"As rival drug gangs battle for supremacy on their patch, Detective Chief Superintendent Colin Harpur and Assistant Chief Constable Desmond Iles struggle to salvage some kind of equilibrium - or at least to set some limit on the brutality. Iles, practical and worldly, has always favoured the 'blind eye' arrangement with senior villain 'Panicking" Ralph Ember, in exchange for peace on the streets. But all this is about to change." "Panicking's situation is suddenly under horrifying siege. The drug importers who keep him supplied have been slaughtered by a new, crooked team who demand that Panicking now deals only with them. His sidekick, Beau Derek, is brutally murdered in front of him as a warning that he could be next and to top it all off his wife leaves him, fed up with his constantly broken promises to go straight." "Panicking's way of handling the situation is immediately to console himself with Beau Derek's widow while deciding to take justice - or at least, his interpretation of it - into his own hands. Harpur, meanwhile, is trying to sort out the harsh complexities of this crisis from the other side of the law while simultaneously fending off the meddlesome and unprincipled Iles. Whatever the outcome, there is certain to be a good deal more violence, and further loss of life."--BOOK JACKET.