In the fourth novel of the series, Anita Cooper finds a solution to a very difficult problem while partying at a dance club. Jones, hired as a temporary bodyguard for a hip-hop producer, stops a knife fight on the dance floor. After subduing the attacker, he tosses his business card at the man to let him know where to find him for retaliation. Anita snatches the card and hires Jones.     

Anita is a maid for a very wealthy and well-known man in Washington DC. But, before she was a maid, she was a student at MIT. Her father was a research chemist until he committed a hit-and-run and was sent to prison for manslaughter, where he died. With no insurance or savings, all Anita has is the promise from her father that there is something of immense value in the house.  

A prison inmate who knew her father shows up and tells her it was her father’s wish that he look after her. Rod Mantooth becomes a boyfriend until six months later ransacks her home and disappears. The main clue for Jones to follow is Mantooth’s “Corvorado: a car with a ’67 Corvette front and a ’59 Eldorado rear.

Jones, formerly with the NY police department and the Secret Service, has no trouble jimmying a locked file cabinet, expecting to find the chemist’s notes. Instead, he finds a dog collar and a list of 90 “rules.” Now he understands his client’s subservient attitude and the real relationship between Anita and her boyfriend. Further investigation leads to a trail of damaged women left in Mantooth’s wake.

At this point, author Camacho might have crossed the line and lost readers due to subject matter. Instead, he shows Jones struggling to understand why smart women like Anita submit to degradation. There is shock value integral to the story, but Jones’ disgust, frustration and helplessness mirrors the readers’. Abuse is never an easy topic to write about, but Camacho manages to do it with integrity.

Earlier books in the series are THE TROUBLESHOOTER, COLLATERAL DAMAGE, and BLOOD AND BONE.