Unlikely Hero

Trevor Kane is not a good man. He knows this. He has known it since he was fourteen years old, breaking arms in a juvenile detention yard, and he has spent the twenty-five years since confirming it in ways that would make decent people sick. Burglary. Violence. A body in Fontana he stepped over and never thought about again. He is precise, controlled, and completely without remorse. The California prison system tried to correct him twice. It only refined him.

Then he breaks into a warehouse in the wrong part of Los Angeles at two in the morning, looking for something to fence, and finds three men planning to detonate a nuclear device in downtown LA at rush hour.

He has sixty-two minutes.

Unlikely Hero follows Kane’s desperate race across the Southern California desert as he pushes a stolen Dodge Challenger — and its cargo — toward the San Jacinto Mountains while the engine dies underneath him. Escorting him is CHP Officer Don Martinez, a twelve-year veteran who has built his entire career around documentation and evidence, and who is now betting everything on the look in a stranger’s eyes at a hundred and twenty miles an hour.

The book moves between Kane, Martinez, the three men in the warehouse, and the investigators closing in — each chapter a different angle on the same catastrophe in motion. It does not flinch from what Kane is. It does not redeem him. It asks a harder question: what is the last true thing a man like that can do, and does it mean anything, and who gets to decide?

The answer arrives in a granite canyon east of Los Angeles, in the dark, with no witnesses.

Amazon Reviews of the First Edition

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ rjpaus
Well-crafted.
Reviewed in the United States on March 26, 2017

Traffic cops often have a bad day. Think about it for a minute: while they are out there protecting us from bad drivers, whoever they pull over isn’t likely to be someone pleased to see them. So take pity on Don, a motorcycle officer who is just doing his job when he pulls over someone he sees as driving very badly. Except there’s a reason for the bad driving. An urgent one. Like end-of-the-world urgent. Richard G. Lowe Jr. has crafted an exciting and quick-moving tale about what has to be the worst day in a patrolman’s life—or anyone else’s for that matter. I admire Lowe’s simply-crafted words. He doesn’t bother us with long descriptions or great detail about motivations. He just gets on with telling the story, a style which matches the urgency of his narrative perfectly. I found myself caught up in the story and desperately hoping things weren’t as bad as the author paints—not because I necessarily wanted a happy ending for the characters but because the implications were just too ghastly. This is a scenario that might actually happen, which removes it from the usual thriller style of story. I asked for something different and Richard G. Lowe delivered. I remain a happy and wiser reader. And a terrified one.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Brenda Richards
Could hardly put it down.
Reviewed in the United States on September 18, 2016

If you’re looking for an immediate “you’re kidding me….now what….” kind of suspense, you’ve come to the right place. This book starts out with non-stop drama from chapter one and it just goes on from there. The characters are well developed and the immediacy of action starts from the time you start reading. If you’re looking for something that will draw you in from the beginning and keep you there, this is it.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ cin
Fantastic book!

Read from beginning to end in one sitting! Fantastic book! This book starts out with action the minute you pick it up and start reading! Well written Richard! Looking forward to reading others you’ve written!

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Jim Marquis
Dark Highways
Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2017

This was a quick but enjoyable read. Kind of a classic noir tale, one where the protagonist has previously been anything but a hero but now finds himself in a situation where his courage could save millions. Well done.

Questions

Read the Opening

Chapter One

Just Another Day

My hands worked the lock picks through the leather gloves. Three years out of Pelican Bay. One mistake from going back inside — that calculation was always running.

I could still taste blood from when they tasered me in the courtroom. Three cops pinning me down while Detective Isaac worked me over with his flashlight. “Resisting arrest,” according to the report. My jaw was wired shut for six weeks. I lost twenty pounds eating through a straw, and the break never healed properly. Still clicked when I chewed.

The scar from Isaac’s ring ran from my left temple to my jaw. A fact about what courts allowed. Another eight-year stretch was the other variable.

The lock gave way with a soft click — I’d done this countless times.

I slipped inside, letting my eyes adjust to the darkness. The house had its own smell — dryer sheets and something cooked hours ago, basil maybe, still hanging in the air. At six-foot-three and two-twenty, I had to move carefully to avoid knocking things over. Prison had put muscle on me; you lifted weights or got eaten alive. Jailhouse tattoos covered both arms. Anyone who needed to know what they meant already knew.

Nice place. Middle-class suburban home with decent electronics, probably jewelry upstairs. The kind of score that could keep me afloat for months.

I spotted a laptop on the coffee table. Good start. I stuffed it into my bag along with a tablet and expensive-looking speakers. The dining room had a china cabinet with what looked like real silver. Heavy, hard to fence, but valuable.

I reached for a silver candlestick when footsteps creaked on the stairs.

Shit. Should be empty. I’d watched this place for three days.

A middle-aged man appeared at the bottom of the staircase, wearing pajamas and squinting into the darkness.

“Hello? Is someone there?”

I pulled out my knife. Just business now.

“Don’t move. Stay calm and nobody gets hurt.”

His eyes went wide when he saw the blade, then wider when he took in my size. His mouth moved but no sound came out. Then: “Take whatever you want. I won’t call the police.”

I kept working, stuffing items into my bag. He was just an obstacle now. Nothing more. But scared people do stupid things. When I turned toward the kitchen, he bolted for the front door.

I didn’t shout a warning. Didn’t hesitate.

The knife left my hand. He was at the door already — a half-step further than I’d tracked. It caught him left of center, lower than I’d aimed. He made a sound and went down differently than I expected, one hand pulling the doorknob partway open as he fell.

I walked over and pulled the blade free. Blood pooled beneath him, dark against the white floor.

I looked down at him and felt nothing. No guilt, no satisfaction, no anger. He was just a problem I’d solved. Another body that had gotten in my way. I’d stepped over bodies before.

Moving quietly, I went upstairs. Found a woman and a kid sleeping peacefully in the master bedroom. The kid couldn’t have been more than eight, curled up next to his mother like he’d had a nightmare and crawled into their bed. They didn’t stir when I stood in the doorway.

I looked at them for a long moment, then turned away and went back downstairs.

Not women and kids. I had lines I wouldn’t cross, even if they were thin ones.

I grabbed my bag and headed for the back door. A small dog came running from somewhere in the house, yapping at the noise. It saw its owner on the floor and whimpered, nudging the man’s arm with its nose.

The dog looked up at me with confused brown eyes. It didn’t understand what had happened. It was just a dog in its house, looking for someone to tell it things were fine.

A ceramic jar on the counter. I’d clocked it on the way in — the shape, the painted paw print on the side. I took the lid off. Dog biscuits. I took one out and set it on the floor.

The dog looked at it, then at me, then ate it.

I put my hand on its head once. It leaned into it slightly, the way dogs do.

I picked up my bag and left through the back door.

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