[Shepherd 06] • The Taker

Francis Ackerman Jr. is incapable of fear and addicted to pain, but sometimes stopping the worst of the worst is a job for the best of the bad. Ackerman--an infamous mass murderer now working as a special consultant for the US government--must find a missing member of his team before she becomes the next victim of a serial killer known as the Taker. With the help of his brother, Special Agent Marcus Williams, Ackerman must solve a twenty-year old cold case that connects to a string of abductions surrounding the Navajo Nation. The investigation leads them deep into the heart of the largest American Indian reservation in the US, where a drug runner and gang leader has established his own kingdom in the small town of Roanhorse, NM. With the trail ending in the seemingly quiet town, Ackerman has no choice but to declare war in order to flush out the Taker and rescue the missing member of what he has begun to call his family. But the threats for Ackerman are not only external. He must also contend with increasingly frequent hallucinations and a growing concern that his symptoms are worsening...