Love Like a Loaded Gun, page 1
Love Like a Loaded Gun: Mass Market Edition
A Thriller
Vincent Zandri
Published by Vincent Zandri, 2026.
This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.
LOVE LIKE A LOADED GUN: MASS MARKET EDITION
First edition. January 25, 2026.
Copyright © 2026 Vincent Zandri.
ISBN: 979-8215724323
Written by Vincent Zandri.
Also by Vincent Zandri
A Chase Baker Thriller
Chase Baker Box Set
The Chase Baker Trilogy:Volume II
Chase Baker and the Dutch Diamonds
Chase Baker and the Spear of Destiny
The Chase Baker Trilogy: The First Three Chase Baker Thriller Novels
Chase Baker and the Quest for the Holy Grail
Chase Baker and the Pyramid of Madness
Chase Baker and the Hunt for Nazi Gold
Chase Baker und die Jagd nach Nazi-Gold
Chase Baker and the Purple Robe of Christ
Chase Baker and the Nazi Time Machine
A Chase Baker Thriller No. 12
Chase Baker and the Lost Ark of God
A Chase Baker Thriller Series
Young Chase Baker and the Cross of the Last Crusade
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 1
The Shroud Key
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 2
Chase Baker and the Golden Condor
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 3
Chase Baker and the God Boy
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 4
Chase Baker and the Lincoln Curse
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 6
Chase Baker and the Da Vinci Divinity
A Chase Baker Thriller Series No. 9
Chase Baker and the Seventh Seal
A Dick Moonlight PI Series
Moonlight Falls
Moonlight Gets Schooled
Blue Moonlight
Moonlight Breaks Bad
Murder by Moonlight
Divorce by Moonlight
Moonlight Gets Railroaded
Code Blue Moonlight
A Dick Moonlight PI Series Short
Moonlight Gets Served
Moonlight Goes Viral
Moonlight Mafia
Moonlight Detour
A Dick Moonlight PI Thriller
Moonlight Kills
Moonlight Falls: New and Lengthened Editor’s Cut Edition
The Dick Moonlight PI Box Set II
Moonlight and the Hitman
Terminal Moonlight
Moonlight Rises
Moonlight Gets Schooled
A Dick Moonlight Thriller Book 9
Dog Day Moonlight
A Gripping Ava "Spike" Harrison Thriller
The Concrete Pearl
A Gripping Dick Moonlight PI Thriller Boxed Set
Dick Moonlight Collection One
A Gripping Tanya Teal Corporate War Chronicles Thriller
Primary Termination
A Jack "Keeper" Marconi PI Thriller Series
The Sins of the Sons: A Gripping Hard-Boiled Mystery Thriller with a Surprise Ending
The Innocent
Godchild
American Prison Break
The Jack Marconi P.I. Box Set
White Wedding
The Body
Ruthless
(A Jack Marconi PI Series)
The Guilty
The Slender Man
(A Keeper Marconi PI Thriller Book 5
Dressed to Kill
American Crime Story: A Thriller Series
American Crime Story: Book I
American Crime Story: Book II
American Crime Story: Book III
American Crime Story: Book IV
A Meta Man Time Travel Thriller
The Passion of Casey Smith
Meta Man
Meta Man: Mars 900 C
Cashless Bail
After Life
A Sam Savage Sky Marshal Thriller
Dead Heading
The Sam Savage Sky Marshal Boxed Set
Tunnel Rats
The Empire Runaway
A Short Thriller
Ghosts
Pembroke PInes
The Killer
Hit and Run
The Devil Won't Have You
The Girl in the Window
Go Get Me A Gun
The Left Hook
Autonomous
Delusional
Desperate Measures
Domestic Dispute
Living Doll
The Woman with Two Faces
The Man Who Prayed for the End of the World
Hitchhiker
Bang Bang Shoot Shoot
Memory Bank
Left Alone
The Commuter
A Short Thriller Collection
Desperate Measures: A Short Thriller Collection
A Short True Crime Thriller
I Am God
A Steele and Blood Thriller
Alligator Alcatraz
A Steve Jobz PI Thriller
The Flower Man
The Extortionist
The Plumber
I, The Judge
The Steve Jobz PI Box Set
The Blackmailer
A Steve Jobz Thriller
The Embalmer
(A Thriller)
The Scream Catcher
A Touch of Evil
Detonator
A Thriller
The Caretaker
Tarantulas at Thirty Thousand Feet
American Crime Story: The Complete Saga
Deranged Fan
The Girl Who Wasn't There
Her Darkest Secret
Paradox Lake
Max Gator: A Thriller
The Squatters
Assignment Rendition
The Ex-Con
Bullet
Love Like a Loaded Gun
Everything Burns
Love Like a Loaded Gun: Mass Market Edition
A Tony and Stan Thriller
Bingo Night
Border Crossings
A Vincent Zandri Hard-Boiled Short Read
Pathological
A Young Chase Baker Thriller
Young Chase Baker and the Well of the Souls
Young Chase Baker and the President's Assassin
Dick Moonlight PI
The Moonlight Falcon
Full Moonlight
PI Jack Marconi
Arbor Hill
PULP Thrillers
Pulp 2: Three Gripping Thrillers Collected in One Box Set
The Rebecca Underhill Trilogy
The Remains
The Ashes
The Bones
The Remains
(Vincent Zandri on Writing Book)
Pieces of Mind: Fictional Truths & Non-Fictional Lies about Writing and the Writing Life
Writer's Life Mindset Lecture Series
The Writer’s Life Mindset Lecture Series Number 1: The Series that Helps You become a Real Pro Writer!
