Stephen King, Lisa Morton, Nell Quinn-Gibney, Norman Prentiss, Joyce Carol Oates, and Tim Curran plunge readers into the dark side in this deeply unsettling short-story collection curated by legendary horror editors Brian James Freeman and Richard Chizmar. THE OLD DUDE’S TICKER by Stephen King Richard Drogan has been spooked ever since he came back from Nam, but he’s no head case, dig? He just knows the old dude needs to die. THE RICH ARE DIFFERENT by Lisa Morton Even though she made her name revealing the private lives of the rich and famous, Sara Peck has no idea how deep their secrets really go… or the price they’ll pay to get what they desire. THE MANICURE by Nell Quinn-Gibney A trip to the nail salon is supposed to be relaxing. But as the demons of the past creep closer with every clip, even the most serene day of pampering can become a nightmare. THE COMFORTING VOICE by Norman Prentiss It’s a little strange how baby Lydia can only be soothed by her grandfather’s unnatural voice, ravaged by throat cancer. The weirdest part? What he’s saying is more disturbing than how he says it. THE SITUATIONS by Joyce Carol Oates There are certain lessons children must learn, rules they must follow, scars they must bear. No lesson is more important than this: Never question Daddy. Or else. THE CORPSE KING by Tim Curran Grave robbers Kierney and Clow keep one step ahead of the law as they ply their ghoulish trade, but there’s no outrunning a far more frightening enemy that hungers for the dead

NINE YEARS It is almost a decade since Duluth said goodbye to its innocence. The city creeps ever closer to the tenth anniversary of the year in which it found itself both gripped by murder and united in terror; and during which the pillar of its community, DS Jonathan Stride, had his home and heart torn to ribbons by the claws of cancer. NINE LIVES Cat Mateo, an orphan with a knack of landing on her feet, has bid farewell to a life on the streets. This once-stray teenager owes her rescue to Detective Stride, the father figure she holds close to her heart. But Cat holds something else to her chest — a secret: the sheer power of which she could not possibly comprehend. A secret that, once out of the bag, will not just viciously scratch at Duluth’s still-healing wounds, but will make DS Jonathan Stride wave goodbye to his convictions about the events nine years before, and say hello to his darkest fears

"A page-turner of the highest calibre. It has enough twists and turns to keep you guessing until the end." – Michael Connelly "Breathtakingly real and utterly compelling… some of the most literate and stylish writing you'll find anywhere today."- Jeffery Deaver "One hell of a read, gut-wrenching and exciting." – Ken Bruen *** In Duluth, Minnesota, a young woman, Rachel Stoner, has gone missing. Cop Jonathan Stride, a sharply focused detective despite the stresses of his troubled personal life, is quick to suspect her stepfather of murder. And yet, he has his doubts. Even for a man accustomed to power, the accused seems remarkably convinced he'll go free. Could he be telling the truth? While Stride endeavours to make sense of the conflicting pieces of evidence, a young woman's body lies half-buried deep in the woods. But if it's not the body of Rachel, where is the missing girl? Is she dead, or is the terrible, unexpected fate that awaits Graeme Stoner one he does not deserve? In this dark, involving mystery, nothing is as it seems, and readers will be gripped to the very last page as the shocking truth gradually emerges

Lieutenant Jonathan Stride has never forgotten the case that made him decide to join the police force. Back in the 1970s, Laura – sister of Stride's girlfriend – was murdered. The obvious suspect was a vagrant, who slipped through the hands of the police, including Stride's detective hero Roy. Now, though, Stride's looking at the case in a new light. Tish Verdure, an old friend of Laura's, has come home, and she's certain that the killer was a local boy, now an attorney with connections at the highest level. Stride's soon convinced that there was a deliberate decision to direct the investigation towards a simple solution and away from Tish's suggested perpetrator, but he's also sure that Tish is hiding a secret about the past. A secret that could have shattering consequences – including a second murder…

One rainy night, the unthinkable happens: Dylan Moran’s car plunges off the road into a raging river, his beautiful wife drowning as he struggles to shore. In the aftermath, through his grief, Dylan experiences sudden, strange visions: wherever he goes, he’s haunted by glimpses of himself. Dylan initially chalks it up to trauma, but that changes when he runs into a psychiatrist who claims he’s her patient. She says he has been undergoing a unique hypnotherapy treatment built on the idea that with every choice, he creates an infinite number of parallel universes. Now those parallel universes are unlocked — and Dylan’s doppelgänger has staked a claim to his world. Can Dylan use these alternate realities to get a second chance at the life that was stolen from him? Or will he lose himself...  to himself?

