Charlie Newton Libri

Patti Black is the most decorated cop in Chicago; a ghetto street officer, she redefines the word badass. But the steel-plated exterior she shows to the world - solitary, friendless, loveless - hides the hideous traumas of her past. As an orphaned child, she was horribly sexually abused by her foster parents, and the torments of the past are only barely contained by her meticulously maintained tough-guy persona. When a serious of seemingly unrelated cases - a drug bust gone bad, a mayoral assassination attempt, the abduction and murder of a state attorney, a long-hidden body walled up in a tenement basement - all point in her direction, she comes to the horrified realization that her past is no longer staying in its deeply suppressed place. It's back and hunting her down...

Set against the backdrop of World War I, the story unfolds as three determined women embark on a treasure hunt for $26 million in gold stolen by US marines in Haiti. Their quest, ignited by clues from a Chicago racetrack demolition, leads them to the perilous Corazón Santo triangle of Havana, Kingston, and Port-au-Prince. Joined by a savvy Chicago horseplayer, they navigate a treacherous landscape filled with modern piracy and shadowy forces, ultimately facing a harrowing decision between wealth, survival, and redemption.

Set against a backdrop of political turmoil and impending chaos, the story unfolds in Chicago, where tensions are at a boiling point. Canaryville, a gritty Irish neighborhood, becomes the epicenter of potential violence as the city teeters on the brink of a race war. With a police department facing federal intervention and the community grappling with economic despair, the narrative explores themes of loyalty, identity, and the struggle for survival in a divided society.