A charred female torso in a torched Cadillac and a fretting relative send Smokey Brandon undercover in Ayres's second mystery, after A World the Color of Salt . Smokey, a civilian employee in the Orange County, Calif., sheriff's forensics department, learns from her brother Nathan that Miranda Robertson, one of his ex-wives, has vanished. Smokey has no comfort to offer: the burned car in her case was registered to Miranda, whose physician-husband claims she is vacationing in Italy. According to Nathan, Miranda was sleeping with (in addition to himself) Monty Blackman, who shared her fondness for motorcycles. With her boss's permission, Smokey taps into her experience as a Vegas stripper to land a job at Monty's bar, which features ``young ladies in lingerie at lunchtime.'' Monty turns out to be a man of many parts, some of which Smokey finds attractive until she wanders away from a rally she and he are attending and sees two of his chums coolly slit a man's throat. On reporting to the police, Smokey understands that she has stumbled on something bigger than she suspected--and that she is going back in. Although Smokey has a full ration of soft spots, her second appearance is as gritty as a mouthful of ashes, offering a convincing, high-speed chase for readers who don't mind riding with tattooed hog lovers. (July)
Ayres writes hard-hitting crime fiction that's vivid, graphic, and visceral. Smokey Brandon, former striptease artist and cop, now works as a civilian employee of the Orange County, California, crime lab. She's a hard-living, tough-talking gal with an attitudebut she's damn good at her job and practically fearless when it comes to confronting danger. Smokey's latest assignment is to discover the identity of a woman's body found burned beyond recognition in a rural canyon. At first fearing the victim is her brother Nathan's ex-wife, Smokey soon becomes convinced that going undercover is her only hope to solve the case. Disguising herself as a motorcycle groupie, she's soon pulled into a dangerous world where violence is an everyday occurrence and where her own life is threatened by a brutal and mysterious killer. Ayres' story is chilling and well told, combining dark humor, gritty realism, plenty of gut-wrenching, eye-popping action, andnow and thena welcome dose of Smokey's own brand of cheerful charm.
