Years ago, Lucas Davenport almost died at the hands of Clara Rinker, a pleasant, soft-spoken, low-key Southerner, and the best hitwoman in the business. Now retired and living in Mexico, she nearly dies herself when a sniper kills her boyfriend, the son of a local druglord, and while the boy's father vows vengeance, Rinker knows something he doesn't: The boy wasn't the target-she was-and now she is going to have to disappear to find the killer herself. The FBI and DEA draft Davenport to help track her down, and with his fiancie deep in wedding preparations, he's really just as happy to go-but he has no idea what he's getting into. For Rinker is as unpredictable as ever, and between her, her old bosses in the St. Louis mob, the Mexican druglord, and the combined, sometimes warring, forces of U.S. law enforcement, this is one case that will get more dangerous as it goes along. And when the crossfire comes, anyone standing in the middle won't stand a chance.... Filled with the rich characterization and exceptional drama that are his hallmarks, Mortal Prey proves that John Sandford just keeps getting better.

“One of [the] best” (Orlando Sentinel) Lucas Davenport Novels—now with a New Introduction by the Author. Clara Rinker is twenty-eight, beautiful, charmingly southern—and the best hit woman in the business. She just goes about her business, collects her money, and goes home. Her latest hit sounds simple: a defense attorney wants a rival eliminated. No problem—until a witness survives. Clara usually knows how to deal with loose ends: cut them off, one by one, until they're all gone. This time, there’s one loose end that’s hard to shake. Lucas Davenport has no idea of the toll this case is about to take on him. Clara knows his weak spots. She knows how to penetrate them, and how to use them. And when a woman like Clara has the advantage, no one is safe.

He seems like such a nice man. You’d never guess what was going on in his mind… Art history professor James Qatar has a hobby: he takes secret photographs of women to fuel more elaborate fantasies. When he’s alone. Behind locked doors. Then one day, he goes a step further and... well, one thing leads to another. Qatar has no choice. He has to kill her. And you know something? He likes it. When Deputy Chief Lucas Davenport takes the case, he assumes it’ll be straightforward police work. He couldn’t be more wrong. As the investigation trail takes some unexpected turns, it becomes clear that nothing is straightforward about this killer, his victims, or his motives. And to stop him Lucas has no choice but to walk right into his lair. WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY JOHN SANDFORD

“One of the strongest in Sandford’s Prey series.”—Entertainment Weekly “Good, dark, perverse, bloody fun.”—The Washington Post Book World Theories abound when a Russian gets himself killed on the shore of Lake Superior—shot with fifty-year-old bullets. But when it turns out he had very high government connections, state troubleshooter Lucas Davenport gets the call. Well, Lucas and a mysterious Russian cop with secrets all her own. Together, they’ll follow a trail back to another place and another time, and battle the shadows they discover there—shadows that turn out to be both very real and very deadly.

Lucas Davenport has met his match-a brilliant, wanton killer who knows more about mind games than Lucas himself. This man is more depraved and intelligent than anybody Lucas has tracked before-and with a female psychiatrist in his trap, he's already one step ahead of Lucas...

The #1 New York Times bestselling Lucas Davenport novel from John Sandford. Two people are found hanging naked from a tree in the woods of northern Minnesota. What makes the situation particularly sensitive is the bodies are of a black man and a white woman. Lynching is the word everyone’s trying not to say, but as Lucas Davenport begins to discover, the murders are not at all what they appear to be. And there is worse to come—much, much worse. “All but impossible to put down.”—The Washington Post “Fast paced and full of surprises, this may be Sandford’s best novel yet.”—Library Journal

Lucas Davenport investigates an unsettling series of murders in this classic novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling series—and this one is John Sandford “at the top of his game” (New York Post)… In life she was a high-profile model. In death she is the focus of a media firestorm that’s demanding action from Lucas Davenport. One of his own men is a suspect in her murder. But when a series of bizarre, seemingly unrelated slayings rock the city, Davenport suspects a connection that runs deeper than anyone had imagined—one that leads to an ingenious killer more ruthless than anyone had feared... FEATURING A NEW INTRODUCTION BY THE AUTHOR