Writer's Life Volume 1
The Writer's Life
Standalone
Pulp!: Two Thriller Novels and a Novella
Head
Pathological: Collected Short Reads of Sex, Lies, and Murder!
Go Get Me a Gun
Watch for more at Vincent Zandri’s site.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Also By Vincent Zandri
Begin your Moonlight journey today with a FREE copy of MOONLIGHT FALLS, the first novel in the Thriller and Shamus Award winning series. | Or visit WWW.VINZANDRI.COM to nab all of Vin’s pulse-pounding thrillers and mysteries. | PRAISE FOR VINCENT ZANDRI
Love Like a Loaded Gun | Vincent Zandri
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
Sign up for Vincent Zandri's Mailing List
Also By Vincent Zandri
Begin your Moonlight journey today with a FREE copy of MOONLIGHT FALLS, the first novel in the Thriller and Shamus Award winning series.
Or visit WWW.VINZANDRI.COM to nab all of Vin’s pulse-pounding thrillers and mysteries.
PRAISE FOR VINCENT ZANDRI
"VINCENT ZANDRI IS ONE of the most acclaimed thriller writers working today!"
—Publishers Weekly
“ZANDRI (IS) A VETERAN wordsmith who executes quality and quantity at superlative levels.”
—Book Reporter
"THE STORY OF VINCENT Zandri is the story of our times."
—Business Insider
"VINCENT ZANDRI HAILS from the future."
—The New York Times
“SENSATIONAL . . . MASTERFUL . . . brilliant.”
—New York Post
"...BIG TIME AUTHOR..."
—Digital Journal
“. . . OH, WHAT A STORY it is . . . Riveting . . . A terrific old-school thriller.”
—Booklist “Starred Review”
“ZANDRI DOES A FANTASTIC job with this story. Not only does he scare the reader, but the horror
show he presents also scares the man who is the definition of the word “tough.”
—Suspense Magazine
“(THE INNOCENT) IS A thriller that has depth and substance, wickedness and compassion.”
—The Times-Union (Albany)
"THE ACTION NEVER WANES."
—Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
"GRITTY, FAST-PACED, lyrical and haunting."
—Harlan Coben, New York Times bestselling author of Six Years
"TOUGH, STYLISH, HEARTBREAKING."
—Don Winslow, New York Times bestselling author of Savages and Cartel.
“A TIGHTLY CRAFTED, smart, disturbing, elegantly crafted complex thriller . . . I dare you to start it and not keep reading.”
—MJ Rose, New York Times bestselling author of Halo Effect and Closure
“A CLASSIC SLICE OF raw pulp noir . . .”
—William Landay, New York Times bestselling author of Defending Jacob
Love Like a Loaded Gun
Vincent Zandri
“It was like being asleep when you were awake and awake when you were asleep. ... I’d pinch myself ... then I’d wake up kind of in reverse; I’d go back to the nightmare I had to live in. And everything would be clear and reasonable.”
