Death in the Snow — Richard Martin Stern

MONEY.
IT'S HOTTER THAN SEX, COLDER THAN A CORPSE...

In a small town like Santo Cristo there are no coincidences. So when a collector for an East Coast syndicate gets ice-picked in a porn house, Detective Johnny Ortiz takes a look around. What he finds is three junkies dead from poisoned heroin, and a land grabber with five million dollars in his eyes. It's a picture the half-Apache cop doesn't like to see in the land of his ancestors...

On his side Ortiz has his bright and beautiful lady, Cassie Enright; a hard-nosed federal agent who knows the sleazy turf; and a double-dealing crime boss out to save his own neck. But big-city corruption is blowing Santo Cristo apart, and Ortiz is twitching a handful of loose ends to see who jumps. It's a waiting game of split-second timing--until a killer gets Cassie at the point of a gun.