Elliott Light

Jake Savage is doing some underwater photography off Key West when a shadow floats above him. Much to his surprise, it is a young girl, scantily dressed and floating face down. The police are called ... and they are labeling it an accident. Jake takes it upon himself to find out who she is and how she wound up dead. He soon learns that he has all kinds of help .... his elderly step-mother, her caretaker, a cop who is terminally ill, and assorted strangers he happens to bump into. It gets dangerous when he finds that the girl was somehow involved with sex trafficking, a crime committed against someone high up in the government with ties to a crime lord, and the super-rich (think people like the late Jeffrey Epstein). Attacks come fast and furious .... and Jake and his partners find themselves in deeper trouble than they ever imagined.

The body of a young girl drifts over a reef where Jake Savage is photographing lionfish, beautiful brown-striped creatures with feathery pectoral fins that could almost make one forget their venomous spines. For an instant, Jake thinks she might be watching him, but she has no snorkel or mask. She isn't wearing a swimsuit, but rather is clad in only a shirt and panties. And she can't have looked at him because she has no eyes. What has this child done to die so young, to be forgotten and left to drift until consumed by the creatures of the sea?A voice whispers to let her go, but he can't leave her to the whim of the wind and tide ....a simple decision with deadly consequences.

Small-town lawyer Shep Harrington should have known nothing good could come of a sudden visit from a stranger. When former soap-opera star Sydney Vail lands on his doorstep all keyed up, Shep figures he should help the damsel in distress, going so far as to agree to baby-sit her companion, a very intelligent chimp named Kikora. Problem is, Sydney doesn't return, and soon Shep learns that she stole Kikora from a drug-testing laboratory and is being sought in connection with the murder of the lab's head scientist. With the help of close friends, a very persistent investigative reporter, and one crotchety old attorney, Shep decides to help defend Sydney, all the while becoming enlightened about the plight of laboratory animals.

Reilly Heartwood, a famous country singer, is dead. His sister doesn't recognise the body. The local reverend has refused to bury him. The funeral home director plans on exhibiting Reilly -- and charging admission -- to his adoring fans from all over the country. The people of Lyle detest Reilly -- holding him responsible for unmade fortunes and lost investments. His death, to the concern of no one other than his sister, is ruled a suicide. Shep, 32-year-old divorced and disbarred lawyer, arrives to attend the funeral of the now deceased Reilly Heartwood, and finds all of this too puzzling, especially the part about Reilly killing himself. Shep is compelled to ask a few questions, then a few more. Before he knows it, he's drawn into a complicated web of grudges, half-truths, and misplaced good intentions that only a small town could weave. As he reconstructs the final destructive minutes of Reilly's life, Shep ultimately learns the startling truth about his mother, Reilly, and himself. Shep is surrounded by a cast of characters--Doc Adams, the Reverend Billy, the four residents of the local poor farm (Jamie, Carrie, Harry, and Cecil) and Rose Abernathy to name a few.And Shep's life is complicated when he meets Cali McBride, a reporter in need of a story. Besides the death of Reilly Heartwood, there are several old mysteries to unravel. Why does the town hate Reilly? What is the connection between Reilly and someone named C.C. Hollinger (the name under which Reilly recorded most of his music)? What is the old feud between Shep's mother and Rose about? And what had Reilly planned for the poor farm? Shep, the book's main character and its likeable narrator, comes easily to his new role of amateur sleuth. Because of his own recent experience, he's deeply distrustful of authority, having just spent three years in prison for a white collar crime he didn't commit. Yet, in digging out the particulars of Reilly's demise, he is neither bitter nor uncaring, and the book manages adroitly to be an engaging who-dunnit set in a small town. Woven into the story line are universal themes -- classic injustice, unrequited love, and consequences of an unforgiving heart.