Ten years of marriage. One murdered wife. And a husband everyone is certain did it. When Annabel Benson is found dead, suspicion falls immediately on her husband, Nathan. Their marriage looked solid enough from the outside, but marriages rarely are what they look like from the outside. When a second victim turns up and she is identified as Nathan's mistress, the case against him seems to close itself.

Almost everyone is satisfied. DI Geraldine Steel isn't.

Uneasy about where the investigation is heading, and unable to shake the feeling that her colleagues are chasing the wrong man, Geraldine starts pulling on a thread of her own. Somewhere a killer has been waiting for her.

With Geraldine gone and no way to trace her, Ian and the rest of the team are left working blind, racing to find a colleague who might already be beyond saving.

The twenty-sixth Geraldine Steel novel puts one of British crime fiction's most trusted detectives in more danger than she has ever faced, and asks how far instinct can be trusted when it might cost you everything.



Leigh Russell is one of the UK's most prolific and successful crime writers. She studied English and American Literature at the University of Kent before pursuing a career in teaching. Her debut novel, Cut Short, introduced DI Geraldine Steel in 2009 and launched what has become one of the most enduring series in British crime fiction. There are now twenty-six Geraldine Steel novels, which have sold over two million copies worldwide and been translated into many languages. Cut Short was shortlisted for the Crime Writers' Association John Creasey New Blood Dagger, and Leigh has since been longlisted for the CWA Dagger in the Library. She is a member of the Crime Writers' Association and lives in England, where she continues to write full time.