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Books : Mystery & Thrillers : Authors, A-Z : ( B ) : Bernhardt, William
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Oklahoma defense attorney Ben Kincaid has found himself smack in the middle of more than a few controversies and deadly predicaments–and the unexpected leap from his modest Tulsa law offices to Washington, D.C.’s Senate chamber hasn’t taken the edge off Ben’s knack for stepping into the line of fire. Now the idealistic junior senator is plunged into the thick of lethal intrigue when a shocking campaign of terror against key government officials rocks the nation’s capital.
The nightmare begins with the abduction and murder of the director of Homeland Security; escalates with the killing of the Senate minority leader, who is felled in his office by an envelope laced with weaponized poison; and comes to a shattering climax at the site of the Oklahoma City Memorial, where a fusillade of sniper fire meant for the president claims unintended victims. In all, twelve people perish in the melee, while Ben himself narrowly escapes a car-bomb blast that leaves his best friend, Tulsa cop Mike Morelli, comatose. But the smoke has barely cleared when the stunned nation is sent reeling yet again by the president’s impassioned call to amend the U.S. Constitution with an antiterrorism law that would drastically curtail civil liberties.
It’s a hot-button issue guaranteed to bitterly divide the Beltway and the country. The chief executive has handpicked Ben to help harvest the support that will make the amendment a reality. Shaken by the carnage,
Ben embraces the president’s radical cause, and alongside unlikely new political allies he takes the battle for the controversial bill to the Senate floor. But he can’t ignore his growing suspicion that what’s haunting Capitol Hill isn’t the specter of foreign terrorism but something much closer to home. Now, with his ever-resourceful chief of staff–his wife, Christina–and along with his support team backing his play, Ben sets squares off against what could be the most dangerous Goliath he’s ever challenged.
Capitol Conspiracy is a bravura William Bernhardt performance–bursting into action on the very first page, and crackling with breathless suspense, sharp wit, crafty twists, and timely thrills clear through to the last.
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William Bernhardt’s bestselling novels featuring Oklahoma defense attorney Ben Kincaid capture the bare-knuckles reality of high-stakes criminal defense, as lofty ideals of justice clash with power, corruption, and wealth. In Capitol Murder, Bernhardt’s hard-charging hero takes on his most shocking, headline-making case yet.
Kincaid’s legal success has earned him a dubious reward: a journey through the looking glass into the Beltway. Here, in the heart of the nation’s capital, a powerful U.S. senator has been caught first in a sordid sex scandal, then in a case of murder.
Senate aide Veronica Cooper was found in a secret Senate office beneath the Capitol building, on Senator Todd Glancy’s favorite couch, blood pouring from the knife wound in her throat. The young woman’s death comes on the heels of the release of a sordid videotape depicting her and Senator Glancy in compromising positions.
With the senator’s reputation in tatters, the evidence against him–as a sexual predator and possibly a killer–mounts. By the time a nationally televised murder trial begins, Kincaid and his team know they’re facing the challenge of a lifetime. According to public opinion, and even in Kincaid’s most private thoughts, Glancy is one more politician who cannot admit his own culpability.
But while a dramatic trial unfolds in the courtroom–loaded with pitfalls, traps, and an astounding betrayal–another trial is taking place on the mean streets of D.C., as Kincaid’s investigator pursues a young woman who was a friend of Veronica Cooper’s, plunging Kincaid into a bizarre world of Goths, sadomasochists, and a community of self-proclaimed vampires. Somewhere in this violent underworld lies the secret behind Veronica Cooper’s demise . . . and the crux of Senator Glancy’s innocence or guilt.
In a case that pits Kincaid and his freewheeling partner Christina McCall against the brutal machinery of Washington politics, the answers they seek are hidden in a murderous maze of lies and hidden motives. And in William Bernhardt’s best novel yet, getting to the truth is an unparalleled experience in pure, satisfying suspense.
From the Hardcover edition.
