Merci Rayborn, T. Jefferson Parker's stubborn, principled Orange County detective, is almost alone in believing that deputy Archie Wildcraft didn't kill his beautiful young wife and then turn his service weapon on himself. The evidence against Wildcraft--now hospitalized with a bullet lodged in his head--seems overwhelming. But Merci, who's still unpopular for exposing an old police scandal that caused the death of one cop and the ruination of others...

This time around, Hood is running the California-Mexico border with the ATF, searching for the iron river, the massive and illegal flow of handguns and automatic weapons that fuels the bloody cartel wars south of the border. Gunrunners by nature aren't exactly ethical, but the lengths they'll go to, and the innocent lives they'll risk, are shocking even to Hood. Most shocking of all is the close personal connection Hood finds wrapped up in events...

Charlie Hood must determine if ATF undercover agent Sean "Oz" Ozburn--deep undercover supporting the "sicarios" of the Baja Cartel--has suffered a permanent break with his mission and his moral compass--or if he has his reasons for going "completely dark."

Roland Ford--once a cop, then a marine, now a private investigator--is good at finding people. But when he's asked to locate Air Force veteran Clay Hickman, he realizes he's been drawn into something deep and dark. He knows war, having served as a Marine in first Fallujah; he also knows personal pain, as only two years have passed since his wife, Justine, died. What he doesn't know is why a shroud of secrecy hangs over the disappearance of Clay Hickman--and...

Matt Stromsoe was in high school when he met the boy who would someday murder his wife and son . . . Once Stromsoe was best friends with brilliant, unpredictable Mike Tavarez. That was before Matt joined the San Diego P.D. and Mike left Harvard to run La Eme, the brutal Mexican Mafia, before a vengeance-obsessed Tavarez blew away everything Stromsoe loved, leaving him physically and emotionally broken. Years later, Mike Tavarez is in prison for life,...

Returning hero and private investigator Roland Ford is on the trail of a mysterious killer who is beheading CIA drone operators and leaving puzzling clues at each crime scene. His troubled friend Lindsay Rakes is afraid for her own life and the life of her son after a fellow flight crew member is killed in brutal fashion. Even more terrifying is the odd note the killer left behind: "Welcome to Caliphornia. This is not the last." Ford strikes an uneasy...

It's two years after the death of Tim Hess, Detective Merci Rayborn's partner, and the father of her child. Merci is trying hard to hold it all together. She and her son live with her father, and she's fallen into a comfortable relationship with Mike McNally, a respected fellow officer. But when a young prostitute is found murdered, and Mike emerges as the prime suspect, Merci's carefully constructed world explodes.

"The Carson dynasty rules the ski resort town of Mammoth Lakes in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California. Founded by patriarch Adam, the town is the site of the Mammoth Cup ski race - a qualifier for the Olympics. But when Wylie Welborn, Adam's illegitimate grandson, returns after a stint in Afghanistan, it reopens a dark moment in Carson family history: the murder of Wylie's father by his jealous and very pregnant wife, Cynthia. Her son Sky, born...

"Laguna Beach, California, 1968. The Age of Aquarius is in full swing ... Folks from all over are flocking to Laguna, seeking peace, love, and enlightenment. Matt Antony is just trying get by. Matt is sixteen, broke, and never sure where his next meal is coming from. Mom's a stoner, his deadbeat dad is a no-show, his brother's fighting in Nam --and his big sister Jazz has just gone missing. The cops figure she's just another runaway hippie chick,...

Homicide cop Tom McMichael is on the rotation when an 84-year-old city patriarch named Pete Braga is found bludgeoned to death. Not good news, especially since the Irish McMichaels and the Portugese Bragas share a vilolent family history dating back three generations. Years ago Braga shot McMichael's grandfather in a dispute over a paycheck; soon therafter Braga's son was severely beaten behind a waterfront bar - legend has it that it was an act of...