Blog Tour: Perfect Prey by Helen Fields

Amazon UK

Goodreads

Claire's Review

Perfect Prey is the second book in the DI Callanach series. I had read the first book when I read this but it didn't affect my enjoyment.

The story is about DI Callanach and DI Turner. Callanach is called the a festival where a man has been stabbed; Turner is called the another murder where a nurse has been crushed to death.

I found this book dark and intriguing, and fast paced read, full of detail from start to finish including the grotesque murders. 

This is a must read for anyone who reads this genre and I will definitely be grabbing a copy of the first and the next installments!

Extract

Chapter nine page 61 – 62

Callanach took out his mobile and switched on the torch app that would drain the battery in no time, but it would do for him to get his bearings and stop wasting any more minutes. He walked between rows of books, all neatly stored, with boxes at the end of each line containing the expected jumble and junk. Children’s toys, some costumes, ageing furniture that no one had decided what to do with. He turned a corner, letting his phone shine at the floor, sensing rather than seeing obstacles as he walked away from the neat rows of books. There was a noise behind him. He spun round, disoriented. One foot flew out from beneath him and he threw a hand to the side to grab what he could to stabilise himself. His other foot followed the same fate, slipping on the floor, and his free arm shot up rather than out, clutching at the first thing it touched. It was a textile, smooth and slippery, wet on one side. Callanach shouted as he fell, landing on his back as whatever his hand had found loosened in his grasp. He closed his eyes as pain shot through his coccyx. A few moments later he repositioned his mobile and shone the light upwards.

Above him was, without a doubt, the body of Michael Swan. He had been suspended horizontally from a metal structural beam by his neck and his bound ankles. Callanach could only see fragments as the beam of torchlight moved, shakily, along the length of the corpse. Whoever had hung him had almost entirely skinned Swan’s face. Callanach had read numerous articles about it but never seen a case where it had been done. An incision had been made around the outer circle of facial skin, starting at one side of the lower jaw, heading up around the cheekbone, across the forehead and back down the other side. Finally, like a perfectly skinned rabbit, his face had been peeled.

Callanach felt the stickiness in his palm and knew that the resulting flap of skin had been what he’d grabbed as he’d slipped. He didn’t need the torchlight to confirm the pool of blood he was lying in.

‘Police officer, put down your weapons,’ Salter shouted from the doorway, no doubt assuming an assault and possible injury.

‘I’m all right, Salter. There’s no one else here.’ He may not have checked every inch of it, but Callanach was sure the assailant had left the building the night before, taking Swan’s mobile and wallet with them.

‘The fuse box is fine, the light bulbs must all have blown. Callanach could hear the caretaker’s voice getting closer.

‘Salter, get everyone else out of here right now. Close down the scene. Contact the pathologist immediately and call foren­sics in. Do not enter. I’ve already compromised the evidence.’

He could hear urgent instructions being given and the sound of footsteps disappearing away.

‘You sure you’re not hurt, sir? It sounded bad,’ Salter called.