Joan Merriam

A Just Reckoning Joan Merriam

Slicing into the poisonous underbelly of the global sex trade, prize-winning investigative journalist Tess Alexander finds herself catapulted into an unspeakable world that she barely knew existed. It also puts a target on her back.




Driven by a tragedy in her own past to hunt down and expose the worst of human corruption and brutality, this isn't the first time Tess's work has put her in danger--but this new investigation places her in far worse peril than anything she's faced before.




It begins after she meets Ekaterina Voitenko, who as a small child living alog the Black Sea cost of Crimea, was kidnapped and sold into decades of sex slavery. After hearing Ekaterina's appalling story, Tess becomes determined to unmask the ruthless criminals behind the international sex trafficking ring that enslaved the young woman, and so many others.




Her search for the ringleaders behind the conspiracy drives her thousands of miles from the safety of her northern California home to the streets and alleyways of Ukraine, Crimea, Great Britain, and then back to the U. S.




During the course of her investigation--and with the help of a collection of characters that includes a Ukrainian revolutionary, an officer with London's Metropolitan Police Department, and one of the leaders of a transnational organization dedicated to rescuing victims of the sex trade--Tess uncovers the sinister extent of the trafficking operation, and almost pays with her life.