Steven F. Havill Final Payment

Final Payment

Steven F. Havill

Dunne, Jun 2007, $23.95

ISBN: 0312354150

In Posadas County, New Mexico, everyone excitedly awaits the first annual Posadas 100, a cross bicycle race; everyone that is except first responders like cops and ER personnel as they expect incidents and injuries. However, Under-sheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman has other concerns as she looks closely at the three Hispanic corpses, who were executed. However, just one look at their relatively expensive garb and affirmed by their soft hands tell Estelle these are not unfortunate illegal immigrants caught sneaking across the border and murdered by a vigilante group.

At about the same time, pilot Jerry Turner reports that someone apparently flew his Cessna 206 away from and back to the Posadas Airport; everyone including Estelle assumes it is drug traffickers, but no lingering evidence is found. At home, Estelle's seven-year-old son refuses to inform her, his music teacher or anyone what he plans to perform at his first piano recital. As much as she worries about him, more murders and a Mexican exchange art student's watercolor lead Estelle to believe she knows who is the next victim and why, but to stop this brilliant killer means risking her life.

This is a terrific New Mexico police procedural that will have the audience finishing it in one delightful read. The story line is fast-paced on both the official and personnel fronts as Estelle deals with a clever murderer and her even slyer son. Newcomers as well as Reyes-Guzman's fans will appreciate the heroine's balancing act of trying to stop a killer and remain alive so she can solve the deeper mystery of what piece her son will play.

Harriet Klausner