Overnight Delivery - kindle ebook by Nathan Birr


Two cases. One day. No worries.

At least that’s how California private investigator Jackson Douglas sees it. After all, the cases are simple and his plan of sleeping the day away is already shot. Plus, he could use a distraction from the tragedy for which this day—his 30th birthday—serves as a reminder.

Jackson’s morning begins when his neighbor Connie asks him to ensure that her visiting niece’s potential date, Landon, is suitable (enough) for her. Then a cute but ditzy valley girl named Shay wants protection from unknown forces while she delivers wooden idols in her brother’s place. Although a little dubious, Jackson takes both cases and goes to work.

He splits his morning and afternoon between the two cases, doing his due diligence on Landon (he’s a bit of a playboy, but a nice enough guy) and accompanying Shay on a pair of deliveries to posh L.A. neighborhoods. He also squeezes in lunch with Maggie, his casual girlfriend and a reporter with the Los Angeles Times, who helps him with his research. Throughout the day, including dinner with his grandpa Leroy and dessert with Sam, another casual girlfriend, he can’t shake the feeling that something isn’t quite right. Is it Shay? Her story? The odd recipients of the deliveries? The nagging keeps growing louder, but it doesn’t get any clearer.

All that changes when Jackson returns to his place to meet Shay and finds evidence that she has been kidnapped. Realizing her fears weren’t irrational after all, he tracks her to a warehouse where she’s being held by a local gang. Although Jackson is able to rescue her, he does so at great expense. By now he’s in too deep to get out, even when Shay reveals the whole truth to him.

Relying on his friends Mouse and Reggie, Jackson embarks on a night-long chase across Los Angeles, risking his life while trying to fix Shay’s mess. He finds himself in the heart of a decade-old gang rivalry and forced to cross lines that cannot be uncrossed. With Shay’s life in danger again, Jackson pulls every string he can find, enlisting Maggie, Sam, and Leroy’s help. Only when he figures out there’s a link between his two cases is Jackson in position to save the day. But to do so, he’ll have to survive a showdown with a gang leader while everyone’s life hangs in the balance.