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When Oklahoma attorney Ben Kincaid came to Washington, D.C., to defend a senator caught in a red-hot sex scandal turned murder case, he never dreamed he’d end up trading the courtroom for the senate chamber. And after his not-so-distinguished client stepped down, Ben found himself appointed to complete the sullied senator’s term. Now, having barely gotten his political sea legs, he must rise to yet another challenge: advising the president’s next Supreme Court nominee during the sometimes thorny confirmation process. Luckily, Judge Thaddeus Roush’s popularity on both sides of the aisle looks to make him a shoo-in. Until he decides to out himself on national television–igniting a Beltway uproar and setting the stage for a bare-knuckle partisan brawl.
Forced to scramble for spin control, Ben hastily calls a press conference for the now controversial candidate. But the photo op becomes a tabloid nightmare when, on live TV, a brutally murdered woman is discovered in the judge’s backyard. For the political forces out to torpedo the nomination of a gay Supreme Court Justice, the shocking turn of events is pure gold.
With the secret backing of the president and a made-to-order new candidate waiting in the wings, the cagey senate majority leader and his most ruthless allies mount a smear campaign that would put Joe McCarthy to shame. But Team Kincaid isn’t about to let the best man for the job get derailed.
While Ben uses his best courtroom strategies to wage a war of words, his crack private eye, Loving, hits the capital streets to fight a much more hands-on battle–with hustlers, hit men, and homicidal hoods–as he digs for dirt in places even Deep Throat would avoid. It’s soon clear that this game is anything but politics as usual.
In Capitol Threat, William Bernhardt serves up a resounding one-two punch of political intrigue and legal suspense peppered with a volley of his trademark plot twists, sly wit, and persistent thrills.
From the Hardcover edition.
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"Bernhardt is a master legal tour guide, taking the reader through the labyrinth of the judicial system of America's heartland."
--Mostly Murder
Ben Kincaid is not a superstar attorney. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, there are only a few lawyers who win headlines and big bucks. So when the notorious Apollo Consortium offers Ben a job as their in-house counsel, he takes it--for the money.
The violence in the streets outside the Apollo is nothing compared to the backstabbing politics of the firm. And when Ben wins his first case, he unwittingly sets up some bitter rivalry with his colleagues--rivalry that will culiminate in a fellow lawyer's dead body and Ben charged with murder.
"Ben Kincaid is a refreshing change from the omniscient, holier-than-thou attorney/investigators whose courtroom acrobatics and aerial law displays are more show than substance."
--Tulsa World
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Oklahoma attorney Ben Kincaid put his reputation on the line when he represented Ray Goldman. The seemingly mild-mannered man was charged with massacring an entire suburban Tulsa family. When the prosecution’s star witness—Erin Faulkner, the lone survivor of the slaughter—took the stand, Goldman’s fate was sealed. But just as his date with the death chamber is imminent, Erin abruptly recants her testimony; after seven years of silence, she is desperate to keep an innocent man from dying. Yet the next day, Erin is discovered dead, an apparent suicide. And Ben Kincaid is the only witness to her stunning confession. Now Ben must hunt down the killer who is determined to cover his tracks . . . with blood.
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Bestselling author William Bernhardt is an unsurpassed master at blending psychological suspense with gripping, surprise-filled legal action. Now, Bernhardt and his crusading attorney Ben Kincaid return in a thrilling story of love, hate, and the power of a courtroom to separate deception from the truth.
In Tulsa, Ben Kincaid has built a national reputation as a stalwart defense attorney who will fight tirelessly for his clients. In Evanston, Illinois, Johnny Christensen has built a national reputation as a sadistic bigot who beat and stabbed a gay man and left him to die. When Johnny’s mother comes to Ben and begs him to defend her son, he has one secret reason for saying no.
But while Ben turns down the case, his younger, beautiful partner, Christina McCall, does not. Traveling to Chicago and facing an explosion of controversy and deadly violence surrounding the trial, Christina steps into a case that is already nearly lost. Her client’s only defense is his claim that he left his victim bludgeoned but alive. To prove that someone else committed the actual murder, Christina needs a little bit of evidence—and a good motive to go with it.
When unforeseen circumstances force Ben Kincaid to enter the trial, the defense attorney sees only one way to prove Johnny’s innocence. But Ben’s plan means luring a killer out of the woodwork—even though he may kill again. . . .
