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New York Times bestselling author Saron Sala has written more than sixty-five books that regularly hit all the bestseller lists. Her emotionally charged stories are about ordinary people whose experiences are often larger than life.

She was born and raised in rural Oklahoma and still calls the state her home. Being with her family is her ultimate joy, although her life has changed drastically from when she made her first sale to the way it is now. Sharon claims it is her greatest satisfaction to create her stories, then share them with people who love to read.

Also by Sharon Sala

THE CHOSEN

MIMOSA GROVE

THE PERFECT LIE

WHITE MOUNTAIN

STORM WARNING

THE RETURN

BLOODLINES

THE SURVIVORS

SHARON SALA

NINE LIVES

For Bobby

You taught me how to enjoy life to the fullest.

Now I’m having to learn how to live it

without you.

One

It was December in Dallas, Texas.

Cat Dupree hated winter and all that came with it. The weather made for miserable stakeouts, although stakeouts were a part of a bounty hunter’s life. The time of year only added to the chip she carried on her shoulder and reminded her of all she’d lost.

When she was six, she and her mother had been shopping for groceries when they’d been hit by a drunk driver. It had killed her mother instantly and put Cat in the hospital for days. When she was finally dismissed, her mother’s funeral was over, and she and her father were on their own.

Over the years, she learned to adjust, and she and her father grew closer. Then, just before her thirteenth birthday, and only days before she and her father were planning to leave on vacation, a man with a tattooed face broke into their house, stabbed her father and cut her throat, leaving her unable to scream as she watched him die.

After that, the Texas Social Services system finished the raising of Catherine Dupree, during which time she’d acquired the nickname Cat.

Being a bounty hunter had been a job she’d thought about during those long years. What better way to find her father’s killer than to work in his world? At eighteen, she’d aged out of the system, then, two months later, gone to work for a bail-bondsman named Art Ball.

Art had been taken with the dark-haired, leggy teenager, and hired her to file and deliver papers to the courthouse, even though he hadn’t needed the extra help. But, he would say later, it was the smartest thing he’d ever done. By the time she turned twenty-one, she had a black belt in Karate, was licensed to carry a firearm and had gone through several kinds of schooling to learn private investigation techniques, as well as the ins and outs of bringing home bail jumpers.

Also during that time, she began accumulating mug shots of perps with tattoos on their faces in hopes of finding her father’s killer. She’d been looking for him ever since, and often thought it strange that a man with such markings was so difficult to find. Logically, one would have assumed that a man with the equivalent of a road map on his face should stand out in any crowd.