Haunted by the death of her mother and tortured by the secret that died upon her best friend's lips, assistant district attorney Mary Crow is obsessed with finding the man who holds the key to both those tragedies. When her infant goddaughter is kidnapped, Mary knows the hunt she's been dreading has begun.

Mary Crow returns to her hometown for a promised job that does not materialize. With shrinking prospects and pocketbooks, she opens a tiny one-woman law practice. Her first client is a successful developer, who hires Mary for brain-numbing real estate work. Her second client, however, is Ridge Standingdeer, a young Cherokee boy accused of murdering the beautiful and popular Bethany Daws. Though Mary's promised, her great love Jonathan Walkingstick...

Someone is killing federal judges. Eleven deaths in eleven months, some of the murders have been set up to look like accidents or illnesses, while others are clearly the work of skilled assassins. The November victim died so horrifically that even veteran law enforcement officials are stunned. Fearing that the next victim will be Judge Irene Hannah, friend and mentor of Mary Crow, the FBI enlists Mary's aid in protecting this distinguished jurist. As...

"Mary Crow's new job as western North Carolina's special legal counsel leads her to a string of possible homophobic hate crimes tied to an extreme preacher as well as a boy searching for his missing sister" --