The Wolf Path — Judith Van Gieson

MAN -- THE DEADLIEST ANIMAL

The temperature is hitting 104 degrees when Neil Hamel leaves her shoestring Albuquerque law practice for the Soledad border country. As a favor to an old friend, Neil has agreed to help a radical environmentalist. An Anglo with a past as strange as his name, Juan Sololobo has come to campaign for the reintroduction of wolves. He has a permit for his own wolf, but local ranchers' hackles go up fast. When the wolf vanishes and a friendly federal official turns up dead, only Neil believes Sololobo hasn't committed murder.

Following an eerie trail known to smugglers and illegal immigrants as "the wolf path" Neil embarks upon a deadly high-desert hunt where someone hides a secret he will kill to keep.