He freed a monster. Now the city wants his head.

Mitchum Sweeney is fifty, separated from his wife, and one bad hand away from financial ruin.

By day, he's a judicial staff attorney at Oakland's Superior Court. By night, he's dodging creditors and chasing lost causes. But when his expert testimony sets cartel kingpin Paco Castillo free, Mitch becomes a target - for the union, the FBI, and Paco himself.

Castillo has one final demand: find his missing wife, and Mitch's mountain of gambling debt disappears.

But when Mitch's search uncovers evidence of a child trafficking ring buried in the justice system itself, the stakes turn lethal.

As bullets fly and bodies drop, Mitch is forced to reckon with his past and confront impossible choices - because the truth won't set him free, and saving the people he loves might mean damning himself for good . . .

A razor-sharp legal thriller packed with corruption, blackmail, and moral reckoning. Perfect for fans of John Grisham, Michael Connelly, Scott Turow, James Patterson and Harlan Coben.

Meet Mitch Sweeney. He's a divorced judicial staff attorney with a gambling problem and a job that keeps him behind the scenes. At 50, Mitch isn't looking for trouble - just a smooth path to retirement and maybe a second chance with his ex-wife and son. But when he's pulled into the orbit of a violent criminal empire, Mitch must dust off his old skills from his life as a private investigator - the very life that cost him his family - and find out how far he's willing to go for the truth.