―Jim Thompson, The Killer Inside Me
1
I sat at the bar, tired eyes glued to a thing of absolute destructive beauty. But it was also a thing of absolute inebriation and therefore joy. The afternoon sun that leaked through the window illuminated its golden color, as if it were somehow made of real gold, not cheap hops shipped to New Jersey from flyover country, then bottled and shipped north to Albany. In this concrete jungle, you dare not go out of your house after sundown or risk taking a bullet between the eyes. Call me cynical.
It was, of course, a cold draft beer that held my rapt attention. Correction, a draft beer served to me in a frosted mug of all things by a barmaid named...get this...April, who just might have been as beautiful as the beer. But this wasn’t just any beer. It was my first beer in more than ten years. They don’t go much for beer in state prison.
In fact, about the only hooch you can get is the homemade moonshine the Blacks and Hispanics make out of the powdered potatoes they’d steal from the chow hall. The stuff was so powerful it could remove the battleship gray paint from off the floor when it dripped from the still. It was also lethal enough to kill at least one or two inmates per year when they imbibed too much. But then, for a lifer, an early death meant that he was escaping prison forever, and that was one of the sweetest gifts any condemned man could ask for.
I eyed the beer, and about the only thing that could take my eye off it was April. She was younger than me by maybe ten years. She wasn’t skinny, but she wasn’t big either. Instead, she was what my late mother would have called shapely, with perfect hips, a peach of an ass packed in tight jeans, and breasts that were bulging out of a black lace pushup bra shrouded by a bone-colored blouse unbuttoned enough to break my bleeding heart. Her shoulder-length hair was golden blond, almost like the beer, and it was parted on the side over her left eye, which was blue and, dare I say it, mesmerizing. When she smiled at me, I could tell it was not forced or fake.
“Well, aren’t you the handsome one,” she said as I came through the glass entry and sat myself down on one of the many available stools that surrounded the horseshoe-shaped bar.
Sure, it might have been a line intended to provoke an extra-large tip, but it seemed like she meant it. Or maybe I’d been in the joint for too long, and just hearing a knock-out of a woman pay some special attention to me was enough to fall in love on the spot.
I ordered my beer, and while she was pouring it from the tap, she said, “I don’t recall seeing you around here before.”
I took a quick look around. The place hadn’t changed much since the last time I was here. It was called Tommy’s Place back then, and it was mostly filled with leather-clad bikers during all hours of the day and night. But it was called Lanies Café now. Gone were the dark wooden paneled walls and the ceiling fans. It was replaced with a more pleasant hunter green paint job, and the fans were replaced with air conditioning. Even the floor was clean.
The Quick Draw was still working, however, and the flat-screened TV that was broadcasting it was still mounted to the far corner of the square-shaped room by the entry. The picture was coming and going, but maybe the cable TV attachment was loose. Happened all the time in gen pop in the joint.
Only one other patron occupied the bar. He looked familiar enough, but for the life of me, I couldn’t recall his name. He was an old man now, and he was drinking bourbon from a rocks glass, no rocks, as if he had a grudge against his liver or was committing a slow suicide, anyway. He kept one eye on the Quick Draw and the other on the numbers he’d chosen for it, which were recorded on a narrow yellow sheet set on the bar beside his drink. On occasion, he’d curse at the bad TV reception. But then he’d shift his glance to me and stare me down enough to make me nervous.
When you live in prison for as long as I did, you learn not to look anyone in the eye, since that was reason enough to get you shivved inside the showers. I carried the habit with me to the outside. But then, I couldn’t help but stare into his tired brown eyes, and at his wrinkled face and crazy gray hair.
“Say, how about some lunch, friend?” April said with that killer smile. “Best cheeseburgers in the city.”
It hadn’t dawned on me how hungry I was. Thirsty, yes, but hungry too. I’d even had breakfast at a diner after they released me since I had an hour to kill before my bus was due. But I found myself famished again.
“Sure thing,” I said. “You got French fries?”
She pulled an order pad from her pocket and a pencil from behind her ear.
“Well, of course we do, honey,” she said. “We run a respectable establishment around here.”
I grinned.
“Well, then make it a double order of fries,” I said.
“Healthy boy,” she said while writing the order down on the pad and then touching the back of my hand with the tips of her red-painted stiletto fingernails.
Let me tell you something. Just the gentlest touch of her fingertips was enough to get my blood speeding through my veins so fast I thought I might pass out.
She was just about to turn back around when she said, “And what did you say your name was again?”
“I didn’t,” I said. “Least, I don’t think I did.” Then, “I’m Michael. Michael Sampson. But you can call me Mike.”
