This is the moving and powerful story of innocence and betrayal told in the endearingly wise voice of thirteen-year-old Nellie Peck. It is early summer, and her beloved father's business is failing. Forced to take care of her shy younger brother, Nellie is determined to make him--and herself--toughen up. Three strangers enter Nellie's protected life: mysterious and brutish Max Devaney works in her grandfather's junkyard, the thieving Bucky Saltonstall...

Four-year-old Marissa Fordham, brutally slashed and mutilated, witnessed the murder of her mother. To protect their fragile witness, the police call in Anne Leone, child advocate. But when one loose thread begins to unravel the shroud of lies behind the case, a truth more terrible than anyone could have imagined is revealed--a truth that will put Anne and Haley directly in the sights of a killer

"Daughter of a cold, controlling mother and an anonymous donor, studious, obedient Elizabeth Fitch finally let loose one night, drinking too much at a nightclub and allowing a strange man's seductive Russian accent to lure her to a house on Lake Shore Drive. The events that followed changed her life forever. Twelve years later, the woman now known as Abigail Lowery lives alone on the outskirts of a small town in the Ozarks. A freelance programmer,...

Seattle police sergeant Lou Boldt is stunned when the local fire investigator presents him with frightening evidence in a series of fires that have occurred in the Seattle area. These white-hot fires burn so cleanly that even the ash disintegrates-leaving not a trace of its victims or any evidence of criminal activity. Only when Boldt is taunted by someone sending him pieces of melted green plastic-houses from a Monopoly board, does he realize that...

When a young Amish woman and her son get caught up in the murder of an undercover narcotics agent, their savior turns out to be the hardened Philadelphia detective John Book, who runs head-on into the non-violent world of a Pennsylvania Amish community.