Weave Her Thread With Bones: A Magda Santos Mystery

Magda Santos is a lawyer in San Francisco.  Of Portuguese and Mexican descent, she's "as American as Taco Bell."  Forced out of her law firm and newly on her own, she's found a haven and a cultural outlet as a member of an obscure dance-and-martial-arts cult, the Xuchil Dancers.  Sworn to secrecy, she learns erotic dance steps and powerful attack and defense techniques, which are combined in intense initiation rituals and performances.

Magda specializes in bank fraud, so when two wealthy, beautiful widows are indicted for bank fraud in Federal Court, Magda is called to defend them.  She soon discovers that the women did not become widows by accident, and malevolent Xuchil Masters are controlling their every move.  Magda is only supposed to help them take the fall, not win the case.

Magda's professional pride battles her loyalty to the Xuchil Dancers.  She can't tell which of the Masters can be trusted, and which is waiting to pounce.  In the cavernous passageways under an old San Francisco church Magda makes her final decision, facing down the highest of the Masters she has sworn to obey.