Showing results by author "Dell Sweet" in All Categories

Michael Watson is the captain of an inner galaxy cruiser: He Purchased Star Dancer right out of school and has spent the last twenty years running people and supplies to outposts within the confines of the Solar System and the established bases on the Moon, Mars and Saturn's moons. The times are changing though and the big money is in the longer out of system runs. To do that he'll need a crew and a bigger ship, but he has the ambition and the rest just might fall into place. A new navigator, the beautiful Petra starts him thinking in a new direction and not just about Star Cruising. Maybe ...

The humid New York City night air hung heavy, thick with the scent of exhaust fumes and desperation. It clung to the skin like a second, grimy layer, a miasma composed of stale hot dogs, overflowing dumpsters, and the perpetual hum of a city that never slept. Under the flickering neon glow of a forgotten alleyway, a fractured mosaic of sickly green and searing red, Jenna and Marcus watched the transaction unfold. It was a performance they had rehearsed a thousand times in their minds, a delicate ballet of risk and reward, but the reality was always more visceral, more charged with an almost...

Then I saw him. Robby. He hadn't changed much. Still the same lean build, the same unsettlingly calm demeanor that had always made me both wary and fascinated. His eyes, though, held a sharper glint, a honed edge that spoke of survival in a world even harsher than the one behind bars. He was a predator, disguised in the sheep's clothing of a casual acquaintance, and the way he sat at the bar, radiating an aura of dangerous nonchalance, sent a chill down my spine. He caught my eye and offered a small, almost imperceptible nod, a silent acknowledgment of our shared history. The years melted ...

The air hung thick and greasy, a miasma of stale beer, cheap whiskey, and desperation clinging to the shadowed corners of the bar. Smoke, thick enough to choke a horse, curled lazily from ashtrays overflowing with crushed butts, painting the dimly lit space in a hazy, sepia-toned gloom. Robbie sat hunched over a sticky tabletop, the flickering neon sign outside casting long, distorted shadows that danced across his face. He nervously tapped a chipped mug against the scarred wood, the sound sharp and brittle in the oppressive silence. Across from him, Marva nursed a drink, her eyes darting ...

The air hung thick and heavy, a humid blanket clinging to the skin even in the pre-dawn chill. The city, normally a cacophony of distant sirens and rumbling traffic, was unusually quiet, punctuated only by the rhythmic tremor that vibrated through the very foundations of the buildings. It wasn't a major quake, not yet, just a series of unsettling shudders, a prelude to something far more destructive. This was the kind of morning that scraped against the nerves, a low hum of anxiety that tightened chests and made even the most hardened criminals pause. In a cramped, dimly lit apartment above...

In my younger days I lived my life like there was no tomorrow. I wasn't thinking about what to do when the check came due, when life changed, when I crossed someone or they crossed me. I wish I had grown up different, but my time on the streets and the lessons that taught me. And my time working for bad people after that just set me up for the mistakes that would nearly end my life more than once. Even people who were supposed to care about me did their best to sacrifice me when the time came to pay the check. Luckily, for me, some things and some people got in the way and stopped some of ...

The dust swirled around my worn boots, a miniature desert storm kicked up by the frantic thump of my own heart. The air hung thick and heavy, the scent of dry earth and something else… something metallic and sickeningly sweet, clinging to the back of my throat. It was the smell of blood. Old blood. New blood. The kind that stains the soul as deeply as it stains the earth. I’d been clean for six months, six agonizing months of sweat-soaked nights and gnawing cravings, a testament to a willpower I never knew I possessed. Six months of staring at the cracked pavement, avoiding the shadowed...

Amy and Diedra are best friends, maybe more, something always seems to be in the way every time an opportunity to explore the possibilities arise. Dave Plasko is serving a long sentence at Huntsville state prison, and after that he will be transferred to New York to serve more time. Rebbeca Monet is working her way up the ladder of success in the television reporter game. A hurricane of epic proportions is heading towards Mobile Alabama. The lives of the people involved will never be the same again…

I had come back to spend time with Laura. I could not tell her my real reasons. That I was afraid of leading the Dream Killer to her. Or I was not sure even whether I was coming back in the end, so I had wanted to see her one more time. She asked me about the Bear Killer who had been my Uncle and so I told her as we sat in the quiet of the evening and talked... I thought a moment, gathered my thoughts, and then began to speak to Laura. "I Knew Benjamin from my father's side of the family. My grandmother was Blackfoot. She came from Canada with my father and my uncles and aunts. My father ...

In AA they say that addictions will take you to hospitals, Mental Institutions and Prisons. It's true. They will. I have been in all of those places because of my addictions. But addictions are not responsible for the life I lead entirely, and certainly not responsible for the things I did. I may have used because I believe it solved problems, or to cover pain, but the decisions I made, I made because I wanted to make them. Because I chose to make them. This is about the life that I lead that took me down the path of addiction that ruled almost all of my life. Although my addictions were ...