On a rainy June morning, tens of thousands of people crowd into Duluth for the city’s biggest annual event: the Duluth Marathon. Exhausted runners push to reach the finish line and spectators line the streets to cheer them on. Then, in a terrifying echo of the Boston bombing, there is an explosion along the race course, leaving many people dead and injured. Within minutes, Jonathan Stride, Serena Dial, and Maggie Bei are at work with the FBI to find the terrorists behind the tragedy. As social media feeds a flood of rumors and misinformation, one spectator remembers being jostled by a young man with a backpack not far from the bomb site. He spots a Muslim man in a tourist’s photo of the event and is convinced that this was the man who bumped into him in the crowd — but now the man’s backpack is missing. When he tweets the photo to the public, the young man, Khan Rashid, becomes the most wanted man in the city. And the manhunt is on. But are the answers behind the Duluth bombing more complex than anyone realizes? And can Stride, Serena, and Maggie find the truth before more innocent people are killed?

It's every parent's worst nightmare. Chris Hawk's daughter has been accused of murder . . . and she looks guilty as sin. Chris rushes to the small town in Minnesota where his ex-wife and his only child, Olivia, now live, determined to defend his daughter. He discovers two towns at war: Barron, where a chemical works has brought jobs and fortune, and St Croix, Olivia's downriver home, where the same chemical works are believed to have brought death: a cancer cluster with mysterious origins. Olivia is at the centre of this feud. So is the girl she's suspected of killing. If Chris is to find out what really happened, he needs to learn everything about his daughter… but he's beginning to realise he hardly knows her at all. Chris wants to believe Olivia is innocent, but belief is only the first step. Now he has to prove it. And all the while, the Barron boys are waiting, baying for her blood

Lieutenant Jonathan Stride knows his partner Maggie Bei is in trouble when she reports a deadly crime on a bitter winter night. She's obviously hiding a terrible secret, and her silence only feeds suspicion. Maggie isn't the only one keeping secrets in Duluth. A seductive young woman has disappeared, leaving behind a stash of lurid fantasies and a cryptic message: I know who it is. Following a twisted trail, Stride uncovers a sordid web of violence and voyeurism that someone is willing to kill to keep hidden. Stride isn't alone. His lover Serena Dial – a homicide cop turned private investigator – is chasing a blackmailer who knows all the city's dirty secrets. Even Maggie's. But as Stride and Serena hunt for a killer, a predator with a vicious past is hunting them – with a terrifying plan for revenge. Now every step they take to expose the truth brings them closer to a showdown amid the howling winds of a winter storm. Where survival in the blinding snow is measured in seconds. Where crimes can be buried forever

In this stunning follow-up to Brian Freeman's remarkable debut novel, Immoral, Detective Jonathan Stride discovers that there are only two ways to go in Las Vegas. You can hit the jackpot. Or you can get Stripped… They looked like isolated cases: a hit-and-run and a celebrity murdered during a fling with a prostitute. No one could ever imagine they'd be linked to a brutal crime in Las Vegas 's steamy past-and that the race against the clock to corner a determined serial killer would stir up secrets long thought buried with the dead. As detectives Jonathan Stride and Serena Dial are called separately to investigate, they have no idea what they're stepping into: a world where desperate ambition rules and loyalties know no bounds, and where their own uncharted emotions and sexual desires will reach an explosive conclusion. Shocking, twisted, with edge-of-your-seat suspense, Stripped pushes the limits of its heroes and keeps the reader turning ever page until the last plot twist

