When an elderly Provincetown homeowner dies under what looks like natural causes, newly-minted police chief Silas Lopez feels a tug of doubt he can’t quite overcome. Suspicious tox-screen results spur him to discover a trove of meticulous notes on suspicious property deals all over her neighborhood—claims most people would dismiss as paranoia, if not for the pattern of missing records, unlisted sales, and silent companies snapping up properties. As Silas works the case, he finds himself up against a menacing real-estate frontman, a syndicate hiding behind shell corporations, and a conspiracy built on pressure, fear, and money. The investigation pulls him from quiet streets of Provincetown to the dark edges of Boston finance, where documents speak louder than bullets and the wrong questions can get a person erased. With Wren Bradford stepping in as a civilian advisor—grounding Silas in the human cost of displacement—he follows a trail of forged signatures, whispered threats, attempts on his life and one death too convenient to ignore. In a town where everybody wants a piece of paradise, Silas learns the hardest thing to protect isn’t property—it’s the people who still call it home.

Christopher Mirabile, the middle child of a small-town librarian, has loved books all his life. A magna cum laude graduate in English from Colgate University and a Boston College-trained lawyer, he built a career as an attorney, executive, and startup investor. He co-authored six books on early-stage investing, wrote for Inc. Magazine, and served as Chair of the Angel Capital Association and the SEC’s Investor Advisory Committee. Today, after decades in business and nonfiction, he has returned to his roots as a fiction writer. He lives in Provincetown, Massachusetts, with his wife, their three dogs, and visits from their two adult children.