A novel of gut-wrenching twists and surprises, this thriller brilliantly explores the passions between lovers—and the passions behind society’s most heinous crimes. Once again, the remarkable William Bernhardt makes us challenge every assumption, second-guess every judgment, and feel the terror of the truth.
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She likes the sudden seconds of sheer terror. The neon dreams fit perfectly with the dreams that wake her up at night: about the man she loved and lost, about the constant temptations in her life, and about the odds that inevitably she’ll be in the right place at the right time to look naked, human madness in the eye.
Welcome to the world of Susan Pulaski, an unconventional and unusually subversive Las Vegas police behaviorist who’s already been canned once and has never been needed more. In the Sin City, someone is ritually murdering handpicked victims, each with dirty secrets in their past. The killer’s gimmick: Not only does he leave behind parts of the victims’ bodies, he also writes obscure mathematical formulas–in their blood. Pulaski doesn’t have a clue what the codes mean. But she knows someone who will.
Darcy O’Bannon is a twenty-six-year-old whose autistic savant skills are perfect for unraveling such mysteries as how many rivets are in the Eiffel Tower and how many Elvis impersonators there will be in the year 2020. As it turns out, innocent Darcy can also think along the arcane lines of Vegas’s most savage serial killer, peering into a numerological mystery that stretches back hundreds of years.
With her own life one spark away from going off the rails, her department turned against her, and the lives of those she cares most about in jeopardy, Pulaski hunts for dangerous prey in the shadow of the Strip–with herself as the perfect bait. And the closer she gets, the more terrifying and intriguing the case becomes, for the person she’s tracking possesses truly ingenious powers–and a heart full of hate.
The incomparable William Bernhardt brings to life America’s most fascinating city and the people who police it, while he invites the reader to join one woman’s fight to stay sane, stay alive, and keep a killer from making the most shocking score of all.
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"A thoroughly entertaining page-turner."
--Phillip Margolin
Leeman Hayes, a black teenager in Tulsa, is accused of brutally murdering a young woman. As attorney Ben Kincaid struggles to pull together a defense, a young boy is falling into the clutches of a child molester. Ten-year-old Abie Rutherford, lonely and desperate for approval, thinks the handsome, smiling stranger in the baseball cap might be that friend he has longed for.
When Abie Rutherford vanishes without a trace one hot summer day, Ben Kincaid, like everyone else in Tulsa, fears the worst. Then a bone-chilling discovery compels Ben to forge a link between the missing boy and the seemingly hopeless case of Leeman Hayes--thereby igniting the fuse for the most explosive courtroom case of Ben's career.
"An enthralling murder mystery . . . The ending is both surprising and explosive."
--The Sunday Oklahoman
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Out of corporate life and on his own, lawyer Ben Kincaid sees the seamy side of the law every day. There's no glamour and little reward when it comes to defending the lowlifes who beat down his door. But when a friend is set up for murder, Ben has no choice but to enter the world of hardball litigation and face a judge who despises him in a trial he is guaranteed to lose.
BLIND JUSTICE is a riveting, emotion-packed thriller in which guilt and innocence remain obscure and justice is a matter of opinion.
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Ben Kincaid wants to be a lawyer because he wants to do the right thing. But once he leaves the D.A.'s office for a hot-shot spot in Tulsa's most prestigious law firm, Ben discovers that doing the right thing and representing his client's interests can be mutually exclusive.
An explosive legal thriller that takes readers on a frantic ride of suspicion and intrigue, PRIMARY JUSTICE brings morality and temptation together in one dangerous motion.
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When a priest with radical ideas and a parish council with traditional values lock horns over the beliefs they hold most sacred, there’s bound to be controversy—and consequences. But murder crosses the line between committing a sin and committing a crime, turning a battle over faith into a battle for justice. And smack in the middle of the explosive case is Tulsa attorney Ben Kincaid.
Kincaid rescued Father Daniel Beale once before. When the priest’s renegade views and violent temper nearly cost him his position as rector of St. Benedict’s Church, Ben intervened and saved the day. Now Beale is the prime suspect in the brutal murder of a female parishioner—though lack of evidence has left the case unsolved. But as Father Beale struggles to escape the shadow of suspicion, another woman is savagely slaughtered. And this time, Ben himself discovers Beale literally red-handed . . . with the blood of the victim.