The hand was mangled. It looked chewed, a finger missing, maybe an accident with a dog, his mind supplied. Accidents with dogs happened. He watched the little boy stumble along. The arm a grotesque parody of a real arm, swinging freely from its shoulder socket. Their eyes met a moment later, but it was already too late for the little boy. Roux had used his hands to prop his knees so he could stand. A second of standing had told him he could walk, and a single limping step had told him he could walk well enough. It had probably been the standing, his mind supplied now. His feet scraping on ...

Earth's Survivors Collection Two contains the complete text from books three and four of the Earth's Survivors series, The Nation and Home In The Valley. It also includes bonus material, a complete major character bibliography, plus information from the series and the future plans for the series. Save when you buy both books at once and get more of what you want. Earth's Survivors follows survivors of a worldwide catastrophe. A meteorite that was supposed to miss the earth completely, hits and becomes the cap to a series of events that destroy the world as we know it. Police, fire, ...

As the clock ticks down for our planet and her inhabitants, powers that have lain dormant for centuries are loosed on the Earth. Zero Zero takes a look at a post apocalypse world in ruins. The governments are gone. The police, the military. The United States is no more. And even the simplest things are hard to come by. Some have hidden to ride out the storm unleashed upon the Earth, others have taken a stance in the fight. Those that survive the apocalypse are splintered and isolated. Mistrustful of one another, but beginning to come together in small groups. They have been told of a place ...

Crime Time 2 contains two complete crime novels in one book. Livie: A trip to the weed man goes horribly wrong for a young woman who is skating through life. Not really taking care or caution. Something has happened to the weed man though, he isn't answering the door, and that just escalates because Livvie has o know what has happened inside the house, she can't just walk away. Maybe there will be free drugs, something special, something unexpected. She didn't know, but she had to open that door and find out... (From the story) The heroin became a less frequent companion, its presence ...

Crime Time is a collection of nine crime stories from author Dell Sweet. From short stories to near novel length... ... When a man tells you he has the moral flexibility to include murder in his life if he deems it necessary this is probably not a man you should be hanging out with. Jeff Johnson had reminded himself of this fact about Robert Biel more than once, yet every day he found himself hanging around, giving him lifts to do job searches, parole, where ever he needed to go: Even hanging around with him at night... Nine stories that are hard edged, entertaining and good, fast rides ...

Laura and Joe live lonely lives, but they are dreamers. When they close their eyes they dream travel through space and time, to other worlds with little more than a thought, but dreaming comes with a purpose. They have both fought that purpose, but when they meet each other in the dream world, that meeting creates a longing that neither can deny. A purpose, a destiny both must choose to follow.Laura Kast: Laura is a dreamer: When she was a little girl she knew she was destined to dream. She fought it and that fight nearly killed her, She found herself on the streets, drug addicted, away ...

Earth Date 2096-08-25 16:52:58 Star Dancer Michael He got a good look at Petra as he flagged her through the air-locks: All fresh air; your basic space bug-Earth bug delousing unit. People had at one time believed that space was sterile. A few serious contaminations early in the century had stopped that. Of course the delousing process rendered you sterile. It was the same, male or female. The price you paid, so you banked your eggs or your sperm and didn't give it any more thought. Space travel, constant radioactive exposure, caused all sorts of birth defects. It only made sense. She was ...

For the last two days Michael had found himself thinking in an new direction. All the old stuff we depended on is gone and that's okay. He didn't care at all if he never saw space again. In fact he'd rather not go back to it and even if there was a way to fix it all he didn't want to go back to Earth: He was positive in fact that they could never go back; none of them. He was positive he wouldn't be able to live that way again anyway… Not after this. Less than two years ago his entire life, his entire focus was wrapped up in the old way. Hadn't he been waiting for the countdown to go on ...

The year is 1969: In the small city of Glennville people tend to stay to themselves. Neighbors matter. The streets, even in the poorest of neighborhoods are safe for children to travel on their own: Play kick the can after dark. But the city has its secrets, and those secrets have their dangers. Under the city, a series of caves cut from the limestone by the Black River attract visitors, children, some have entered and never come out; maybe lost, maybe part of Glennville's secrets. Something else lives in the cold, dark caves. Something some have suspected but refuse to believe. After all, ...

He had been lying half in half out of the gutter for the last several hours that he knew of. He had no idea how long before that. Days? Weeks? Weeks seemed wrong. Days, he decided. He turned his attention back to the roadway before him. Was it a roadway? When he thought roadway, he thought highway, something like that. From what he could see this was more like a city street. It had never occurred to him in the passing hours to move his head, but the thought of it being a street in a city had caused him to move his head slightly so he could look around to be sure. Slightly, but enough to ...