Chapter One

Zach Hargrove held the serrated hunting knife in a white-knuckled grip as he silently crept forward. No room for mistakes this time. This had to be silent, swift and deadly. Just one fierce thrust into the carotid artery. It would be messy, but she had to die.

Nellie sat—unmoving—in a black leather office chair, facing the third-floor windows that looked out over Old Mill Creek. If she was aware that he was behind her, she gave no sign. Her dark straggly hair hung over the back of the chair in tangled clumps. Zach couldn’t remember the last time he’d run a brush through it. She needed a wash too, but he’d given up on that long ago. Nellie had been exactly what he needed at first, but after so many years, she’d become more of a burden than a help. He hated having to move her heavy, awkward body from chair to chair, room to room. Caring for her had become arduous. No one would miss Nellie if he got rid of her . . .

Her head tilted to the right, blocking her neck from his view, and he hesitated. He wouldn’t be able to strike cleanly from this direction with her head tilted. He swapped the knife from his right hand to his left. The rubber handle felt awkward in his grasp. A few practice swings with his non-dominant hand felt odd and clumsy, so he tried some overhead plunges. Maybe he could stab Nellie in the back of the neck instead. A quick blow to sever her spinal cord, and she’d die in seconds. What if he yanked her head back and ran the knife across her neck, slitting it open from side to side? He shook his head. Too clichéd. Everyone slashed throats these days. He toyed, for a moment, with driving the knife through the back of the chair and into Nellie’s back. I’d never get the knife deep enough to kill her, he thought. She’d survive with a flesh wound—if that happened, he’d never hear the end of it.

With a frown, he shifted the knife back to his right hand and decided to continue with his original plan: one fast jab to the right side of the neck. Zach glanced at his prey. Nellie remained still, oblivious of what he was about to do. He inched forward, his gray Skechers silent on the plush beige carpet. His fingers tightened on the knife handle, and he drew his arm back. The muscles on his shoulder were taut, but his arm had a slight tremble. He had to get this right on the first try.

After two more cautious steps, he stood behind Nellie, staring down at a scalp of unkempt hair. Oh, how he hated that hair. With one barbaric swing, he brought his arm down, but the blow didn’t go quite as planned. The knife tip deflected off her head, tangled in a clump of hair, and plunged into Nellie’s shoulder.

“Damn it,” Zach shouted.

He stood for a moment, studying his handiwork. Nellie slumped forward, the knife standing tall in her shoulder.

He tried to withdraw the knife slowly, but the serrated blade caught on several threads and tore the seam in Nellie’s shoulder. Clumps of polyester stuffing—like giant cotton balls—tumbled out of the hole and fell to the floor. Zach let out a long sigh as he placed the knife on the nearby desk. Now he’d have to sew her up. He spun the office chair around and stared at Nellie. Her featureless face and black button eyes stared blankly back at him. Patches—both big and small—covered her arms, abdomen, head, and legs—scars of the many instances of his mistreatment.

“I’m glad you don’t hold a grudge,” he said.

Zach wrapped his arms around the life-size dummy and lifted her out of the chair, her canvas skin rough on his bare arms. A trail of white filling marked his steps as he manhandled her across the room and propped her up on the sofa.

Dropping into his desk chair, he reviewed the previous few paragraphs he’d written just before he attempted to kill Nellie. The murder scene “seemed” to flow, but he wasn’t satisfied with the way it turned out. His antagonist—the mysterious Mr. Price—had entered the home of Dallas Kincaid with the intention of killing Kincaid’s new girlfriend. But Zach had found the scene difficult to write. There was something about the logistics that bothered him, hence his attempt to “kill” Nellie, his long-time partner for acting out crime scenes. For her part, Nellie had endured a dozen or more stabbings, being thrown from windows, run over by cars, and even shot twice. And yet she never once complained.

Zach stood again, snatched a Bic pen from the desk, and paced around the room, pausing on occasion to glance out the windows that covered all four walls. The third floor of his house, his “Author’s Loft,” as he liked to call it, had a 360-degree view of the surrounding yard as well as the creek that flowed past the back of his property. The small Delaware town of Lewes hadn’t been his first choice of places to call home. But when he’d first toured the house three years ago, the bright openness of the room couldn’t have been more perfect for him. It satisfied his need for a place to write, and the room’s openness was preferred over the more confined spaces he’d seen in every other house he’d toured. He’d put an offer on the place immediately and moved in a month later.

As he paced, Zach furiously clicked the button on the pen with his thumb. He passed the lone bookshelf, stuck in the corner between the adjoining walls’ windows, and paused to study the colorful hardback spines of his previous eight Dallas Kincaid Mystery novels. Five of them had become New York Times bestsellers, but not the last two. His protagonist, Dallas Kincaid, had become increasingly more difficult to write over the past couple years. The character had become too clichéd, too much like every other amateur detective in the market, and Zach was struggling to keep each new book fresh and original. He was ready for something new, something different.

“This will be the last Kincaid novel,” he’d told his agent, Mariah Maddison.

“Don’t be too hasty,” she’d said. “You might regret those words once the book is released.”

With a sigh, Zach slipped the Bic pen into his pants pocket, returned to his desk, and hovered his fingers over the keyboard of his laptop. He stared at the text on the screen, the words fading together into a jumble of pixels that made no more sense than when he’d read them a few minutes ago.

Pushing back from the desk, he growled, “Hell,” and stood, rounding the half wall that hid the stairs from view and descended into the house below.

In the kitchen, Zach grabbed a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale from the fridge, twisted the top off and took a long sip. A calendar—tacked to a nearby corkboard—was open to the month of June. A quick glance over the dates made his stomach churn. He had until mid-July to finish the first draft of the next Dallas Kincaid novel. That gave him six weeks. The manuscript was only thirty percent done. He sighed as he eyeballed the next few weeks. There was an upcoming recording session for the Society of Fibbers podcast. A book signing with Jasper Stone and Martina Vargas in Virginia. He flipped up the calendar page and looked over July. The week after Independence Day was blocked out for ThrillNYC in New York City. Damn, that only gives me five weeks to finish the book. His stomach twisted in knots as his anxiety rose.

Zach moved through the open dining room to the sliding glass door, stepped onto his back deck, and gazed out across the creek. The tide was out, and the muddy banks were exposed to the Tuesday afternoon sun. An eagle was perched in the tree that hung over the water. The lush cordgrass stood tall along the edges of the creek, outlining the maze of the twisting waterway. A gentle breeze rustled the tips of the grass. The faint aroma of marsh water punctuated each deep breath. So peaceful. So relaxing. He closed his eyes and listened to the tranquility around him. But it did little to subdue the angst within him. When was his next therapy appointment? Maybe it was time to try some of the meds his therapist had so often suggested.

From within the house, the shrill of his mobile phone interrupted the serenity of the moment. Moving back into the kitchen, he scooped up the phone from the counter where he’d left it.

The voice that greeted him was grave and somber. “Zach? It’s Rebecca. Something terrible has happened. Martina Vargas is dead.”

***

Excerpt from Those Who Shall Die by Michael Bradley. Copyright 2026 by Michael Bradley. Reproduced with permission from Michael Bradley. All rights reserved.