Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for 13 Stolen Girls, a Triller Mystery by Gil Reavill (Alibi, Alibi, 285 pages). This is the second book in the Layla Remington Mystery series. The third book in the series, 13 Under the Wire, is due to be published on 19 January 2016.
Check out the book's synopsis and the excerpt below, as well as details about the whole series so far.
Do make sure to follow the tour where you will be able to read other excerpts (☀), author interviews (ℚ) and reviews (✍). Author Q&A | Synopsis | Teaser | The Series | About the Author | Tour Stops
Synopsis
Perfect for fans of Michael Connelly's Bosch series, Gil Reavill's gripping new Layla Remington thriller plunges readers beneath the glittering facade of Hollywood and into a terrifying underworld where beautiful women can just . . . disappear.Malibu is crumbling. A monster earthquake has just ripped apart some of the priciest real estate on the planet. In a bizarre twist, it has also exposed a grisly tableau buried for years beneath one particularly unstable hilltop: a steel barrel containing the mummified remains of Tarin Mistry, the beautiful starlet who went missing a decade ago. When Detective Investigator Layla Remington looks into that wretched metal coffin, she realizes she's just landed the case of a lifetime.
But before Layla even strips off her latex gloves, a pair of hotshot LAPD detectives arrive on the scene and pull her off the investigation. Undeterred, Layla pursues her own line of inquiry, risking her badge and her life to track down Tarin's murderer: from the rarified air of exclusive canyon communities to seedy sex clubs downtown, all the way to the secluded lair of one of Hollywood's most powerful men. But while Tarin's a cold case, her killer is poised to strike again--and, in Layla, this depraved sociopath has just found fresh prey.
Teaser: Excerpt
The Corean master took a break from his emergency-service work on the Malibu earthquake. He went grocery shopping and returned with his purchases to the apartment building on Jane Street.
The hallway that led to 3C exhibited the kind of banal environment he preferred. The Sheetrock walls had a knockdown finish. The rug-makers had designed the durable frieze carpet not to show stains. Fluorescent lighting rendered everything in a nicely sick shade of lime-white. He relished such places in the same way that a chameleon favors a green leaf.
The triple locks on 3C’s cast-aluminum door seemed to be the only feature that set it apart from the forty-eight other apartments in the complex. The locks, plus the privacy/security film on the windows. And, yes, another oddity about 3C: the adjacent apartments, eight in all, had been left vacant. Because sound—weeping, moaning, screaming—travels.
Once inside, the Corean master set his groceries on the kitchen counter. Recently, he had resolved to treat his body better. No more of the sugar-and-fat junk food on which he had gorged in the past. The paper bag from the local Food Depot spilled over with produce, tomatoes, plums, Romaine lettuce. The bread was whole grain.
He felt a little impatient with himself, since he had often embarked on new healthy diets before, only to see the fruits and vegetables he bought rot in the refrigerator. This time would be different.
The apartment carried over the predictable decorating themes of the hall, with more white drywall, more industrial carpet, more innocuous lighting fixtures. The place barely looked lived in. Which made sense, since no one really did. Apartment 3C was just one of the Corean master’s many apartments scattered around the Valley suburbs of Reseda, Canoga Park and Woodland Hills, California, all communities that were just over the foothills from his Malibu ranch.
Building management, the Corean master thought, not for the first time, represented the perfect sideline for a man of his interests. He had his fingers in a lot of pies, but among his numerous business perks one of the most useful, he felt, was his ability to gain access to empty apartments all across the area’s heavily developed suburban landscape.
Partially visible through the open door of the first bedroom, his current slave was splayed out in a special rig of the master’s own devising. He had not only drawn the plans for it but had fabricated the device himself. The circular steel hoop had a radius of nine feet, suspended within a sturdy frame, which was anchor-bolted to the floor, wall and ceiling.
The master had fastened his unclothed, blindfolded and gagged submissive to the steel hoop by means of fur-lined leather cuffs and lightweight aluminum chains. The hoop rotated within the frame on industrial-strength ball bearings, providing all-direction access. In his magnificent, masterful generosity, he had allowed the slave to remain upright when he left for work and shopping, its arms secured at the ten and two o’clock positions, legs at seven and five.
Through his angled view of the bedroom, cut off and limited by the doorframe, the master saw that its thin, bony body had sagged a bit within the rig. One reason he liked this slave was that it had gone through some sort of auto accident and its skin was covered over with surgical scars.
Now it made no sound. He wondered if it might have fallen into an exhausted sleep.
He looked more closely.
Something was wrong.
