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VAL McDERMID
DEAD BEAT
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers
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Hammersmith, London W6 8JB
First published in Great Britain by Victor Gollancz 1992 and Orion Books Ltd 1999
Copyright © Val McDermid 1992
Val McDermid asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007142910
Ebook Edition © JUNE 2014 ISBN: 9780007327645
Version: 2014-09-05
For Lisanne and Jane; can we just tell them that, then, darlings?
CONTENTS
Part One
Part Two
I swear one day I’ll kill him. Kill who? The man next door, Richard Barclay, rock journalist and overgrown schoolboy, is who. I had stumbled wearily across the threshold of my bungalow, craving nothing more exotic than a few hours’ sleep