As Father Beale declares his innocence, Ben and his team feverishly work to build a defense that will deliver the man of God from a date with the death chamber. But each new revelation that emerges in the packed courtroom only serves to tilt the scales increasingly in the prosecution’s favor. And Father Beale’s own shocking testimony ignites a firestorm of controversy that could doom his last best hope for acquittal.
In his heart and in his gut, Ben knows Father Beale is innocent. But proving it means taking a leap of faith that will plunge Ben into the whirlpool of dark secrets and dangerous intentions that surround St. Benedict’s. And ultimately, it will force the idealistic attorney to confront the chilling face of evil in the most unexpected of places.
Criminal Intent proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the author of Murder One has earned his critical reputation as the master of the courtroom drama whose novels of legal suspense consistently offer a one-of-a-kind reading experience.
From the Hardcover edition.
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When a powerful corporation is charged with dumping toxic chemicals into a community's drinking water and killing innocent children, Ben Kincaid knows the class action suit is a suicide mission. Facing off against the small Kincaid staff is Tulsa's largest law firm. Challenging Ben in the courtroom is the firm's fabled top gun--not to mention a hot-headed judge with a notorious soft spot for big business. But as Ben prepares for legal battle, a sadistic killer strikes. With each gruesome murder, a terrifying connection is more deeply drawn between Ben's quest for justice and another man's relentless hunt for the spoils of his own private--and very dirty--war.
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What Carl Hiaasen and a host of South Florida’s finest authors did for Sunshine State crime capers in the New York Times bestseller Naked Came the Manatee, William Bernhardt now does for legal thrillers–with the help of a "Dream Team" of today’s hottest suspense writers. Like a literary game of telephone, Natural Suspect begins with a chapter from Bernhardt. Then each writer contributes a chapter and passes it along to the next. The result is a completely inventive, brilliantly plotted novel of suspense with more twists than a schizophrenic's train of thought. Can you guess who wrote which chapter?
NATURAL SUSPECT
Arthur Hightower made a name for himself and a vast fortune in the oil business. But when the volatile tycoon decides to disinherit his spoiled children and cheating wife, he makes the biggest mistake of his life-- and the last. After declaring his intentions, Hightower turns up on Thanksgiving Day . . . clubbed to death and stuffed in a meat locker, clutching a frozen asset–his wife’s precious pearl necklace. Now Julia Hightower stands charged with the cold-as-ice crime of murdering for millions. While the sensational trial has New York in a frenzy, a curious cast of characters face off in and out of the courtroom.
Devin McGee, a small-time lawyer about to hit the big-time defending Julia Hightower-- if her intimate encounter with the prosecutor doesn’t catch up with her . . . Trent Ballard, the quirky assistant D.A., who owns a huge pet rabbit and thinks his tryst with Devin will help him get a conviction . . . Patrick Roswell, a wannabe reporter sitting on a scoop that could turn the trial upside-down, unless a scalpel-wielding clown decides to kill the story-- and Patrick . . . Sissy Hightower, Julia's sex-crazed, air-headed daughter-in-law, who has a suitcase full of secrets . . . Robert S. Rutledge, a powerful Wall Street warrior with a lot riding on the Hightower verdict-- and a lot to learn about messing with the wrong people . . . and Cordelia, the mystery woman that everyone seems to know.
All are in for the trial of their lives–but who among them is the true natural suspect?
All author royalties will be donated to The Nature Conservancy.
From the Hardcover edition.
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William Bernhardt, the attorney-turned-writer who burst on the literary scene with Primary Justice, is back with the most suspenseful, most entertaining, most surprising novel of his career.
Wallace Barrett was a college football hero who went on to become mayor of Tulsa--the city's first black mayor, in fact. But when Barrett's wife and two young daughters are found gruesomely murdered, no one doubts for an instant that he's guilty. The mayor, after all, was seen splattered with blood and fleeing his house immediately after the crime. The entire country watched on television as Barrett sped away from the police and smashed his car into a brick wall.
