grim and gritty and packed with action.” —Kirkus Review

“The pages fly like the bullets, fistfights and one-liners that make this one of my favourite books of the year. Top stuff!” —Matt Hilton

“An excellent story well told. A mixture of The Choirboys meets Harry Bosch.” —Michael Jecks

“Sets up immediately and maintains a breakneck pace throughout. Its smart structure and unrelenting suspense will please Lee Child fans.” —Library Journal Review

“This is police procedural close-up and personal. A strong de-but with enough gritty realism to make your eyes water, and a few savage laughs along the way.” —Reginald Hill

Copyright © 2021 by Colin Campbell

All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

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The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover design by Colin Campbell

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Tracking Shot

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Books by the Author

Preview from Moonlight Rises by Vincent Zandri

Preview from Trigger Switch by Bryon Quertermous

Preview from It’s Ugly Because It’s Personal by Ryan Sayles

PART ONE

“I’ve seen dead. And it’s nothing like the movies.”

—Vince McNulty

ONE

“The thing about superhero movies is nobody ever dies.”

“Of course people die.”

Larry Unger gave an exasperated shrug. “Yeah, but they never stay dead. They just come up with some anti-Kryptonite gizmo, and bang—they’re alive again. I mean, look at Spock in that Star Trek movie.”

Vince McNulty laughed. “Star Trek isn’t superheroes.”

“Same principal though. In real movies, when you’re dead you’re dead.”

McNulty looked at his producer and couldn’t help stating the obvious. “You don’t make real movies, Larry.”

Larry looked offended. “More real than all that sci-fi bullshit.”

McNulty shook his head. “I’ve seen dead. And it’s nothing like the movies.”

Titanic Productions hadn’t planned on filming dead people at the Chester Brook Orphanage, but that’s the way it turned out. McNulty hadn’t planned on advising about dead people, either. As Titanic’s technical adviser and an ex-cop, he had already turned Alfonse Bayard into a credible movie detective, so much so that Larry had quickly put the sequel into production. Dead Naked. He had wanted to call it The Naked and The Dead until McNulty told him they’d already made a war movie with that title. Next choice had been The Naked Dead, but Leslie Neilson had ruined starting any title with “naked,” unless it was a spoof. Larry didn’t make spoofs. Not intentionally, anyway.

“This is my chance to go legit,” the producer told McNulty. “Anyone can get lucky once. We get a franchise. We’re McDonald’s.”

McNulty let out a long, slow breath. “McDonald’s makes the same shit with zero taste everywhere.”

Larry ignored the implied put-down. “McDonald’s makes big money.” He raised an eyebrow. “And everybody loves a beefy hunk.”

McNulty snorted a laugh. “Alfonse isn’t a beefy hunk.”

Larry tapped the side of his head then pointed at McNulty. “He could be. With your help.”

The bustle of activity in the lobby grew louder. The crew were almost ready. Chester Brook Orphanage had allowed them to use the west wing, and Titanic Productions had transformed it into a courthouse. Their request to film at the real District Court building farther along Linden Street had been refused, but the architecture at the orphanage was close enough to make no difference. A bit-part player wearing a judge’s gown walked across the lobby. Bright lights went on in the next room, which had been set up as a courtroom. Amy Moore applied a last-minute brush to Alfonse Bayard’s makeup.

Larry turned again to the ex-Yorkshire cop. “The auto body shop knows to stop working. Right?”

McNulty glanced at the actor playing the hero detective but his real interest lay with the makeup artist kneeling beside him. Amy Moore paused and looked at McNulty. She smiled and McNulty smiled back, gave her a little nod, then looked back at Larry and stood to his full height. He towered over the diminutive movie producer.

“I’ll go make sure.”

He didn’t like being around the camera when they were filming. It made him feel self-conscious and mildly embarrassed. This wasn’t what being a cop was all about, and he couldn’t help thinking of himself as a cop. All ex-cops did. He walked along the corridor and out through a side door into the clean, bright Massachusetts air, looking for all the world like a cop walking his beat.

McNulty’s beat today was a two-block stretch of Linden Street, Waltham, Massachusetts. Twelve miles west of Boston in Middlesex County. Fifty yards either side of the Chester Brook Orphanage. He still wasn’t sure what constituted two blocks in America, whether it was intersections or buildings, but in the small town of Waltham, it was walking distance. Just as well on a sweltering June afternoon.

Linden Street had temporary roadblocks at the fifty-yard limit. Men with walkie-talkies let the traffic flow until they got the message that filming was about to start. The message had been sent. The street was empty. A dark grey panel van pulled