WHO'S NEXT?

 4 stars out of 5

This is the second in the series featuring Detective Dan

Lockhart and psychologist Lexi Green, and for the two of them, it's pretty much same old, same old. Lockhart is still wrestling with bouts of PTSD and with finding the beloved wife who disappeared 11 years ago. Green is still being largely ignored by the police department even though her profiling expertise has helped them solve cases, and for the most part ignored by Lockhart as well.

The plot involves two scenarios, the first of which is the gruesome murder of a well-known man in Wimbledon; the other is an attacker of women at bus stops. For the most part, Lockhart concentrates on the former, where the only clue seems to be a strange mark on the victim's neck, while colleague Max Smith follows up on the latter. Lockhart calls on help from Green, but he's called to task for doing so by his boss so has to solicit her advice on the sly (after which he seems to consider her persona non grata, making me wonder why in the heck she keeps going back for more, especially when she's spending hours working for Lockhart but not getting paid a dime). If there's supposed to be any sort of romantic "connection" between Lockhart and Green, I didn't feel it in the first book - nor did I in this one. 

At any rate, two chases are on, with Lockhart inserting a third as he continues to be hung up on finding the wife that her brother and parents insist is long since dead. Green, smarting from being shut out of the police investigation, decides to go off on her own (quick: get her in a cozy mystery series - she's a perfect fit for the typical never-listen-to-reason heroine). Everything comes together nicely in the end (well, except maybe for Lockhart and Green). A cliffhanger, paves the way for the next book, which came as a surprise mostly because it made me wonder why what happens didn't happen years ago. Of the two books in the series so far, I enjoyed the first one a bit more, but this one makes a more-than-decent follow-up. Thanks to the publisher, via NetGalley, for the opportunity to read and review a pre-release copy.

Who's Next? by Chris Merritt (Bookouture, September 2020); 449 pp.