A special agent’s search for a serial killer turns personal when one of her own becomes a target in this new, engrossing series of murder, mystery, and revenge.
They disappear without a trace. . . and then they die

Deep inside a national forest, Special Agent Ricki James stands in the middle of a killing field that was never meant to be found. The victims are all naked, with no identification and no clues other than a single bullet hole in their skulls. With the carnage laying all around her, Ricki only knows two things for sure: they were all murdered execution-style, and a killer who goes to this extreme to hide his work, isn’t finished yet.
Teaming up with the local police chief, she starts a dangerous hunt for a serial killer who moves like smoke through the forest and hides in plain sight within a crowd. The only common link between the victims that Ricki uncovers is one she shares with them herself. When she finds the blood-soaked remains of the latest murder, the body isn’t even cold before another person vanishes in broad daylight. But this time the killer strikes close to home in a direct, taunting challenge for Ricki to follow him if she can.
Now it’s no longer a game of cat and mouse, but a race against time. A race she must win, or someone she loves will die.

Ricki James is faced with a pair of baffling murders and a desperate killer in this suspense-filled mystery/thriller.
Will a cold case from fifty years ago put her in a grave today?

There is no doubt that Maxwell Hardy was shot in the chest. So was the other body lying nearby in the rundown and long-abandoned lighthouse. Aside from that, all Special Agent Ricki James knows is that Max was a private investigator, the other victim was an unknown park ranger who was never reported missing, and both died in the same way and the same place. . . fifty years apart.
As Ricki digs into the past to find the connection between the two murders, the baffling cases quickly take a dark turn. Without any warning ‘accidents’ start to happen, each one more deadly than the last.
Someone who was willing to kill half a century ago, is ready to kill again today, and his sights are set on Ricki. The closer she gets to the truth, the more likely she will end up in a grave of her own so that an old, closely kept secret, can stay buried forever.

Special Agent Ricki James has a personal stake in solving a murder, and an old score to settle, in this gripping, suspense-filled mystery thriller.
Digging up secrets might get her buried with them.

It’s been eighteen months since Special Agent Ricki James was shot and her partner killed, in an ambush during a routine prisoner transport. Despite recurring nightmares, Ricki has slowly pulled the pieces of her life back together and is wearing the badge once more. She’s already solved several tough cases but now things have settled down and she is enjoying some much-deserved breathing space. . . until a second agent is found dead, with a bullet in his side.
Ricki can’t ignore the strong connection between the two murders, so she finagles her way onto the case despite the ambush occurring out of her district. The murdered agent and her former partner both deserve justice, and she’s determined to unearth the truth no matter what it is, or whom it might lead to.
Before she realizes it she's knee-deep in a tangled web of conspiracy and murder. Now her life on the line as she is forced to confront the real meaning of trust and betrayal.

Special Agent Ricki James is assigned a case that is far outside her comfort zone, and leads her down a dark road created by a twisted mind.
If the only way to catch a killer is to step into his trap, will she do it?

Special Agent Ricki James is less than thrilled to be assigned to a case by none other than Dr. Jonathan Blake. The top profiler in the country has made good on his promise to form an inter-agency team to investigate a string of unsolved murders, and he has made very sure that Ricki is on it. Whether she wants to be or not.
But her distrust of the FBI profiler quickly takes a back seat to the puzzle he hands over to the team. Ricki can’t decide if it is a single disturbing case or a dozen separate ones. The bodies were found hundreds of miles from each other and none of the forensics match. The only connection between the victims is how they were murdered, and a square patch of skin missing from each of the victim’s torsos.
As the team follows a twisted trail of evidence, Ricki has a gut feeling that they aren’t hunting a killer, but being lured by one into a trap that none of them can survive.

When hunter and hunted come face-to-face, who will blink first?

Special Agent Ricki James, a criminal investigator with the National Park Service, was finally back home in Northwest Washington. After closing her last grueling case, she’s looking forward to some quiet time with her friends and family, not to mention enjoying her growing relationship with the local police chief, Clayton Thomas.
But all her plans disappear in the blink of an eye when an attack on a pair of hikers hundreds of miles away happens again in the park she can see from her own backdoor. This time the target is an entire group out on a wilderness trip in the park, and led by her ex-husband. But it isn’t only wounded hikers being sent to the local hospital. There are also dead bodies in the morgue.
As her former husband lies critically injured in a hospital bed, all Ricki knows is that the victims were in town attending a conference at a nearby luxury resort. But aside from mingling over cocktails, she can’t find another link between them. As she struggles to uncover any small clue that will lead her to their killer, another attack occurs. Now it is Ricki whose life is on the line when she comes face-to-face with the deadliest adversary she has ever hunted.

Special Agent Ricki James’ every move is being watched by an unknown figure who keeps to the shadows, following her team as they chase a killer through the rugged backcountry of a national park.

The report for her last case is barely finished when Special Agent Ricki James is called on to help a fellow agent track down illegal hunters operating in North Cascades National Park. But the hunters aren’t the only thing they find. Deep in the forest, and way off the trail, there’s a body, with a bullet in his back and another in his head-- grisly proof that hunting deer isn’t the only illegal activity going on in the wild, untamed park.
When more bodies are uncovered, and their prime suspect is murdered, the stakes climb to new heights as innocent park visitors are in danger of becoming collateral damage. With the investigative unit stretched thin, Ricki is forced to accept help from Dr. Jonathan Blake. She’s had run-ins with the famous FBI profiler before and does not want to owe him any favors. But with few clues and even fewer resources, there isn’t much choice.
As the investigation heats up, Ricki receives threats pointing directly at her from someone who is also searching for the killer. Someone who is careful to keep to the shadows of the forest, and no one has seen in decades. In the small town just outside the park, he’s talked about in whispers as “the Hermit”.
It’s unnerving to be shadowed by someone who know the park better than she does, and who’s blatantly told Ricki that if she doesn’t catch the killer soon, then he will. And he’ll dispose of anyone who gets in his way. Now catching a killer isn’t Ricki’s only problem. She must fight to keep the team from being cornered in the backcountry because that’s where the Hermit operates best. If he traps them there, no one will walk out of the forest alive.

It’s the case every agent dreads: one of their own is among the dead.

Special Agent Ricki James stands in a peaceful field stained with the blood of seven people, all victims of a mass killing. The slaughter is horrific enough, but when one of the dead is a fellow agent, it makes the hunt for this killer a personal one.