Disliking the cheap orange ball gags sold in sex shops, the Corean master had painstakingly fashioned one himself, using an ivory death’s-head originally intended as a custom shift knob for a manual automobile transmission. It wasn’t real ivory, of course, just plastic, but it looked fierce and served its purpose.
Usually he would hear the thin wheeze of ball-gag-obstructed breath from his slave. He heard nothing.
A squeeze of fear nearly took his own breath away. Something had happened while he was gone. He hated not being in control. Stress stressed him out.
So, okay. No need to get upset. Just breathe. Of all the activities in the world, what worked to soothe him most? Why, the same thrill available right there, with the slave behind door number one. They were headed together toward the Ultimate Consumation.
Eat, shower, gear up, then stride in and wake it up with a good, furious twirl of the hoop. Rotate it long enough, fast enough, and it lost all sense of direction, of time, all sense of itself, really. There was no danger that it would lose its lunch, since he hadn’t fed it for days.
The master removed his T-shirt as he strode down the hall. He would put on his bulldog harness and his U.S. Marines jockstrap. He wanted the slave to see him in his full Corean regalia when it woke up. But as he passed the bedroom the sagging posture of the slave struck him once again.
Now real panic seized him.
He entered the bedroom, crossed to the hoop and grabbed the slave by the jaw, pulling its head upward. But his hand jerked away as if he had touched a hot stove.
The skin was cold and clammy, the body limp. The slave was gone.
The Corean master’s stunned surprise was immediately overwhelmed by rage. She had cheated him, the little bitch! The horror of what had happened stalled out his mind. She had gained the upper hand. Somehow, the slave had proved the master.
He had been so careful, so meticulous. What had gone wrong?
He reached out a trembling hand, extending two fingers, middle and fore, to feel her neck for a pulse. Nothing. It was really true.
“Cheat! Cheat! Cheat!” he barked.
Though he could hardly think, he slowly grasped what had happened. She had worked her head up through the restraints. It must have been an agonizing process. The head harness was cinched tight. But somehow she had gotten it so that one leather strap circled her neck.
Then the girl had strangled herself.
Strangled herself. He should never have left the bitch alone.
The Corean master considered himself something of an anatomical expert. He understood that normally it was a physical impossibility for a human being to self-asphyxiate. Yes, one can hang oneself, that happened all the time. That was gravity doing the job. But it wasn’t what had occurred here. There was plenty of give in the restraint strap. It was sized for a head and hung loosely around the throat.
This creature, this rancid little whore, this bound-and-gagged swindler had accomplished an unachievable feat. She had pushed her windpipe against the strap and held it there long enough to die.
It was an act of defiance.
The Corean master tried to remember her name, her real name, not her slave name. Marjorie? MaryAnn? Something with an “M.”
An ugly, weak feeling took over his groin, familiar in his youth but since then exiled from his life by sheer determination. He felt his member shrivel. She had robbed him of his manhood.
After he went to the toilet and vomited, he returned to the kitchen. He intentionally avoided glancing into the first bedroom as he passed. Let her rot. He opened the refrigerator and took out one of the peach wine coolers that he so loved.
He was back to square one. He would have to start again. Again, again, again. So many do-overs!
The Corean master made a promise to himself. He would find the perfect one. He would finally accomplish what he had been put on earth to do.
He would create his masterpiece.
The hallway that led to 3C exhibited the kind of banal environment he preferred. The Sheetrock walls had a knockdown finish. The rug-makers had designed the durable frieze carpet not to show stains. Fluorescent lighting rendered everything in a nicely sick shade of lime-white. He relished such places in the same way that a chameleon favors a green leaf.
The triple locks on 3C’s cast-aluminum door seemed to be the only feature that set it apart from the forty-eight other apartments in the complex. The locks, plus the privacy/security film on the windows. And, yes, another oddity about 3C: the adjacent apartments, eight in all, had been left vacant. Because sound—weeping, moaning, screaming—travels.
Once inside, the Corean master set his groceries on the kitchen counter. Recently, he had resolved to treat his body better. No more of the sugar-and-fat junk food on which he had gorged in the past. The paper bag from the local Food Depot spilled over with produce, tomatoes, plums, Romaine lettuce. The bread was whole grain.
He felt a little impatient with himself, since he had often embarked on new healthy diets before, only to see the fruits and vegetables he bought rot in the refrigerator. This time would be different.
The apartment carried over the predictable decorating themes of the hall, with more white drywall, more industrial carpet, more innocuous lighting fixtures. The place barely looked lived in. Which made sense, since no one really did. Apartment 3C was just one of the Corean master’s many apartments scattered around the Valley suburbs of Reseda, Canoga Park and Woodland Hills, California, all communities that were just over the foothills from his Malibu ranch.
