The dramatic new novel in the Philadelphia police saga by #1 New York Timesβbestselling author W. E. B. Griffin.
In Philadelphiaβsuffering among the countryβs highest murder ratesβthe tension between the Philadelphia Police Department and its Citizens Oversight Committee has long been reaching a boiling point. That turmoil turns from bad to worse shortly after the committee begins targeting police shootingsβespecially those of twenty-seven-year-old Homicide Sergeant Matt Payne, the βWyatt Earp of the Main Lineββand then the committeeβs combative leader is found shot dead point-blank on the front porch of his run-down Philly row house.
As chanting protesters fill the streets, the city threatens to erupt. Payne, among many others accused of being complicit in the leaderβs death, becomes quietly furious. He suspects thereβs something deeper behind it all, but what? Ordered to stay out of the line of fire, he struggles ahead to do what he does bestβ his job. Heβs been investigating the murder of a young family. A reporter, working on an illicit drug series for Pulitzer Prizeβwinning journalist Mickey OβHara, has been killed with his wife and child, a note stapled to his chest warning that the drug stories are to stop. Period. While Payne knows that he, like his pal OβHara, cannot back down, he also knows that they damn sure could be among the next to die. . . .
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