Hilary and Mark Bradley are trapped in a web of suspicion. Last year, accusations of a torrid affair with a student cost Mark his teaching job and made the young couple into outcasts in their remote island town off the Lake Michigan coast. Now another teenage girl is found dead on a deserted beach. . and once again, Mark faces a hostile town convinced of his guilt. Hilary Bradley is determined to prove that Mark is innocent, but she’s on a lonely, dangerous quest. Even when she discovers that the murdered girl was witness to a horrific crime years earlier, the police are certain she’s throwing up a smoke screen to protect her husband. Only a quirky detective named Cab Bolton seems willing to believe Hilary’s story. Hilary and Cab soon find that people in this community are willing to kill to keep their secrets hidden — and to make sure Mark doesn’t get away with murder. And with each shocking revelation, even Hilary begins to wonder whether her husband is truly innocent. Freeman’s first stand-alone thriller since his Stride novels is a knockout

One cold night — Two shocking mysteries — In the quiet town of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, a baby vanishes from her bedroom in an opulent lakeside home — Was she abducted — or does her father have a terrible secret to hide? — That same night, a young policewoman gets lost in the fog and stumbles into the middle of a horrific crime. Now a sadistic killer wants her to play his deadly game — Lieutenant Jonathan Stride and his team need to move fast to save a child and stop a vicious killing spree — As fear grips the frozen winter farm lands, Stride knows that every snow-covered field may be the next burying place. Each twist in the investigation takes Stride into an elaborate web of deceit and desire — But his biggest obstacles may be the very people he-s trying to help — With everything at risk and time running out, Stride worries how far a desperate mother will go to rescue her baby — and how far a desperate cop will go to save herself

San Francisco homicide detective Frost Easton hadn’t seen his estranged friend Denny in years. Not until he dies in Frost’s arms uttering a final inexplicable word: Lombard.Denny appears to be the latest victim in a string of murders linked by a distinctive clue: the painting of a spiraled snake near the crime scenes. Is it the work of a serial killer? Or is Denny’s death more twisted and personal? To find the answer, Frost reaches into a nest of vipers — San Francisco’s shady elite — where the whispered name of Lombard is just one secret. Now, drawn into a cat-and-mouse game with an enemy who knows his every move, Frost finds there is no one he can trust. And somewhere down the crooked streets of the city, Frost’s cunning adversary is coiled and ready to strike again

Homicide detective Frost Easton doesn’t like coincidences. When a series of bizarre deaths rock San Francisco — as seemingly random women suffer violent psychotic breaks — Frost looks for a connection that leads him to psychiatrist Francesca Stein. Frankie’s controversial therapy helps people erase their most terrifying memories... and all the victims were her patients. As Frost and Frankie carry out their own investigations, the case becomes increasingly personal — and dangerous. Long-submerged secrets surface as someone called the Night Bird taunts the pair with cryptic messages pertaining to the deaths. Soon Frankie is forced to confront strange gaps in her own memory, and Frost faces a killer who knows the detective’s worst fears. As the body count rises and the Night Bird circles ever closer, a dedicated cop and a brilliant doctor race to solve the puzzle before a cunning killer claims another victim

Four years after serial killer Rudy Cutter was sent away for life, San Francisco homicide inspector Frost Easton uncovers a terrible lie: his closest friend planted false evidence to put Cutter behind bars. When he’s forced to reveal the truth, his sister’s killer is back on the streets. Desperate to take Cutter down again, the detective finds a new ally in Eden Shay. She wrote a book about Cutter and knows more about him than anyone. And she’s terrified. Because for four years, Cutter has been nursing revenge day after stolen day. Staying ahead of the game of a killer who’s determined to strike again is not going to be easy. Not when Frost is battling his own demons. Not when the game is becoming so personal. And not when the killer’s next move is unlike anything Frost expected

Lisa Power is a tortured ghost of her former self. The author of a bestselling thriller called Thief River Falls, named after her rural Minnesota hometown, Lisa is secluded in her remote house as she struggles with the loss of her entire family: a series of tragedies she calls the “Dark Star.” Then a nameless runaway boy shows up at her door with a terrifying story: he’s just escaped death after witnessing a brutal murder — a crime the police want to cover up. Obsessed with the boy’s safety, Lisa resolves to expose this crime, but powerful men in Thief River Falls are desperate to get the boy back, and now they want her too. Lisa and her young visitor have nowhere to go as the trap closes around them. Still under the strange, unforgiving threat of the Dark Star, Lisa must find a way to save them both, or they’ll become the victims of another shocking tragedy she can’t foresee