Early in the morning, Lieutenant Lauren Riley is sent to investigate a murder in a notorious, wealthy and politically charged resort in the Sierra Nevada. This will be an interagency investigation because the summons came from Plumas County to her Sheriff in Butte County. From the beginning, it will be complicated, but the tangles do not fully reveal themselves until the investigation is underway, and they keep on coming.
The Lieutenant was born in Moluku Lake. She is the daughter of one of the tribal council members. The tribe is poised to open a casino in the resort – in direct competition with the current hub of all that happens in Moluku Lake – the Eagle Nest Empire. Everyone is for or against the casino and yet, nothing is likely to stop it, unless scandals, blackmail and extortion can slow it down!
Riley arrives in Moluku Lake as a blizzard already crossing the Sacramento Valley up into the foothills. The storm won’t slow down this ski resort that is designed to function in snow, but it will place pressure on the annual benefit gala for the art council: the masque ball. And it will allow the sheriff to close the roads in and out of the resort – which traps everyone in a super charged arena as a second murder threatens to unhinge everything.
Moluku Lake is a pleasurable and private destination for the wealthy but behind the obvious opulence, colossal and unscrupulous egos twist back and forth – not for money but in order to demonstrate their power and control. Nothing is what it seems at first and there is nothing like murder to ignite mayhem. The ambitious Lieutenant must sort it all out while keeping her own balance amid help and hinder in a town where everything is the color of ice and just as elusive.
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