In pursuit of a shapeshifting killer, rookie homicide detective Kat Hicks must coax secrets from LA's Cambodian community?but a steamy affair with a female witness and her own war trauma threaten to derail her investigation.

In pursuit of an elusive killer, rookie homicide detective Kat Hicks must coax secrets from LA's Cambodian community?but a reckless affair with a female witness and her own war trauma threaten to derail her investigation.

In LA's vibrant Cambodia Town, former marine and first-year homicide detective Kat Hicks investigates the brutal murder of a Cambodian American boy. The graffiti on-scene shouts gang murder, but Hicks is suspicious of pat answers??the boy was a dance student passionate about restoring the arts of his 1,000-year-old culture, and a sacred statue he had in his possession is missing.

Using a sixth sense born on the battlefield, Hicks burrows into the victim's family's secrets?including his mother's shocking experiences in the killing fields of Cambodia?and soon gets plunged into a shadow world of antiquities dealers and international criminals so outrageous that her department dismisses her as unhinged. Already on shaky ground, when she engages in an explosive love affair with a female witness, she's removed from the case . . .

Frustrated by the department's refusal to believe her and tormented by her mistakes, Hicks goes rogue to catch the killer herself. From psychiatric facilities to cartel shoot-outs, she runs down every lead, no matter how unlikely, to a jaw-dropping finale?but ultimately, it's her empathy and the bonds she forges with the Cambodian American community that solve the crime. In turn, these friendships help quiet the ghosts of her turbulent past.