The Diabolical

Book 11

Bruno Johnson is a wanted fugitive—and unless he helps the Costa Rican police, they’re turning him in.

Ex-cop, ex-con Bruno Johnson is hiding from US law enforcement in Costa Rica with his wife, Marie, and the twelve children they rescued from toxic homes in south central Los Angeles. Bruno works at the Lido Cabana Bar at the Punta Bandera Hotel, and his friend, Karl Drago, is getting married on the beach right outside. After the festivities, Bruno and Marie go skinny dipping in the ocean, but they’re quickly interrupted by a visit from law enforcement.

A shooting has just occurred at El Gato Gordo nightclub, and the victim is a prominent local figure and Bruno’s close friend. The chief of police asks Bruno to help investigate, but the stakes are higher than ever—if Bruno doesn’t find the shooter, the chief will turn him over to US authorities.

Everything is complicated further when Bruno becomes a victim of a crime himself, realizing that someone else may be after him. Bruno has to juggle the police investigation with figuring out who’s targeting him—if he drops the ball, it might be the last thing he ever does.

The Scorned

Book 10

Ex-cop, ex-con Bruno Johnson stumbles into a criminal organization that exploits women and children—he must fight his way out and home.

Bruno Johnson is hiding out from the U.S. law in Costa Rica with his pregnant wife, Marie, and the ten kids they rescued from toxic homes in South Central Los Angeles. When Marie encounters a difficult labor and delivery, their good friend Dr. Vargas rescues both her and Bruno’s infant son. So Bruno feels indebted when asked to escort his daughter Layla, a college student in Los Angeles, back home to Costa Rica.

When Bruno arrives in Los Angeles, he finds the problem with Layla is complicated and dire. Layla has fallen in with Johnny, the leader of a vast and notorious criminal empire that exploits women and children. She says she’s had his child and that he has taken the baby.

Bruno enlists the help of his old friend Karl Drago—and his dog, Waldo—to aid in his search for Layla’s baby—a baby her parents disavow. Bruno soon discovers things aren’t as they appear, but he will stop at nothing to save the innocent baby and return to his family and newborn son in Costa Rica—providing he can evade capture while on U.S. soil.

The Sinister

Book 9

Publishers Weekly Starred Review

Bruno Johnson, shaken to his core, but still a formidable force—unrelenting when it comes to saving a child.

Ex-cop, ex-con Bruno Johnson and his wife Marie hide in plain sight from the law in an upscale L.A. hotel as Bruno heals from a run-in with a brutal outlaw motorcycle gang—and the loss of his son—a son he didn’t know he had until it was too late.

Marie, now pregnant with her first child, fears Bruno may never fully recover. She knows that soon they must return to Costa Rica to rejoin their large family of rescued children—kids who owe their lives to Bruno and Marie’s intervention.

But when Bruno’s friend, FBI Deputy Director, Dan Chulack, pleads with Bruno to help rescue his kidnapped granddaughter, escape plans are put on hold. After exhausting all legitimate investigative avenues, Chulack seeks Bruno’s brand of justice. With Marie’s reluctant consent and her own special expertise, they plunge into the evil world of those who prey on children.

Meanwhile, Bruno’s mother, a woman he has never known, appears asking for forgiveness—and Bruno’s assistance—while bringing her own set of complications. Bruno finds his professional and his personal lives colliding in a pursuit that is excruciating and brutal.

The Ruthless

Book 8

Bruno Johnson, shaken to his core, but still a formidable force—an unrelenting focus on doing the right thing—unwilling to let anyone or anything stand in his way.

Pushed to his emotional limit, Los Angeles County Sheriff Deputy Bruno Johnson struggles to hold his family together while immersed in his unrelenting career. His daughter, Olivia, is a teen mom to twin toddlers; her common-law husband, Derek Sams, is a thug; and one of their little boys has disappeared under his care.

The overwhelming intensity demanded of Bruno on this personal level is compounded by the brutal shotgun murder of a superior court judge and his wife, both friends of his. Bruno cannot ignore these violent crimes even though he’s supposedly off the law enforcement grid—undercover—working an illegal gun sting.

Tragedy strikes Bruno’s life on all fronts: family, friends, and professional—however, none of these colossal forces can match the unthinkable catastrophe that will forever dominate Bruno’s life.

The Heartless

Book 7

Tough deputy Bruno Johnson can handle violent criminals, but his biggest challenge—his teenage daughter, who’s fallen hard for a street thug.

Former LA County Deputy Bruno Johnson is now a bailiff in the courts having stepped down from his role on the Violent Crimes Team to spend more time with his daughter, Olivia. Bruno fears his job decision may have come too late when he gets a frantic call to extricate Olivia from a gunpoint situation in a LA gang-infested neighborhood. His desperation escalates when he realizes Louis Barkow, a stone-cold killer awaiting trial, had orchestrated that deadly tableau.

When Barkow and three other criminals break out of jail and hit the streets, Bruno is plunged back into violent crime mode. Now, the agenda is personal—Olivia has become a pawn in the desperate chase of this sinister murderer.

The walls are caving in on Bruno as violence escalates in his hunt for Barkow and his heart strings are stretched to the breaking point as he struggles to protect his daughter not only from the criminal violence swirling around them, but from Olivia’s own impetuous life choices.

The Reckless

Book 6

Bruno Johnson, a young and inexperienced LA County Deputy Sheriff, is trying to balance his life as the single father of a four-year-old daughter and his responsibilities as a cop in the Violent Crimes Unit. When he and his impetuous partner Ned Kiefer are put on loan to the FBI to help out with a “special problem,” Bruno finds himself in a real bind.

