Crime Must Pay the Penalty #23

Zero Quinn's motto is simple—dead men tell no tales—and he's willing to murder anyone who might become a loose end as he orchestrates a string of crimes to stay out of prison for life. But as his gang executes job after job, his paranoid logic begins to unravel, leaving a trail of bodies that only makes the law close in faster. Can a career criminal outrun the very consequences his own ruthlessness keeps creating?

Rick Butell was a vicious pro football star known as "Sticky Fingers" for his bruising play, until his reckless tactics and contempt for authority landed him in hot water with the league—and made him a target for the underworld. Drawn into a life of crime by a gangster named Link, Butell discovers his talent for brutal organization applies just as well to heists, and soon takes over the gang with ruthless efficiency. As he plans his most audacious robbery yet at the Seneca stadium, the ex-athlete's confidence in his meticulous strategy is about to face its biggest test.

A baby-faced drifter named Philip Sloan turns to petty crime after striking out in the job market, starting with street robbery and graduating to holdups that catch the attention of Los Angeles detectives. After a dance-hall encounter with a woman who double-crosses him to the cops, Sloan is sent to San Quentin—where his arrogance and schemes only deepen his trouble. Released years later with a new grudge and an old obsession, Sloan hits the streets searching for the woman he blames for his lost years.

A country boy obsessed with crime kingpins leaves his abusive stepfather behind and heads to New York with dreams of underworld glory—only to find that the fast life he's always romanticized comes with a price far steeper than he imagined. Dave "Rube" Dawson's rapid rise through the ranks of a vicious stickup gang shows him both the riches and the violence he craved, but when he tries to escape it all for a respectable life with Sandy, old habits and ambitions pull him back toward crime. This 1951 crime tale traces how a small-town dreamer's idol worship of infamous criminals leads him down a path where his own final fate becomes just another clipping in his beloved scrapbook.