ALLIGATOR ALLEY

A much-respected Department of Justice administrator’s reservations about the apparently random shooting of a colleague sends D.C. fixer Joe DeMarco on a journey to identify the real killers (not hard) and bring them to justice (much harder).

Andie Moore, found shot dead behind the wheel of her car, seems to have been the victim of an impatient thief. But her boss, Congressional Medal of Honor winner Henry Cantor, who runs the DOJ's Oversight and Review Division, is convinced that her murder is connected to her investigation of Lenny and Estelle Berman, who used the assisted living facility they owned to bilk Medicare of $15 million—which, Henry reminds House Speaker John Mahoney, is not all that much money. He’s right, of course: Andie had snapped a damning photo of McIntyre and McGruder, a pair of FBI agents investigating the case, executing the Bermans in an Everglades swamp so that they could pocket the proceeds themselves, and when they realized they’d been followed to the rendezvous, they tied up the unexpected loose end. It doesn’t take long for DeMarco and Emma, the Defense Department op he teams up with, to identify McIntyre and McGruder, but the killers have an accomplice who’s even more coldblooded than they are and even more intent on tying up loose ends. The quest to identify the murderers morphs into a quest to bring them to justice before they can tie up enough loose ends to sink Lawson’s consistently absorbing franchise. The denouement, well planned on every side, goes abruptly off the rails due to some unwelcome coincidences and a remarkably heroic gesture by one of the leading players.

Storytelling that’s as brisk, efficient, and unsentimental as the killers.