The Stolen Ones
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4.0 • 3 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
The blistering new novel from the author of the multi-award-nominated The Professionals—“Laukkanen is one of the best young thriller writers working today” (Richmond Times-Dispatch).
When you’ve got nothing left, you’ve got nothing left to lose.
Cass County, Minnesota: A sheriff’s deputy steps out of a diner on a rainy summer evening, and a few minutes later, he’s lying dead in the mud. When BCA agent Kirk Stevens arrives on the scene, he discovers local authorities have taken into custody a single suspect: A hysterical young woman found sitting by the body, holding the deputy’s own gun. She has no ID, speaks no English. A mystery woman.
The mystery only deepens from there, as Stevens and Carla Windermere, his partner in the new joint BCA–FBI violent crime task force, find themselves on the trail of a massive international kidnapping and prostitution operation. Before the two agents are done, they will have traveled over half the country, from Montana to New York, and come face-to-face not only with the most vicious man either of them has ever encountered—but two of the most courageous women.
They are sisters, stolen ones. But just because you’re a victim doesn’t mean you have to stay one.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Early in Laukkanen's savage, cathartic fourth series crime novel (after 2014's Kill Fee), Cass County (Minn.) sheriff's deputy Dale Friesen notices a truck towing a container in a diner parking lot. His suspicions aroused, Friesen orders the truck's driver to unlock the container door, and two dirty young women try to flee, but only one escapes. Friesen is shot dead, and later Irina Milosovici, a Romanian sex-trafficking victim, is found next to his body holding his gun. Kirk Stevens, of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and his FBI task force partner, Carla Windermere, investigate. Stevens is sure Irina didn't kill Friesen. Irina is determined to save her younger sister, Catalina, from the clutches of the sex traffickers. Meanwhile, Andrei Volovoi, orchestrator of the slave ring, and his menacing partner, known only as the Dragon, prepare to teach Irina a lesson. Laukkanen deftly mixes sharp social criticism with bleak white-knuckle suspense.
