When sniper fire erupts at the Central Coast Surf Trials at Pismo Beach, private investigator Thad Hanlon is thrust into every parent’s worst nightmare. His eleven-year-old son and two teammates are shot while surfing—one critically injured—plunging the contest into chaos and terrorizing the tight-knit Five Cities beach community.

The shooter disappears, torching his hideout, leaving only questions in his wake. Random attack—or the first move in a deadly game? Why target young surfers? And is the marksman finished…or just getting started?

Urged by desperate parents, Hanlon and his sharp-witted partner, Bri de la Guerra, race to protect the kids as they train for the upcoming West Coast Championships. But as the detective duo close in on the sniper, they uncover a chilling truth:  the surf team isn’t his ultimate target—and the nightmare is far from over.

This gripping thriller will keep you turning pages late into the night.
 

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Book Excerpt

Chapter 1

I was sitting under a beach canopy in the spectator section of the California Central Coast Surf Trials, watching the first heat of the semifinals, when I heard the sonic crack of a large firearm. Something long-range like the scoped high-precision rifle my business partner, Bri, uses to qualify at the Five Cities Shoot’n Center.

“What was that?” my son’s surf coach asked. Gev Burian was sitting on my left. “Sounded like it came from behind us.”

Bri de la Guerra, on my right, stood to check things out. “Cityside, yeah. I’m thinking .30 cal. Maybe three-oh-eight.”

I swiveled to scan the low-rise buildings of downtown Pismo—the seafood cafes, souvenir shops, and beach rentals. Clumps of tourists meandering down narrow Pomeroy Avenue stopped. Some gazed skyward, herd-like, examining the highest roofline—the old Hotel Pier Vista. Others rushed indoors.

When a second blast didn’t happen soon after, I saw pedestrians raise their palms in the classic “what’s up” shrug before continuing their weekend saunter. Some, trailing well-groomed dogs on leashes, took refuge in their smartphones.

I turned to face the Pacific as Bri sat in her folding chair. Coach Gev got out his binocs and we rejoined the hundreds of other parents, friends, and supporters along the beach to watch the tournament.

Three junior surfers, ages eleven to twelve—”grommets” in surf jargon—were perched on their boards 100 yards offshore in the chilly morning waters north of Pismo Pier. The contestants wore different colored jerseys over their wetsuits. Red jersey had priority takeoff; the next wave was his. As the kids waited for the sets to roll in, they bobbed in the mushy surf like sitting ducks.

“Yellow’s down!” Coach Gev shouted. He handed me his binoculars. “The kid’s slumped sideways off his board.”

“Cramp, maybe?” I pressed the field glasses to the bridge of my nose, fiddling with the adjustments. “January water temps are cold, fifty-three, fifty-four degrees. These temps? He should have worn a 5/4/3 mm instead. Maybe even a—”

There was a second sonic crack. I watched Yellow’s board splinter into pieces. Chunks of the foam core ringed the downed contestant as he struggled to keep his head above water.

Red jersey, closest to Yellow, dropped prone and paddled with fury toward him. Just as he was about to grab Yellow’s arm, I heard shot three. There was a splash near the tail of Red’s board.

Red turned turtle, flipping his tri-fin surfboard over so the bottom faced the sky. Only his hands, gripping the sides of the shortboard, were exposed.

Shot four took out Red’s middle fin. Shots five and six took out the two outer fins. Red let go of his board and sank out of view.

That left the eleven-year-old in the light blue jersey as the only contender sitting on the water. My son, Zael, was in full competition mode, hyper-focused on The One Thing—a wave with his name on it. A wave built by the sea gods just for him, for his performance, his tricks, the ones he’d stick. The 10-rating he’d be awarded by all three judges. That perfect ten.

Zael was in the zone, tunnel vision his ally. Chaos bending to will. He had no clue what had happened to Red and Yellow.

I popped out of my beach chair, sprinted from our shade canopy to the shoreline, and screamed as I waded in. “Duck and cover, Zael! Get down! Now!” I waved my arms, zigzagging through the shallows.

My son wasn’t hearing me, wasn’t seeing me, wasn’t even attuned to my panic despite his gift for sensing things unspoken. Zael paddled hard for takeoff, slid into the three-foot wave breaking off the pier, and dropped into the curl. He drove down the line, pumping his board to build speed, then bottom turned, and angled toward the lip to launch into his signature 360-degree air rotation and...

Blam.

Shot seven.

Zael’s right leg buckled. He lost balance and angled into a dive as far away from his board as his leash would let him. When he didn’t come up for air, I stopped sloshing and anchored my feet, wondering where the ocean would take him and where he’d surface. The pause felt like forever, a place outside of now.

And in that fourth dimension, inside the warp of space and time, I replayed each rifle shot. All seven.

Aim.

Fire.

Repeat.

A total of sixty seconds of sniper crazy.

Then nothing, other than the sound of fear and...crashing waves nudging me to make a 180-degree visual scan. I cranked my neck all the way right, then left, methodically searching for a hint of blue jersey. Maybe an arm. A leg breaking the surface of the Pacific.

Nothing.

I did a half-circle sweep of the beach, hoping Zael might have dragged himself ashore.

A father’s desperate hope.

In that microsecond glimpse, I saw the community spooked into action, with some spectators running for cover behind the iconic eight-foot-tall letters of the Pismo Beach sign, the centerpiece of Pier Plaza, while others scrambled to the walls of the sixteen-foot concrete embankment, where the plaza descends to sand level. Everyone panicked. Active shooter on the loose.

Bri and Coach Gev were safely hunkered in place, protected by a rampart fifteen surfboards thick, built from the surf team’s spares. Zael wasn’t with them at the team tent. He hadn’t somehow made it out of the water.

I cranked my neck to the right again and focused on the spot where Zael had gone under, willing him to surface, relying on physics and Archimedes’ buoyant force to push him upward, knowing the mismatch in density between the ever-so-light Zael and the heavy Pacific seawater couldn’t keep him down forever. Eventually, my son would come up. He had to. The physics weren’t optional.

I watched and waited, and watched and waited some more, seconds ticking.

It was another two minutes and fifteen seconds before Zael rose from the deep. But not in an explosive burst to the surface, trailing a rush of spray, followed by a sharp gasp for air as he struggled to refill his lungs. It was more like a limp bob.

Members of the Pismo Beach Lifeguard Team had scrambled into action at the first sign of surfer distress. One lifeguard was already in the water assisting Yellow, another was halfway to Red, and the third, orange torpedo buoy in hand, had just entered the water and was high-stepping toward my son in the blue jersey.

I was fifty yards in front of Lifeguard Three, chest-deep in the frigid Pacific. With another fifty yards to go, I’d get to Zael first. Seconds that could make a difference. I kicked off the ocean bottom and dove into the shore break, fingers crunched tight into blades, allowing me to jab the water with long rhythmic pulls. I swam, head up, eyes always on Zael, pounding out freestyle strokes only a frantic father could make. Monster crawls to close the distance between me and the only earthly connection to my late wife, Marissa.

When I reached my son, he crumpled into my arms. Zael wasn’t breathing.
 

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