With evidence like this, it's going to take one hell of a lawyer to get Wallace Barrett off. That's why Barrett hires Ben Kincaid. Kincaid may not be the slickest attorney in Tulsa, but as he has proven time and again, he's got a knack for pulling off the impossible.
Impossible never looked so tough. Kincaid anticipated that the trial was going to be an uphill fight all the way--but he wasn't bargaining on outright disaster. The media seem obsessed with the case, as crack prosecutor Jack Bullock, Kincaid's former partner and now his sworn enemy, brings in a parade of expert witnesses--a DNA analyst, a blood expert, a medical examiner--all of whom establish beyond a doubt that Barrett was present at the crime scene. Then Bullock clinches the case by springing a surprise witness with particularly damning testimony. Ben Kincaid knows it's going to take a miracle to save this trial. A miracle that can happen only if he puts Wallace Barrett on the stand. . . .
As the trial progresses, new revelations explode like firecrackers, sending shock waves through the city's legal and political establishment. And even as the trial draws to a close, Ben uncovers shocking secrets that precipitously tilt the scales of justice. Smart, stylish and engrossing from first page to last, Naked Justice is a virtuoso performance by an absolute master of his art.
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Sometimes her eyes seduce. Sometimes they stare straight at the kind of sights most people turn away from. But in the blazing neon and searing sun of Las Vegas, she can’t see the man who is watching her and thinking to himself: She is the one. . . .
From the mountain views beyond the Strip to the dingy dens of forbidden pleasure, Susan Pulaski loves Las Vegas. A woman who wears a gun at her side and her heart on a sleeve, Pulaski is the perfect fit for her city and her job: unraveling the minds of deviant personalities. Until a killer begins decorating Sin City with the horribly disfigured bodies of once beautiful young women. . . . and Pulaski’s own demons go on a binge.
Eight months after her cop husband’s death, her life is spinning out of control–just as her detective colleagues start searching for a serial killer who methodically stalks his female victims and plunges them into an orgy of terror. When a violent incident earns Pulaski a pink slip from the LVPD and a trip to detox, she’s out of the hunt altogether, so she begins to desperately try to regain her job, her reputation, and custody of the niece she’s been raising on her own. It seems hopeless–until Pulaski meets the one person who can lead her into the mind of a madman no one else can understand. Darcy O’Bannon is a twenty-five-year-old autistic savant whose relationship with the world around him is so unusual that it forces Pulaski to view the crimes from a bizarre–but ultimately insightful–perspective.
White-knuckling her way to the center of the case, she becomes the key player in a desperate hunt for a killer who believes he has found divine inspiration in the works of Edgar Allan Poe. But even with the assistance of Darcy’s astonishing skills, Pulaski is in even more danger than she knows. For the man she seeks is watching her, seduced by her frailties and strengths, her beauty and boldness. To finish his masterwork of horror, he needs her.
In a blistering novel that brings together glitz and goth, human weakness and human genius, and a murderous psychopath who is all too chillingly real, master storyteller William Bernhardt has created an unparalleled literary Las Vegas thrill ride that will leave readers breathless until the final, stunning page.
From the Hardcover edition.
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"A THRILLER WITH NONSTOP ACTION."
--The Armchair Detective
When mobster Al Moroconi is charged with orchestrating a heinous crime against a young woman, the first defense attorney on the case mysteriously disappears. Now, Travis Byrne--a smart Dallas cop who recently traded his badge for a law degree--is appointed by a federal judge to speak for the defense.
But just as the trial is getting under way, Moroconi shoots his way out of court custody, steals a car, and vanishes into the Dallas underworld--taking Travis's reputation with him. Suddenly the FBI is after Travis for a murder he didn't commit. The mob wants to kill him for a secret hit list he doesn't have. Running for his life, Travis comes to a horrifying realization: the charge against Moroconi is just a cover for something much bigger and more foul....
"Two lawyers on the lam from the mob, the cops, and the FBI move this tale through Dallas neighborhoods and corrupt institutions faster than a hanging judge can bang a gavel. . . . This novel proves as engaging as Bernhardt's earlier work, with its appealing pair of heroes."
--Publishers Weekly
"A straight-ahead thriller . . . A fun ride."
--Tulsa World
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