Ronan Marino's life was going to be a piece of cake after he won the biggest jackpot in the history of the California lottery and left behind a successful career as a Special Agent with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations. He was finally done with long deployments to not so exotic locales and meeting new and exciting people who wanted nothing more than to kill him. After years of war, numerous undercover ops and a bad divorce, he thought he was headed for easy street. He couldn't have been more wrong. Moving back to his boyhood home in Lowell, Massachusetts (best known for Jack Kerouac and boxer Mickey Ward of "The Fighter" fame) he planned to do nothing more than meet the girl of his dreams, start a family, play in a crappy bar band and work on his extensive comic book collection. Life was going to be nothing but peace and relaxation. When his new girlfriend is found dead in the cold waters of the Merrimack River however, Ronan's plans are shattered and he finds himself right back in the line of fire. Believing her death to be a murder, he begins to investigate and discovers she had a dark secret; one that powerful men on both sides of the law are desperate to remain hidden. Calling on his mob enforcer cousin for backup, Ronan dives headfirst into places where even angels fear to tread; committed to finding who took his girlfriend's life even at the cost of his own.