KAREN’S KILLER BOOK BENCH: Welcome to Karen’s Killer Book Bench, where readers can discover talented new authors and take a peek inside their wonderful books. This is not an age-filtered site, so all book peeks are PG-13 or better. Come back and visit often. Happy reading!
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THE LAST HITMAN
Organized Crime Thriller
BY ROBIN YOCUM
BLURB
Perfect for fans of Eli Cranor and Tulsa King, this thrilling mafia tale shows what happens when loyalty isn’t a two-way street.
There was a time when being a “made man” meant something. Angelo Cipriani was a member of the inner circle of the powerful Fortunato Crime Family, which controlled the Upper Ohio Valley. Of course, Angelo would never admit that such an organization existed, let alone to all of the bodies he dropped for his boss. Angelo was a loyal soldier, even after a rival family strafed him with bullets and put him in a coma for three weeks.
But times have changed. Four decades have passed, and the glory days of mob rule have waned. As drugs replace the mob’s traditional revenue streams and the FBI looks to bring down the Fortunatos, Angelo finds himself on the outside with the current administration, essentially, “on the shelf.” He spends his days pining over a waitress at the local diner and reminiscing with a one-legged former colleague in a nursing home.
Angelo was a man of honor in a world that he now barely recognizes.
But when the FBI shows up, Angelo realizes the past is far from dead and buried. Faced with old secrets and fresh betrayals, Angelo finds himself unretired: The Last Hitman is ready to get back to work.
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THE LAST HITMAN
Organized Crime Thriller
BY ROBIN YOCUM
Excerpt
A Girl Scout and a couple of nuns.
Those were the only people who had knocked on my door in the previous three years. I saw the Girl Scout every spring. She was a cute kid, a little redhead with a gap between her front teeth, and she knew that I was a soft touch for those peanut butter cookies they sell. A cocaine addiction couldn’t have a tighter grip.
The nuns showed up one morning as I was coming out of the kitchen with my first cup of coffee. I was barefoot, unshaven, wrapped in a terrycloth robe, my hair looking like it had been combed with a blender, when I heard the rap at the door. It wasn’t a polite, nun-like tap, but a sharp, answer-the-damn-door kind of knock. I jumped like a spooked cat, slopping hot coffee over my hand and wrist. Yeah, I tended to get a little jittery when someone pounded on my door, but for good reason. First of all, I wasn’t expecting company at seven-fifteen in the morning. Of greater concern, however, was the fact that there was no shortage of people out there who would like to see me dead. That nugget of reality tended to put me a little on edge.
I set the coffee cup on the end table and pulled the sawed-off shotgun from under the couch cushion. I prefer a handgun for my work, preferably a 9-millimeter with a suppressor, but for home protection, you can’t beat a double-barrel 12-gauge and a couple of deer lugs. Not only would the slug go through my solid oak door, but it would exit out the spine of anyone in the hall who was hoping to do me harm.
Slowly, I slunk along the wall toward the door, the double-barrel held waist-high.
There was a second knock.
I heard a female voice and leaned across the door for a look out the peep hole. There were two spindly nuns in the hall, both squeezing cardboard boxes to their chests. I hid the shotgun behind my hip and opened the door as far as the security chain would allow.
The smaller nun, who had several wild, disconcerting white whiskers spiraling off her chin, smiled and said, “Mr. Cipriani?”
“Yeah.”
“May we speak to you for a moment?”
I looked them over from the top of their habits to their little black shoes. They seemed legit. Never in all my years with the mob had I known the cops or a rival family to come looking for me dis guised as nuns. The cops might try such a ploy, but no self-respecting mobster would pull a stunt like that. “Just a minute,” I said. I shut the door, propped the shotgun against the wall and out of sight, disengaged the chain, and opened the door.
“Mr. Cipriani, we’re from Catholic Social Services,” said the taller nun, who had gray teeth and an overbite that would have hidden a golf ball. “We were told that you might be experiencing some financial difficulties, so we brought you some things that we thought might be helpful.”
The smaller nun handed me a box that contained bread, peanut butter, and cans of soup and beans and Spam. The taller nun handed me a box of toiletries. It was very nice. It was humiliating beyond belief, but nice. I tucked a box under each arm.
“May we come in?” the shorter one asked.
“It’s really not a good time, Sister,” I said.
She peered into my apartment. “I see. Perhaps another time, then?”
“Yeah, perhaps. I’m curious. Who told you I might need some help?”
“Oh, I don’t really know. We get a lot of calls from people who are, you know, concerned about their friends and neighbors.” The tall one said, “If you’re looking for a way to help make ends meet, Mr. Schumacher at the M&K Market on South Fourth Street is looking for a part-time stock boy. Maybe you could apply for a job there.”
A stock boy. That’s what my life had come to. In that instant, the taller nun had taken our meeting from embarrassing to insulting. My jaw started to tighten, and I felt a wave of heat rising out of my robe and enveloping my ears. I didn’t want to punch a nun, so I cut our meeting short. I thanked them for their charity and backed away from the door.
“We will pray for your soul,” said the shorter one.
“I appreciate the thought, Sister, but I think you should save your breath. Even Jesus has a line in the sand where forgiveness is concerned. I crossed the Rubicon years ago.”
“It’s never too late to ask for forgiveness,” the taller one said. I shut the door with my foot.
About Author Robin Yocum…
Robin Yocum is known for his fiction set in the Ohio River Valley. He has authored two nonfiction books and six novels. His most recent novel, The Sacrifice of Lester Yates, was released in April of 2021 by Arcade CrimeWise, and was a finalist for the 2021 Dashiell Hammett Award for outstanding crime writing. Favorite Sons was named the 2011 Book of the Year for Mystery/Suspense by USA Book News. A Brilliant Death was a Barnes & Noble No. 1 bestseller and a finalist for both the 2017 Edgar Award and the Silver Falchion Award for best adult mystery. Yocum is also the host of the true-crime podcast, Dead Before Deadline, which features stories he covered when he was a police and investigative reporter for the Columbus Dispatch, where he won more than 30 local, state, and national journalism awards. He is the principal at Yocum Communications, a public relations and marketing consulting firm in Galena, Ohio, which he founded in 2001. Yocum grew up in the Ohio River village of Brilliant, Ohio. He has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Bowling Green State University.
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Links to Robin’s websites, blogs, books, #ad, etc.:
Amazon Kindle: https://amzn.to/48QktzB
Amazon Paperback: https://amzn.to/3KVWUxw
Amazon Hardcover: https://amzn.to/44pwBGy
Penguin Random House Paperback
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Special Giveaway: Robin is giving away a paperback copy (U.S. Only) of THE LAST HITMAN to one lucky winner who comments on his Karen’s Killer Book Bench blog. Good luck!
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Welcome to Karen’s Killer Book Bench, Robin. I really enjoyed your excerpt. Great insights into his character. I love the premise. Can’t wait to read this book! Thanks for sharing it with us today!
My pleasure. I hope you enjoy getting to know Angelo.
Hello and welcome Robin, your book sounds like a great read, Thank you so much for sharing the excerpt, the cover looks intriguing!! Have a great week.
I only read the blurb, but it sounds like it would be intense. Thank you for coming in and sharing your book with us.
Sounds like a good read would love to read this book and possibly review would definitely review a print copy of book usually like books like this
Hmmmm….throw nuns in the mix of unwillingly retired hitman causes one to wonder how they’ll fit into the story…🤔 It can’t be by accident.
Thanks, Robin, for making my mind spin off in a lot of “possibles”
Thanks, Karen, for the showcase.
sounds interesting
New author for me, sounds good!