The Desperate, the Dying, and the Damned

Phil Durand is a low level functionary within one of Boston's organized crime outfits. A delivery driver, nothing more. When his girlfriend Evie goes missing three days before they were due to leave town together to start a better, clean, life down in Florida, he turns to the only man he knows with a reputation for helping guys like him...

Alex Rourke was once a respected investigator, first with the FBI and then in the private sector. Now he battles a long-term mental illness that's seen him slide from doing respectable work to ekeing out a living helping those with no one else to turn to. Durand's missing girlfriend looks like just a bread-and-butter job for him and his sardonic, secretive assistant Kayleigh.

But they soon find that something's very wrong with what they've been told. Has Evie genuinely been missing for a few days? Was she really Durand's girlfriend? Is their client lying, or deranged? And how does what happened to the missing woman tie in to the outfit Durand works for, not to mention a rival boss in a neighboring part of town?

The race is on to find Evie, find the truth, and untangle the knots in Durand's story before one side, or another, does it for them...

Praise for John Rickards:

"Rickards is a master of tension and pacing. In Rourke he has created a brilliant anti-hero lead on a par with John Connolly's Charlie Parker." - Crimespree Magazine

"Rickards is one author who doesn't pull punches." - Spinetingler

"Rickards is definitely one to watch." - Peter Robinson (Watching The Dark, Aftermath)