Lines of Duty: Deputy Corus Mystery #1

For most military veterans, entering law enforcement is a smooth transition, but Corus was no ordinary soldier.

Mere weeks after returning from his final deployment, Corus is now a cadet at an elite police academy in Seattle. While doing grunt work at a local precinct, he comes across an unsolved pedestrian hit-and-run and the key to its resolution. Instincts forged in covert action plunge him headlong into criminal ranks, but taking the fastest route to answers runs roughshod over the delicate procedural approach he’s supposed to be learning. Corus knows he’s threatening his new life and career in the process, but putting the mission before self-preservation is the hardest habit of all to break.

Corus isn’t the vigilante type, and he certainly isn’t anti-authority, but the journey home has torn him between competing senses of duty, duty to embrace procedure and civilian life and the duty to bring evil men to justice at all costs. The one person who can help Corus sort through his issues is the least likely of all. Albert Chu is a cheery and childlike cadet who's failing the academy but has a knack for getting into Corus' head. In trying to rein Corus in, he ends up proving his mettle and together they fight to prevent multiple murders and foil a kidnapping plot, even while the eye of the law they hoped to serve is turned on their actions.

Can Corus unite the lines of duty pulling him in different directions, or will he end up another casualty of the war he brought home?

All through Corus’ journey runs a cracking mystery/crime story with humor, thrills, and a cast of well-drawn side characters, from small-time gangsters and rodeo riff-raff to Corus' wife who grapples with her own grifter impulses.