Building management, the Corean master thought, not for the first time, represented the perfect sideline for a man of his interests. He had his fingers in a lot of pies, but among his numerous business perks one of the most useful, he felt, was his ability to gain access to empty apartments all across the area’s heavily developed suburban landscape.
Partially visible through the open door of the first bedroom, his current slave was splayed out in a special rig of the master’s own devising. He had not only drawn the plans for it but had fabricated the device himself. The circular steel hoop had a radius of nine feet, suspended within a sturdy frame, which was anchor-bolted to the floor, wall and ceiling.
The master had fastened his unclothed, blindfolded and gagged submissive to the steel hoop by means of fur-lined leather cuffs and lightweight aluminum chains. The hoop rotated within the frame on industrial-strength ball bearings, providing all-direction access. In his magnificent, masterful generosity, he had allowed the slave to remain upright when he left for work and shopping, its arms secured at the ten and two o’clock positions, legs at seven and five.
Through his angled view of the bedroom, cut off and limited by the doorframe, the master saw that its thin, bony body had sagged a bit within the rig. One reason he liked this slave was that it had gone through some sort of auto accident and its skin was covered over with surgical scars.
Now it made no sound. He wondered if it might have fallen into an exhausted sleep.
He looked more closely.
Something was wrong.
Disliking the cheap orange ball gags sold in sex shops, the Corean master had painstakingly fashioned one himself, using an ivory death’s-head originally intended as a custom shift knob for a manual automobile transmission. It wasn’t real ivory, of course, just plastic, but it looked fierce and served its purpose.
Usually he would hear the thin wheeze of ball-gag-obstructed breath from his slave. He heard nothing.
A squeeze of fear nearly took his own breath away. Something had happened while he was gone. He hated not being in control. Stress stressed him out.
So, okay. No need to get upset. Just breathe. Of all the activities in the world, what worked to soothe him most? Why, the same thrill available right there, with the slave behind door number one. They were headed together toward the Ultimate Consumation.
Eat, shower, gear up, then stride in and wake it up with a good, furious twirl of the hoop. Rotate it long enough, fast enough, and it lost all sense of direction, of time, all sense of itself, really. There was no danger that it would lose its lunch, since he hadn’t fed it for days.
The master removed his T-shirt as he strode down the hall. He would put on his bulldog harness and his U.S. Marines jockstrap. He wanted the slave to see him in his full Corean regalia when it woke up. But as he passed the bedroom the sagging posture of the slave struck him once again.
Now real panic seized him.
He entered the bedroom, crossed to the hoop and grabbed the slave by the jaw, pulling its head upward. But his hand jerked away as if he had touched a hot stove.
The skin was cold and clammy, the body limp. The slave was gone.
The Corean master’s stunned surprise was immediately overwhelmed by rage. She had cheated him, the little bitch! The horror of what had happened stalled out his mind. She had gained the upper hand. Somehow, the slave had proved the master.
He had been so careful, so meticulous. What had gone wrong?
He reached out a trembling hand, extending two fingers, middle and fore, to feel her neck for a pulse. Nothing. It was really true.
“Cheat! Cheat! Cheat!” he barked.
Though he could hardly think, he slowly grasped what had happened. She had worked her head up through the restraints. It must have been an agonizing process. The head harness was cinched tight. But somehow she had gotten it so that one leather strap circled her neck.
Then the girl had strangled herself.
Strangled herself. He should never have left the bitch alone.
The Corean master considered himself something of an anatomical expert. He understood that normally it was a physical impossibility for a human being to self-asphyxiate. Yes, one can hang oneself, that happened all the time. That was gravity doing the job. But it wasn’t what had occurred here. There was plenty of give in the restraint strap. It was sized for a head and hung loosely around the throat.
This creature, this rancid little whore, this bound-and-gagged swindler had accomplished an unachievable feat. She had pushed her windpipe against the strap and held it there long enough to die.
It was an act of defiance.
The Corean master tried to remember her name, her real name, not her slave name. Marjorie? MaryAnn? Something with an “M.”
An ugly, weak feeling took over his groin, familiar in his youth but since then exiled from his life by sheer determination. He felt his member shrivel. She had robbed him of his manhood.
After he went to the toilet and vomited, he returned to the kitchen. He intentionally avoided glancing into the first bedroom as he passed. Let her rot. He opened the refrigerator and took out one of the peach wine coolers that he so loved.
