The Tongue Merchant — Lance Hawvermale

Lieutenant Marcella Paraizo of the U.S. Coast Guard wasn't expecting to find a body aboard the drifting yacht--especially not that of her best friend. Marcella's friend Isabella was the heiress to a vast sugarcane fortune. She was also deaf. Now Marcella must enter Isabella's silent world to unlock the doors of a shadowy and unexpected past.

Marcella soon finds herself among the Caribbean's jetsetters and power-players, where ulterior motives are a way of life and billion-dollar corporations blur the lines between right and wrong. But she soon discovers that it's a short fall from the skyrise casinos and mega-resorts to the seedy urban lairs of drug-pushers and voodoo practitioners, as she follows a fragile trail of clues across the storm-wracked islands of the West Indies.

Defying an order from her superior officers, Marcella risks her career to continue her pursuit of Isabella's murderer. But when her prime suspect is found dead, it takes everything she has to hold off a court-martial, outmaneuver the FBI, and shore up her own wavering resolve.

Welcome to the Caribbean Sea, where illusion and lies conceal industrial espionage, forbidden love, and the true identities of international terrorists.