The FBI hands Bruno and Ned a case that the Bureau prefers not to touch—a group of teenage criminals that are being run by a nefarious criminal known as the Darkman. Bruno discovers the identity of the Darkman and is stunned to realize that he is the perpetrator from a lingering unsolved case—a triple homicide that continues to haunt Bruno.

The problem is how to stop the juvenile criminals without killing kids, and at the same time, avoid being killed by the kids—or by the Darkman—and keep his reckless partner Ned under control.

The Innocents

Book 5

The Early Years: Book One

Bruno Johnson, a newly minted L.A. County Sheriff Violent Crimes detective, gets the worst assignment possible—infiltrate a sheriff’s narcotics team that may be involved in murder for hire. Gain their trust and be brought into the scheme. If he succeeds, he will have to arrest and testify against his fellow deputies—if he lives that long.

To make matters worse, before Bruno leaves home on the first day of this assignment, he answers the door to find an ex-girlfriend. Without explanation, she hands him a baby girl only weeks old. The child is his. Stunned and terrified, he now faces immediate fatherhood as well as the traitor-like charge to take down his colleagues.

Juggling his complex home life, Bruno tackles his assignment to discover that no one is who they seem to be and that his boss, Lieutenant Wicks, might be involved. His mission is further complicated when an attractive female deputy, recently transferred from Public Affairs, is also put on the case. She has no street experience, and Bruno carries the extra burden of watching her back—a tough assignment made tougher by personal attraction.

As Bruno gets deeper and deeper into the corruption, he doesn’t know whom to trust, and in the end, confides in the wrong person.

The Vanquished

Book 4

Former cop and ex-con Bruno Johnson and his wife Marie, living in their safe haven in Costa Rica with the children they illegally rescued from certain death, find a message from their outlaw motorcycle gang enemies—written on the back of one of their beloved children.

The motorcycle gang, Sons of Satan, out for revenge, will stop at nothing to lure the now furious Bruno back into their web. Bruno and Marie, forced to return to Southern California, battle additional demons in the form of an ex-spouse’s entanglements.

The FBI, watching the Sons of Satan, recognizes Bruno’s unique skills and ties. They recruit him to recover a stolen military drone armed with Hellfire missiles, while Bruno struggles to keep pregnant Marie out of the crossfire. Ultimately, Bruno’s inability to ignore a woman in peril yields unspeakable consequences.

The Squandered

Book 3

Can Bruno ignore his inmate brother’s plea? Not if children are at risk.

The Squandered propels Bruno into an emotionally charged high-speed chase as he and Marie leave their rescued kids in Costa Rica and risk returning to the U.S. at the request of Bruno’s terminally ill father. Bruno’s estranged and incarcerated brother needs Bruno to help rescue his abducted young grandchildren—children that Bruno didn’t know existed.

Bruno cannot deny his father, and Marie will not let Bruno go alone. As fugitives, they return to the U.S. to face not only imminent arrest, but also to confront ruthless kidnappers, drug dealers, and government agents who will stop at nothing to keep a secret from the past buried forever.

Glimpses of Bruno’s law enforcement past shed light on the mayhem they encounter once they are discovered in L.A. It seems that Bruno’s brother, Noble, has inadvertently kicked a hornet’s nest of criminals, both in and out of prison, and among various law enforcement agencies looking to find a long missing load of nine million dollars’ worth of cocaine. And Noble’s grandchildren are caught in the crosshairs.

The chase, the brutality, and the emotional stress tests Bruno and Marie’s relationship and forces them to define family—what’s okay to forgive, and what should never be forgotten. Armed with a new moral code, will they live long enough to put it into practice?

The Replacements

Book 2

Finalist for the T. Jefferson Parker Mystery award
Finalist for the USA Best Book Award, Thriller category
number one on Amazon in Mystery, Thriller and Suspense

Bruno Johnson, ex-detective with Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and an ex-convict, is hiding out from the FBI in Costa Rica, tending bar to support eight children he illegally rescued from abusive homes.

Partway through a normal day, Barbara Wicks, a former colleague and the chief of police for Montclair, California, walks into his bar. Bruno is shocked to the core. Is she there to arrest him and take him back to California? Turns out she’s there to request Bruno’s help—two children have been kidnapped.

The kidnapper, Jonas Mabry, was himself a victim whom Bruno rescued as a small child. Now Mabry demands a fool’s retribution—a million-dollar ransom and that Bruno must put his own life on the line to secure the money.

In this twisted turn of fate, Bruno returns to California as a wanted criminal. Despite the risk of arrest and jeopardizing his life, he cannot turn his back on these kids.

The Disposables

Book 1

Finalist for the T. Jefferson Parker Mystery award
Finalist for the USA Best Book Award, Thriller category
number one on Amazon in Mystery, Thriller and Suspense

Ex-cop, ex-con, committed vigilante… with a soft spot for kids.

Bruno Johnson, a tough street cop, member of the elite violent crimes task force, feared by the bad guys, admired by the good, finds his life derailed when a personal tragedy forces him to break the law. Now he’s an ex-con and his life on parole is not going well. He is hassled by the police at every opportunity, and to make matters even more difficult, his former partner, Robby Wicks, now a high-ranking detective, bullies him into helping solve a high profile crime—unofficially, of course.

Bruno’s girlfriend, Marie, brings out the good, the real Bruno, and even though they veer totally outside the law, he and Marie dedicate themselves to saving abused children, creating a type of underground railroad for neglected kids at risk, disposable kids.

Caught between police brutality, the demands of his rogue ex-partner, and the precarious circumstances of the children, Bruno is forced into a brutality of his own as he pulls out every stop to save these children from a warped system of justice.