by J. A. Jance
Part of J.P. Beaumont, book 8
First published 1990
Seattle detective J.P. Beaumont hits rock bottom and lands at a rehabilitation facility in Arizona. The ranch houses all kinds of broken people seeking recovery, but Beaumont faces a special torment: sharing quarters with Joey Rothman, a teenage drug dealer whose arrogance makes him impossible to tolerate. Rothman shows no redeeming qualities and earns no sympathy from anyone around him. Then someone shoots the young man dead with Beaumont's own weapon. The detective finds himself trapped in an elaborate setup designed to destroy him completely. Someone has orchestrated every detail to make Beaumont look guilty of murder. As the evidence mounts against him, Beaumont must navigate a web of deception that threatens to send him to prison for life. The conspiracy runs deeper than he imagined, involving people who want him eliminated permanently. Fighting addiction while battling false murder charges, Beaumont discovers that his enemies will stop at nothing to see him fall.
Genres: addiction, suspense, mystery, crime, contemporary, psychological-thriller
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, false-accusations, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Arizona, Seattle
Period: Contemporary
384 pages · Mass Market Paperback · Avon
Content warnings: addiction, drug-use, murder, violence