The roar of the .45 shook the room. Charlotte staggered back a step. Her eyes were a symphony of incredulity, an unbelieving witness to truth. Slowly… - Mickey Spillane

They found me in the gutter. The night was the only thing I had left and not much of it at that. I heard the car stop, the doors open and shut and two voices talking. A pair of arms jerked me to my feet and held me there.
"Drunk," the cop said.
The other one turned me around into the light. "He don't smell bad. That cut on his head didn't come from a fall either."
"Mugged?"
"Maybe."
I didn't give a damn which way they called it. They were both wrong anyhow. Two hours ago I was drunk. Not now. Two hours ago I was a roaring lion. Then the bottle sailed across the room. No lion left now.
Now was a time when I wasn't anything. Nothing was left inside except the feeling a ship must have when it's torpedoed, sinks and hits bottom.

I couldn't think. I couldn't remember. I was wound up like a spring and ready to bust. All I could see was the dead guy in the middle of the room and my gun. My gun! Somebody grabbed at my arm and hauled me upright and the questions started again. That was as much as I could take. I gave a hell of a kick and a fat face in a fedora pulled back out of focus and started to groan, all doubled up. Maybe I laughed, I don't know.

The first page sells this book. The last page sells your next book.