Cut and Run » (Reprint)

Whether it's crime thrillers for adults or adventure stories for young readers, bestselling author Ridley Pearson brings imagination, suspense, and an impeccable eye for detail to all his award-winning fiction.

Six years ago, witness protection marshal Roland Larson did the unthinkable: he fell in love with a protected witness, Hope Stevens, whose testimony was to put away prominent members of the Romero crime family. When Hope's plan to “cut and run” is interrupted by both the government and the mob, she disappears into a new identity, taking with her not only her testimony but a secret never shared with Larson.

Larson, who has been looking for her ever since, is put back on her trail when the Romeros intercept the master WITSEC list from the Justice Department and Hope is believed among the first protected witnesses to be targeted for execution.

In a series of terrifying encounters, Larson matches wits with a brutally ingenious killer whose sole target is Hope Stevens. For Larson, the stakes couldn’t be higher - he must find Hope in order to protect her, and simultaneously prevent the mob from auctioning off the master witness protection list - an act that will put seven thousand innocent, and not-so-innocent, lives in jeopardy.

Taut and edge-of-the-seat compelling, Cut and Run is a unique thriller that skillfully blends romance and suspense - Ridley Pearson at his heart-pounding best.

The New York Times - Michael Agger

Sure, the heroine's Blackberry will chime at precisely the wrong moment, but we know that in the end the killer will be caught, that justice will be served, and that the hero will arrange it so that the little girl gets the dog she wanted. Every so often, the reader gets what he or she wants too: a little comfort food for the mind.