The Front — Patricia Cornwell

At Risk featured Massachusetts state investigator Win Garano, a shrewd man of mixed-race background and a not inconsiderable chip on his shoulder; District Attorney Monique Lamont, a hard-charging woman with powerful ambitions and a troubling willingness to cut corners; and Garano's grandmother, who has certain unpredictable talents that you ignore at your peril.

And in The Front, peril is what comes to them all. D.A. Lamont has a special job for Garano. As part of a new public relations campaign about the dangers of declining neighborhoods, she's sending him to Watertown to "come up with a drama," and she thinks she knows just the case that will serve. Garano is very skeptical, because he knows that Watertown is also the home base for a loose association of municipal police departments called the FRONT, set up in order that they don't have to be so dependent on the state--much to Lamont's anger. He senses a much deeper agenda here--but he has no idea just how deep it goes. In the days that follow, he'll find that Lamont's task, and the places it leads him, will resemble a house of mirrors--everywhere he turns, he's not quite sure if what he's seeing is true.

"Falsehoods rule," warns his grandmother. And they can also kill.