[Moriah Dru and Richard Lake Mysteries 02] • The Last Temptation

Recovering addict Eileen Cameron and her daughter Kinley Whitney have vanished from Eileen's Palm Springs home. Kinley's custodial father, Bradley Whitney, lives in Atlanta. Eileen and Bradley are locked in a custody battle, and Bradley believes Eileen has taken Kinley to hide with the Indians in the desert. The court hires Moriah Dru of Child Trace to find and bring Kinley home.

Bradley's academic credentials are solid, but Dru is wary. He's rich and involved with the secretive Cloisters. Dru and lover, police Lieutenant Richard Lake, delve into Bradley's past, while Lake investigates the Atlanta Suburban Girl murders.

In Palm Springs, Dru meets a host of glitzy suspects, including Dartagnan LeRoi, a cop; Arlo Cameron, Eileen's movie director husband; Heidi, Arlo's widowed neighbor; Eileen's hairdresser, a cross-dresser named Theodosia; a donut-maker named Zing; Indian princess Contessa (Tess) Rosovo; and Phillippe, a self-styled Frenchman who claims he's a Cordon Bleu chef. Phillippe says everyone in "The Springs" is an actor.

To help find Eileen and Kinley, Tess takes Dru to the high desert for a Moon Maiden ceremony. Dru spots a young girl in a wig. Tess notices Dru's attention to the girl. Dru passes out then wakes in the desert scrub as a monsoon rages. Terrified, she's swept over a rock waterfall to certain death. Her miraculous survival brings her even greater pain.

The Last Temptation is an edgy mystery thriller loaded with eccentric oddballs. Murder and deceit are no strangers to glamorous Palm Springs. Nor to Atlanta.