"12.46: Thirteen-year-old Claire Bingley stands alone at a bus stop 12.47: Ted Conkaffey parks his car beside her 12.52: The girl is missing . . . Six minutes ? that?s all it took to ruin Detective Ted Conkaffey?s life. Accused but not convicted of Claire?s abduction, he escapes north, to the steamy, croc-infested wetlands of Crimson Lake. Amanda Pharrell knows what it?s like to be public enemy number one. Maybe it?s her murderous past that makes her so good as a private investigator, tracking lost souls in the wilderness. Her latest target, missing author Jake Scully, has a life more shrouded in secrets than her own ? so she enlists help from the one person in town more hated than she is: Ted Conkaffey. But the residents of Crimson Lake are watching the pair?s every move. And for Ted, a man already at breaking point, this town is offering no place to hide . . ." --Back cover.