’Til Death

Detective Steve Carella thought it was be an easy day — and an enjoyable one. It was his day off and it was his sister’s wedding day. But it began much too ominously. Tommy Giordano, the groom, found a wedding present on his doorstep in the morning — a small box, neatly gift-wrapped. Its contents were deadly. Weddings-Fetes, Incorporated decorated the Carella back yard; there was a band and plenty of champagne. On the surface it was everything a wedding should be. But Steve wasn’t at all sure that Tommy would live long enough to become Angela’s husband. Meyer Meyer, Cotton Hawes and the rest of the 87th Precinct detectives begin a dogged race against time to trace down one small and possibly fruitless lead. It might mean nothing at all. The man they were trying to find wasn’t even at the wedding — or was he? There is a second attempt on Tommy’s life, then a third, this time on that Steve doesn’t even know about. Will there be more — and when will they come and from what direction? Is the killer a guest at the wedding — at least one man there carries a gun — or is he watching Tommy from a distance through the cross-sight of a sniper’s rifle? Until death us do part... or will death arrive before the ceremony has even began? Even if the bride and groom are joined in holy matrimony, one murder device in timed to strike during the honeymoon — after Carella thinks the case is finished. There never was a gayer wedding or one with such an undercurrent of driving suspense. And Steve Carella gets his biggest shock of the day on the very last page — a surprise supplied by Mrs. Carella!