A woman is found murdered in the woods with a very special watch on her wrist - and what seemed a simple case soon escalates into a nightmare. The criminal methods of some of the most infamous killers of all time are being replicated by a new predator who stalks and strikes victims with a cunning brilliance. No one can understand the murderer's motives or who the next victim will be.
Drawn into this violent affair are two Secret Service agents turned private investigators, Sean King and Michelle Maxwell. Both have been hired to prove a man's innocence in a domestic burglary involving an aristocratic, if dysfunctional, family. Soon stunning secrets will lead the partners into the middle of a frantic search for a killer unlike any they've confronted before.
As the Hour Game barrels forward, Sean and Michelle face a macabre puzzle and uncover one horrifying revelation after another. Nearing the truth, they will find that their own lives are in danger. And then they're hit with the biggest surprise of all. When you play the Hour Game, you have to play to win. But time is running out for all of them.

Hour Game

By David Baldacci

Warner Books

Copyright © 2004 Columbus Rose, Ltd.
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0-446-53108-1

Chapter One

THE MAN IN THE RAIN SLICKER WALKED slightly bent over, his breathinglabored and his body sweaty. The extra weight he was bearing, thoughnot all that substantial, was awkwardly placed, and the terrain wasuneven. It was never an easy thing to tote a dead body through thewoods in the middle of the night. He shifted the corpse to his leftshoulder and trudged on. The soles of his shoes bore nodistinguishing marks; not that it would have mattered, since therain quickly washed away any traces of footprints. He'd checked theforecast; the rain was why he was here. The inclement weather wasthe best friend he could ask for.

Aside from the dead body draped over his sturdy shoulder, the manwas also remarkable for the black hood he wore, on which wasstitched an esoteric symbol that ran down the length of the cloth.It was a circle with a crosshairs through its middle. Probablyinstantly recognizable to anyone over the age of fifty, the logoonce inspired a dread that had significantly eroded with time. Itdidn't matter that no one "alive" would see him wearing the hood; hetook grim satisfaction in its lethal symbolism.

Within ten minutes he'd reached the location he'd carefully selectedon an earlier visit, and laid the body down with a reverence thatbelied the violent manner in which the person had died. He took adeep breath and held it as he undid the telephone wire holding thebundle closed, and unwrapped the plastic. She was young withfeatures that had been attractive two days prior; the woman was notmuch to look at now. The soft blond hair fell away from thegreenish-tinged skin, revealing closed eyes and bloated cheeks. Hadthe eyes been open, they might have still held the startled gaze ofthe deceased as she endured her own murder, an experience replicatedroughly thirty thousand times each year in America.

He slid the plastic all the way free and laid the woman on her back.Then he let out his breath, fought the urge to retch caused by thestench of the body, and sucked in another lungful of air. Using oneof his gloved hands and his light, he searched for and found thesmall, forked branch that he'd earlier placed in the bramble nearby.He used this to support the woman's forearm, which he'd positionedsuch that it was pointing to the sky. The body's rigor mortis,though rapidly fading, had made the task difficult, but he wasstrong and had finally levered the stiffened limb to the correctangle. He took the watch out of his pocket, checked with hisflashlight to make sure it was set properly, and placed it aroundthe dead woman's wrist.

Though far from a religious man, he knelt over the body and muttereda brief prayer, cupping his hand over his mouth and nose as he didso.

"You weren't directly responsible, but you were all I had. Youdidn't die in vain. And I believe you're actually better off." Didhe really believe what he had just said? Maybe not. Maybe it didn'tmatter.

He looked at the dead woman's face, studying her featuresscrupulously as though a scientist observing a particularlyfascinating experiment. He had never killed another person before.He'd made it quick and, he hoped, painless. In the dull, misty nightthe woman seemed surrounded by a yellowish glow, as though she'dalready become a spirit.

He drew farther back and examined the area all around, checking forany extraneous items that might lead to evidence against him. Hediscovered only a piece of cloth from his hood that had caught on abush near where the body lay. Careless, you can't afford that. Heplaced it in his pocket. He spent several more minutes looking forother such items nearing microscopic size.

In the world of criminal investigation it was these forensic"no-see-ums" that did one in. A single drop of blood, semen orsaliva, a smudge of fingerprint, a hair follicle with a bit ofDNA-littered root attached, and the police could be reading you yourrights while prosecutors circled hungrily nearby. Unfortunately,even full awareness of that reality offered little protection. Everycriminal, no matter how careful, left potentially incriminatingmaterial at the crime scene. Thus, he'd taken great care to have nodirect physical contact with the dead woman as though she were aninfectious agent that could cause a fatal disease.

He rolled up the plastic and pocketed the telephone cord, checkedthe watch once more and then slowly made his way back to his car.

Behind him lay the dead woman, her hand upraised to the wateryheavens. Her watch was slightly luminous in the dark and made a dullbeacon for her new resting place. She wouldn't remain undiscoveredfor long. Dead bodies aboveground rarely did, even in places asisolated as this.

As he drove off, the hooded man used his finger to trace the symbolon his hood, making the sign of the cross at the same time. Thecrosshairs symbol also appeared on the face of the watch he'd placedon the dead woman's wrist. That should certainly get a rise out ofthem. He took a breath full of excitement as well as dread. Foryears he had imagined that this day would never come. For years hiscourage had faltered. Now that the first step had been taken, hefelt a great sense of empowerment and liberation.

He shifted into third gear and sped up, his tires grabbing theslicked roadway and holding firm as the darkness swallowed up thelights of his blue VW. He wanted to get to where he was going asfast as possible.

He had a letter to write.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Hour Gameby David Baldacci Copyright ©2004 by Columbus Rose, Ltd.. Excerpted by permission.
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