The Unknown Man by Natalie Hanson
The imbalance between matter and antimatter allowed the big bang to produce the entire universe. Born with a physical abnormality, imbalance is something Zalla Bennbett understands. Her ability to sense out lies gives her an advantage on FBI investigations, but her jaded spirit puts her at odds with most everyone she encounters. The agent’s marriage and career are on the rocks.
Zalla is assigned to work the kidnapping of an FBI informant’s young twins. With no evidence or leads, her suspect is deemed ‘The Unknown Man’. What she discovers makes her question her purpose in the universe. She’ll have to fight against her instincts to find the girls before the kidnapping turns into murder.
About the author
Natalie Hanson is an author and screenplay writer born and raised in Seattle, WA.
‘The Unknown Man’ is the first of five novels chronicling the hunt for serial killers and criminals by FBI agent Zalla Bennbett. This dark series examines the worst criminals humanity has to offer through the eyes of a jaded agent, struggling to keep optimism alive and fight for the voiceless.
Book two in the series, ‘The Butcher’, is an upcoming release.
Her novel ‘Every Moment and Not a Second More’ was published on Amazon in 2018.
Currently she is also working on a horror genre comic series based on her screenplay “Dociles.” It tells the story of a teen runaway, kidnapped by a medical examiner who turns the dead into zombies. It’s a fight to not end up as one of the herd!
This one sounds like is would be an amazing read and to tempt you have an extract to share!
Zalla found herself in a familiar place: stuck between two hells. The current version of damnation meant a contentious conversation with her boss. The next would involve starting a relationship with a stranger on the worst day of their lives.
She stole a glance towards the conference room. Inside, an athletic Asian man in a green sweater, Mr. Chen, paced anxiously. He turned and made eye contact with her. Dear Jesus, why did the office need to have all glass walls?Part of the FBI’s attempt at translating ‘transparency’ into action. What it really meant was employees didn’t even have the privacy afforded by a typical cubicle. No plucking of eyebrows, shopping online or talking to your doctor about that annoying rash.
Even though it was just an intake interview with Mr. Chen, she needed to get to it. Now.
Unfortunately, her boss, Jessica Diaz, didn’t seem to be aware of Mr. Chen or anyone else in the universe as she walked to the window and looked out over the Seattle skyline.
“How long has Mr. Chen been here?” Zalla asked.
“I don’t know,” Jessica said. “But I need to talk to you before you start.” Her brown hair flowed over her shoulders. Everything about her was coordinated and trendy. Aesthetics were the details Jessica dealt in.
Zalla caught a glimpse of herself in the reflection of the office door. It didn’t take a detective to know which one of these women was the manager and which one was the field hand. Her own hair was pulled loosely into a ponytail, no earrings. She was wearing black pants and an oversized sweater. At least her shoes were fashionable, which was a word she would never normally associate with her own wardrobe. But her left pinky toe felt like it was in a vice. When she’d been little, her mother would switch out a larger shoe size for her left foot when they were shopping. Those were the days before electronic sensors that had to be manually removed by the clerk. Now, Zalla had to buy up or down. Size nine would be too small for her left foot. Size ten would leave her right foot swimming in extra space. One foot always hurt. One of the many consequences of having full body asymmetry.
Use the pain to get through this.
“You read the report?” Jessica asked.
“If you could call the three sentences in his file a report, then yes. But the incident location was listed as Almeda. Why are we doing the intake?”
A text message an hour ago had instructed her to read the report and get to the office. The file had only included Mr. Chen’s age, address and family statistics. Priscilla, his wife, was thirty-six. They had two daughters, twins, Megan and Tai, age eight. The last line was the heart of the matter. ‘Children abducted Sunday, December 1st, approx. 7 p.m.’
“He’s one of our Criminal Informants. We should take the first report,” Jessica said.
“OK. And then who do I pass the details off to?”
“We’re not passing it along. We’re working it as back-up.”
“Why?”
“Mr. Chen has been helping us with the Hi Sang Tong gang. He was in the process of moving his family from Seattle to Almeda. But he’s still under our care.”
Typically, a low-level intern would have managed this task. Or the CI handler. Zalla’s mind raced with reasons why she had really been called in.
Buy Links - in case that has tempted you!
