Walking Dead (Atticus Kodiak, Book 7)

Atticus Kodiak knows where people go to hide. That’s why he and Alena Cizkova have come to a secluded Georgian town in the former U.S.S.R. What he doesn’t know is what his friend and neighbor Bakhar Lagidze was hiding from. Bakhar and his entire family have been viciously murdered—all except for Lagidze’s fourteen-year-old daughter, whose nightmare is just beginning. To rescue her, Atticus must enter a lethal web that stretches from Russia to Istanbul, from Dubai to Las Vegas, and into the very heart of evil. But what troubles Atticus the most is that Alena, once one of the world’s most fearless assassins, is clearly terrified of what Atticus will uncover—and what he’ll become when he does.

Publishers Weekly

In Rucka's adrenaline-filled seventh novel to feature ex-bodyguard Atticus Kodika (after Patriot Acts), Atticus and his ex-assassin lover, Alena Cizkova, are living under assumed names in the remote town of Kobuleti in the Republic of Georgia. When the family of their next-door neighbor, Bakhar Lagidze, is slaughtered and Bakhar's 14-year-old daughter, Tiasa, is kidnapped, Atticus vows to do anything to get her back. After discovering Tiasa was sold to pay off her father's debt, Atticus reluctantly immerses himself in the seedy world of human trafficking, which takes him across Eastern Europe to Nevada, with stops in Dubai and Amsterdam along the way. When the men he's chasing target Alena for retribution, she too goes on the run, with help from an unlikely source: hard-nosed New York PI-and Atticus's ex-lover-Bridgett Logan, last seen in Critical Space. Series fans who have come to expect a nonstop thrill ride with a topical angle won't be disappointed. (May)