"Mass market paperback ... August 5, 2005"--Publisher web site.

"Santa Fe police chief Kevin Kerney travels to a California ranch looking to buy some prime quarter horse breeding stock. Instead, he finds himself the prime suspect in a possible homicide when the ranch owner, Clifford Spalding, is found dead. Confronted by a ... cop unwilling to let him off the hook, Kerney decides to conduct his own investigation. As he digs into the victim's background, he learns that Spalding's ex-wife refuses to believe that her son, a soldier killed in Vietnam some thirty years ago, is dead. Kerney digs deeper and ... finds himself sharing the woman's doubts ... 'Slow kill' races from West coast to East coast, as Kerney tries to extricate himself from a situation that could ruin his career"--The publisher.