Bitterfrost (A Bitterfrost Thriller)
“Readers who enjoy character depth, family and smalltown drama, and an intricate plot will enjoy this fast-paced thriller.”
Jimmy Baker, 13 years removed from his hockey-playing days, spends his time now smoothing the ice at the local rink with his beloved Zamboni, Zelda. Zelda has her own fans, as does Jimmy, and he enjoys his time entertaining the fans.
But on one fateful night Jimmy heads to the local bar, where he runs into some out-of-towners not afraid to create trouble. The two men give Ronnie, the bartender, a hard time, and Jimmy wants to defend her, but the strangers leave before things get too nasty.
However, the next morning Jimmy wakes up with a blank where the night’s memories should be. In addition, there is blood on him and in his truck, and he has bruises on his face. What has he done?
“He opens his eyes. He’s sitting on his kitchen floor in the dark. He checks the clock on the microwave: three fifty-three. He’s still wearing the black-and-silver Ice Kings jacket he wore to the hockey rink and then to the Lost Loon Tavern . . . he lifts his hand to his face. ‘Jesus,’ he says. The hand is spackled with dried blood, the knuckles a hash of shredded skin and exposed bone a shade of rust.”
Jimmy is no stranger to violence. His hockey career was spent as the enforcer, the fighter the coach would send onto the ice when the game needed a different kind of energy. In fact, he left the game after hitting an opponent so hard he paralyzed him. Those days would come back to haunt him now. The two strangers from the bar were missing, and no one would believe Jimmy hadn’t hurt them.
Devyn Delaney, however, is willing to give Jimmy a chance. A local lawyer and hockey player, she knows Jimmy and as his friend doesn’t want to think he would have committed these violent acts. She takes his case when he is arrested and soon begins to wonder if his case and one of her others happen to be connected. Another client is missing, and it doesn’t seem like just a coincidence.
“Why did you even agree to represent him, Devyn?
Why did she indeed? She’d admit, if asked, that she made a bit of a snap decision, prompted in part by what she’d heard about Jordan Fawcett’s violent undoing. But all she says is ‘He’s my friend.’”
Garth Klimmek, detective with the Bitterfrost police, catches the case, and isn’t sure what to make of it. The crime scene is a lot to take in, and it’s hard to imagine someone causing so much carnage.
“Magnesium lamps illuminate a ring of snow tamped down by boot prints . . . in the middle of the ring is a circle of mottled darkness that Kilmmek assumes is blood. A great deal of blood. At the center of the circle is what appears to be the body of a man. The arms are flung to either side like the dead man was making snow angels. He’s wearing a jacket that looks to be covered with bloodied fishing and hunting patches.”
Klimmek can’t ignore Jimmy’s violent past and begins to make a case against him, but other forces come into play, causing him to question his boss, the victims’ families, and the amnesia Jimmy claims to suffer about the night in question. What is Klimmek missing, and can he and Devyn work together to figure out what exactly happened on that fateful night?
Pulitzer Prize-winning and Edgar-nominated author Bryan Gruley writes in a way that depicts the cold Michigan nights with detail and feeling, and sets the grisly murder scenes with darkness and dread. Readers who enjoy character depth, family and smalltown drama, and an intricate plot will enjoy this fast-paced thriller.