The Fallen

The Fallen
Jefferson Parker

A detective with a unique gift, a tragic suicide and big city corruption – ‘The Fallen’ is the stunning new thriller from the author of ‘The Blue Hour’: ‘a great writer… he’s amazing’ Lee ChildWhat if you could tell someone was a killer just by looking at them?Detective Robbie Brownlaw can. A six-storey plunge from a burning hotel leaves him with the usual broken bones – and something different. Synesthesia. The ability to see words and emotions as colours makes Robbie a human lie detector.It's a condition that might have helped Garrett Asplundth. Hired to look into rumours surrounding a certain madam's Little Black Book, Garrett found a lot more than the usual round of losers and sad husbands. But the dirt came at a high price.Now he's dead and it's only when Robbie gets hold of the book that he finds out just why Garrett was so curious – and why others will kill to get it back…

The Fallen

Jefferson Parker

For Jim and Jeannie, four decades and counting…

Table of Contents

Cover Page (#u95f856b9-772a-5c19-9732-7527f5b333c5)

Title Page (#u023b8bcd-df8b-53f3-b824-e36e0208b6da)

Dedication (#u51f0cb3f-d287-594f-9144-07b525dcaea1)

Prologue (#ufa8b061e-437b-51da-ac3d-5d3d13c37b94)

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Prologue (#ulink_596cd680-1d63-5579-8015-3a8d2de34b6c)

When the sixth floor of the Las Palmas Hotel caught fire Robbie Brownlaw was in the diner across the street about to have lunch.

It was a cool March afternoon in San Diego and Brownlaw’s turkey burger had just arrived when he saw orange flames roiling behind the hotel windows. He took a bite of the sandwich and hustled outside. The sixth-story windows blew and an orange explosion knocked him back against the brick wall of the diner.

Robbie heard screams up there in the fire. He had never heard screams like these. Then he heard all the yelling as people spilled from the restaurants and offices, pointing up at the Las Palmas while debris clattered to the asphalt – a splintered chair, a flaming lampshade, a nightstand with the drawers hanging out.

Fire alarms shrieked competing warnings down the street. Brownlaw heard a guy screaming up on the sixth floor right through the ringing. Such fear. He looked up, still braced against the wall of the Sorrento Diner, heart pounding like a dryer with a load of sneakers.