On the day of her friend's wedding, Special Agent Smoky
Barrett did not expect to have a case dropped on her,
literally. Discovering that a murderer-for-hire makes good
on his promise to deliver the tortured wives he has agreed
to kill seven years later in revenge for reneged
assassination contracts drives Smoky to pursue the
husbands, as well as the killer. A torture victim from when
a previous case went south, Smoky can put herself in the
minds of the victims; however, she has to be able to
imagine the inner thoughts of a coldhearted killer to be
able to catch this criminal.
ABANDONED is levels beyond the basic "catch a serial
killer" genre. The writing is edgy, realistic and fast-
paced. Cody McFadyen rushes into realms where
reality's twisted people ply their trade, and he does so
expertly.
For FBI Special Agent Smoky Barrett, the wedding of one of
their own was cause for celebration. Until a woman
staggered down the aisle, incoherent, emaciated, head
shaved, and wearing only a white nightgown. No one knows
who she is or where she’s come from—or why she’s chosen to
appear in a church filled with law enforcement agents.
Then a fingerprint check determines that the woman has
been missing for nearly eight years—that once she was
someone’s wife, someone’s mother…and a cop. Imprisoning
her in a dark cell, depriving her of any contact with the
outside world, her enigmatic captor was a man she didn’t
know and who seldom spoke, who punished her only when she
failed to follow his most basic instructions designed to
keep her alive.
Cold, businesslike, seemingly indifferent
to his victims, he’s a predator with an M.O. as
terrifyingly inscrutable as any Smoky has ever
encountered. As she fits together the pieces of what
remains of his victim’s fractured life, a chilling picture
emerges of a killer every bit as calculating, masterful,
and professional as Smoky and the team she leads—a
professional psychopath who doesn’t take murder personally
and never makes a mistake. There’s a reason he let one of
his victims go free. And by the time Smoky pierces the
darkness of his twisted mind, it may cost her more than
she can bear to lose to escape. For a trap snapped closed
the moment she took this case too much to heart.