Simulated Assault

Simulated Crime #2

by Donald Hanley

Who is the Southside Angel? A young woman lies in a coma. The only witness to what happened is an Angel, a simulated human, but she is behaving erratically and has gone into hiding without revealing what she knows. With no other leads to go on, the authorities call in the only person with experience dealing with rogue Detective Jennia Bennett. It seems like a hopeless task. How can Jen possibly locate a holographic simulation of a woman who doesn’t leave traces and doesn’t want to be found? Digging into the victim’s past, however, Jen finds clues pointing to a popular actress, a failed research project that was canceled thirty years before, and a series of shipments from the Martian colonies. But what do any of these things have to do with the assault that left the woman on the edge of death? Determined to track down the missing Angel and discover the identity of the assailant, Jen searches for the thread that ties the pieces together. Jen’s best friend Elise is obsessed with helping an orphaned Angel find a new home, and Jen herself is distracted by the Metro officer assigned to the case, Christopher Wolf. When Jen gets too close to the truth, however, Elise and Wolf must rush to rescue her, before she becomes the next victim.

341 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 5, 2014