Short Cut to Santa Fe

Sale's charming Toronto duo, Inspector John Sanders and photographer Harriet Jeffries, are headed to Taos, N. M., for a vacation when they are drawn into their latest case, following Pursued by Shadows. At the Santa Fe airport they meet 11-year-old twins who have just missed the bus they were scheduled to take to Taos. Harriet and John pile the twins into their rental car and follow the bus, which they don't realize has been hijacked, up a twisting road into the mountains where they and the kids also come under the hijackers' control. Meanwhile in Taos, Harriet's photojournalist friend Kate, alarmed when Harriet and John don't show up, contacts authorities. While Harriet and John labor to get safely off the mountain and avoid a throat-slashing villain, Kate visits the fortified compound of the crime's mastermind hoping to learn what has happened to her friends; she too must devise an escape when the man locks her up. In this departure from her signature police procedurals, usually focusing on John's work, Sale packs her usual full measure of suspense and intrigue while allowing Harriet to shine in her own light. (July)