He was back to square one. He would have to start again. Again, again, again. So many do-overs!
The Corean master made a promise to himself. He would find the perfect one. He would finally accomplish what he had been put on earth to do.
He would create his masterpiece.
13 Stolen Girls - available 18 August 2015!
UK:
US:
The Series: Layla Remington Mystery
Click on the book cover to Look Inside the book on Amazon and read an excerpt.
13 Hollywood Apes [1]
INTERNATIONAL THRILLER WRITERS AWARD FINALIST, BEST EBOOK ORIGINAL NOVEL
In a savvy, stylish thriller debut perfect for anyone who loves the crime novels of Michael Connelly or Nevada Barr, Gil Reavill unravels a chilling tale of murder and mayhem among humans and their closest evolutionary relatives—a primate family that may just be too close for comfort.
As a wildfire rages outside the Odalon Animal Sanctuary in the rugged Santa Monica foothills, the retired Hollywood movie chimpanzees housed there are shot and left for dead. When Malibu detective Layla Remington reaches the grisly scene the next morning, she’s deeply disturbed—and even more confused. The victims are not human, so the attack cannot be classified as homicide. Yet someone clearly wanted these animals dead, and executed them with ruthless efficiency. Miraculously, there is one survivor: a juvenile male named Angle.
But as Layla reaches the veterinarian’s office where Angle is recovering, a man with rock-star good looks and a laid-back Southern California attitude swoops in and removes him. And just like that, an unusual case turns truly bizarre. Soon reports surface of ferocious attacks against Odalon employees . . . with Angle as the prime suspect. As a wave of senseless violence reaches its apex, Layla chases a mystery man and his chimp—but everything comes back to that terrible night at the sanctuary. [Published 16 December 2014, 308 pages]
About the Author
Gil Reavill is a journalist, screenwriter, and playwright. Widely featured in magazines, Reavill is the author of a crime novel, Thirteen Hollywood Apes, nominated for a Thriller Award from International Thriller Writers. He has written two works of crime non-fiction: Mafia Summit: J. Edgar Hoover, the Kennedy Brothers, and the Meeting That Unmasked the Mob, and Aftermath, Inc.: Cleaning Up After CSI Goes Home. He also co-wrote the screenplay for the 2006 film Dirty, starring Cuba Gooding, Jr. He lives in New York with his wife, the author Jean Zimmerman, and their daughter.Follow Gil Reavill:
Tour Stops
Follow 13 Stolen Girls's tour at:
August 4th: I Heart Reading
August 5th: Books on Fire ☀
August 7th: BooksChatter ☀ℚ
August 7th: Indy Book Fairy ☀
August 11th: Mallory Heart Reviews ℚ✍
August 13th: Vic’s Media Room ✍
August 14th: The World of Sarah Lou ✍
August 15th: Katarina Nolte’s Blog ℚ
August 17th: Knows my Books ℚ✍
August 18th: Red Wine & Books ☀✍
August 20th: My Bookish Dream ✍
August 5th: Books on Fire ☀
August 7th: BooksChatter ☀ℚ
August 7th: Indy Book Fairy ☀
August 11th: Mallory Heart Reviews ℚ✍
August 13th: Vic’s Media Room ✍
August 14th: The World of Sarah Lou ✍
August 15th: Katarina Nolte’s Blog ℚ
August 17th: Knows my Books ℚ✍
August 18th: Red Wine & Books ☀✍
August 20th: My Bookish Dream ✍
August 23rd: Michelle Dragalin’s Journey ☀✍
August 26th: Wendy Miller’s Blog ☀✍
August 27th: SolaFide Publishing Blog ☀ℚ
August 27th: Rising Indies United ☀
August 29th: Book About ℚ✍
August 30th: Cara Correnti’s Blog ☀ℚ
August 31st: Cajun Book Lover ☀
September 1st: A Fold in the Spine ☀✍
September 3rd: Books Direct ☀
September 4th: Books, Booze & BDSM ☀ℚ
September 4th: Author C.A. Milson’s Blog ℚ
August 26th: Wendy Miller’s Blog ☀✍
August 27th: SolaFide Publishing Blog ☀ℚ
August 27th: Rising Indies United ☀
August 29th: Book About ℚ✍
August 30th: Cara Correnti’s Blog ☀ℚ
August 31st: Cajun Book Lover ☀
September 1st: A Fold in the Spine ☀✍
September 3rd: Books Direct ☀
September 4th: Books, Booze & BDSM ☀ℚ
September 4th: Author C.A. Milson’s Blog ℚ
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