'Watch this writer.
She does it all.'
- Kirkus Reviews
‘Compton has a definite gift for creating flawed, multidimensional characters,
and Hailey may be her most compelling creation so far.‘
- Booklist
Twenty-three-year-old Hailey Cain is going nowhere fast. A bike messenger on the chaotic streets of San Francisco, she’s trying to outrun her failure to graduate from West Point, as well as the tragic accident that forced her to leave Los Angeles.
When an old friend calls asking for a favor, it seems like an easy task: drive a naive teenage girl home to her family’s village in rural Mexico. But on an isolated highway, Hailey and her charge drive into a calculated ambush by heavily-armed men. Hailey is shot. The girl disappears.
When Hailey recovers, she realizes that she knew nothing about the girl’s true identity and motives.
The smart thing to do now is to go home and stop thinking about it. But Hailey is done with doing the smart thing, the safe thing, the easy thing. Instead, Hailey goes on a mission for answers ... and for justice.
Book 1 of 2.
'Addictive ... Hailey's comet continues to shine.'
Hailey Cain is back in Los Angeles after a battle with a powerful organized-crime figure which nearly got her killed. Now, Hailey’s carved out a life on the wrong side of the law, as the second-in-command to her old friend, the rising gangster Serena ‘Warchild’ Delgadillo.
But just as Hailey’s slipped off the authorities’ radar, disaster: A double homicide in San Francisco, with all evidence pointing to her as the shooter. Hailey knows she was in Los Angeles the night of the murders, but she can’t prove it. And since one of the murder victims was an SFPD officer, coming forward isn’t just unwise, it could be fatal.
There’s only one thing to do: with Serena at her back, Hailey goes on the road again, north to track down a killer and reclaim the one thing she still has of value: her good name.
Book 2 of 2.
‘This is serious, first-class crime fiction.’
- Publishers Weekly
On a cold Minnesota morning, Detective Sarah Pribek comes home to a puzzling answering-machine message: her husband, a homicide detective who was supposed to start his FBI training, never showed up at Quantico. When Sarah finds his packed bag underneath their bed, she knows: her husband has disappeared. As hours turn into days, Sarah finds herself investigating on her own. Her colleagues, following the wisdom on missing adult males, suspect that Mike Shiloh has simply walked out on his life in the Twin Cities, including his wife.
But though Shiloh’s co-workers in the MPD consider him remote and sharp-tongued, Sarah knows her husband to be unflinchingly loyal and protective of those he loves. She cannot believe that Shiloh would leave her with no warning, and she embarks on a investigation that includes the cold case that made Shiloh famous, and then his childhood in a stifling, deeply-religious home. But when the trail of evidence turns back toward home, Sarah has no choice but to turn to her old partner, and they head for a showdown with a killer who has never paid for his crimes ...
Book 1 of 3
'First-rate ... Compton scores big.'
- Library Journal (starred review)
Six months after the death of a small-town criminal in rural Minnesota, Sarah Pribek is still protecting the identity of a killer. Now an ambitious D.A.’s investigator has come to town to close the case, and with Sarah’s husband in prison and her partner half a world away, only Sarah remains to face the consequences of last fall ...
Providing a much-needed distraction is a perplexing missing-persons case: the son of a famous, reclusive novelist is unaccounted for, perhaps a runaway. Despite the lack of evidence for foul play, the boy’s twin sister pleads for help from Sarah -- but she, and she seems to be hiding as much information as she’s sharing. As Sarah reluctantly steps in to help, she discovers hints that the family is haunted by a much older and more serious crime. Caught up in a cat-and-mouse game with an investigator who wants to ruin her, drawn ever deeper into a family's tangled past, Sarah fears that a misstep on her part will end not only in her disgrace, but in the death of one of those she has promised to protect.
Book 2 of 3.
Redball: The conclusion of the Sarah Pribek trilogy
Detective Sarah Pribek has seen what happens when a cop goes rogue in pursuit of justice: Her husband Shiloh is in prison, serving the last of his sentence. Since his conviction, Sarah’s own choices have earned her a reputation on the force as an erratic maverick. Now, just as she’s finally getting back on her feet, Sarah is pleased to be appointed to a task force investigating the murder of a University of Minnesota student. The case is a “redball,” a high-profile investigation closely watched by the brass, the media and the public. During a round of routine interviews, Sarah questions a young man who leaves her chilled to her nerve endings. A background investigation quickly turns up evidence that further implicates him, and she is certain she’s found their killer. Then, disaster. A voluntary blood test exonerates the man. Sarah is convinced that the results are wrong. Yet how could that be? She was there. She saw the blood drawn. But when another young woman dies, Sarah finds herself throwing out the rule book in hopes that she can stop a killer who now believes himself untouchable.
Book 3 of 3.