Less Dead (Unabridged‪)‬

How is a Goth teen involved in the murder of a city councilman? Former police officer Niki Alexander risks her life to find out. When a homeless teenage girl wakes up in Houston's Tranquility Park next to a murdered city councilman and then disappears, Homicide Investigator Luis Perez turns to his ex-partner Niki Alexander. Now a counselor with a teen shelter, she may be his only hope in locating the girl. Three years earlier Niki quit the Houston Police Department after a fatal shooting involving a teenage boy. Haunted by the memory and the guilt, she is driven to help troubled teens who have run away or been abandoned. Soon she suspects that the missing teen is a street girl she knows as Jade. Niki fears there is more of a connection between Jade and murdered man than was initially apparent. Niki's search takes her among homeless teens, and into predominantly male gay bars, where dangerous secrets are revealed. She soon realizes she isn't the only one desperate to find the girl. The closer she gets to the truth, the more her own life is at risk.